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| This picture from Safya's house just makes me so happy. Safya is standing in front of the blackboard,reading aloud the new topic, she was a teacher in our first session. |
This is the article I sent to the national newspaper about my experience at PHC:
144 uneducated, marginalized women empowered, 13 others
made into community leaders.
In April 2016 I was interviewed by Talloires Network for
the MacJannet Prize for our work in Sikanderabad,
the squatter settlement
behind Ziauddin University. Talloires Network is an international association of different institutions who encourage university students around the globe to be actively involved in their community. The secretariat of Talloires Network is based in Tufts University, USA. MacJannet Prize recognizes exceptional member universities of Talloires Network and awards them a monetary prize to aid them in their work.
Our Director of Students
Affairs, Mr. Raza Abbas registered us for Talloires Network. Out of 47 original
nominations 10 were selected for the second round which was followed by
interviews of each member organization. My Skype interview was supposed to last
for 15 minutes but by the time I was done talking to the wonderful interviewer
it was past 50 minutes. There was so much to say. I had been involved with
Siaknderabad since my first year at Ziauddin. KaraHealth Welfare Organization
was a student run organization that held health awareness camps in the area and
I joined them. In my fourth year of med school, I was chosen to be the
president of the society and I decided to focus all my energy on this area. All
the fundraisers that we conducted were mainly to pay for the medical and
surgical bills of these patients for treatments at tertiary care hospitals. I
had an amazing group of juniors with me and we did regular awareness camps on
hygiene and preventable diseases including TB, hepatitis, polio, malaria,
typhoid and dengue among others and called in my friends from dental schools to
do sessions on oral hygiene. Having no gap between pregnancies, most children
in the area grow up without a childhood. We started weekly art sessions for the
kids to go wild in art and imagination. We provided sewing machines, monthly
groceries, school fee, rent money and money for surgeries and rehab to all
those who were needy. KaraHealth is not functional anymore but the students are
still very much involved with the community. There was always something more
that we wanted to do but we were limited because of our funds. There were so
many more people to help and personally I wanted to give them something that
stayed with them and made them self-sufficient. This is where the MacJannet
Prize came in. We were awarded the second prize of $5000 in June 2016. This had
been the stimulus we needed at Sikanderabad.
Glushan-e-Sikanderabad, home
to 130,000 residents from all ethnicities of Pakistan, including thousands of
Afghan refugees, is the place of poorest of the poor who moved to the
metropolis in hopes of a better life. The average number of children per house
is 7 and the families on average, earn less than Rs.10,000 a month. Two sides
of the settlement are bordered by huge water bodies of sewage and the houses
with electricity face about 8 hours of power cuts a day and since there is no
water supply, the residents have to purchase water from hydrants daily.
Since 1996, Ziauddin
University has provided medical consultation and medicines for minimal fee at
the Primary Healthcare Center built in the area. The department of Family
Medicine, that runs under the supervision of Dr Jawaid Usman, conducts clinics
and ensures all children are vaccinated based on WHO’s Expanded Program of
Immunization. Free of cost medicines are provided for TB, hepatitis C and
asthma. Besides health related work, the center has also held computer classes
and sewing courses for women to train them to become financially independent.
We knew that to help the
women stand up for themselves and take control of their lives they needed
education and there was no school for older women in the area. Because of the
MacJannet Prize we were able to open five different schools for 2 hours a day
which ran simultaneously in 5 different blocks. We started with Urdu and
Mathematics so that the women could at least be equipped to do their daily work
efficiently. The curriculum we used is specially designed by Jugnoo for people
who have never attended school. After learning for just two hours a day for 90
days the students are able to read Urdu newspaper, write a letter and do
everyday math. For the first session we identified in the neighborhood and from
the patients who came to PHC, five women who had at least completed their
matriculation. We then asked them if they had an open space in their homes
where they could conduct the daily classes. Their houses were inspected and the
family members were informed of the program and the plan. We could have hired
teachers from other schools or the university studnets could have taught them
but our plan was to keep it completely community oriented and to encourage them
to stand up for themselves. In the past we have noted that some of our plans
could not be implemented as they seemed too foreign and the residents could not
relate to the teacher/organizer and always saw them as an outsider who was
unaware of their background and cultural limitations. The university students
then visited them for regular guidance. Each teacher was paid Rs 5000 per month
and held classes for 2 hours daily. The women coming to the classes were above
15 years of age and most of them had never even held a pencil in their hands
before. At the beginning of the session each student was given a school bag,
books and stationery. Each school was given an attendance register, mats, black
board, fan, dustbins and watercoolers for their sessions.
In the time since then two
sessions have graduated and third one starts in August. Our initial plan was to
have fifteen students per school and have the session run for six months. Due
to unforeseen reasons schools have run longer and few students did not continue
their studies. The first session ran for eight months and the second for seven
months. We have certified 144 women who cleared the post session exam. Those
who did not take the exam or failed it were advised to join the session again.
13 fine teachers have lead these eager women to the gates of knowledge. Our
youngest student was 15 and the oldest was 70.
I wanted to know why they
never went to school when they were young. One of them said back in their
village only boys could attend school and it has been the way since. Another
said she go did go to the school but her father was let go from work so they
let her brother finish his education while she did household chores so the
mother could go out and work. Another one of them said their father let them go
to madrassah but thought we would be corrupted by attending school. What is
commendable now is that they are doing their best to send their own children to
school. They were all so grateful that they could attend school for free now
and that too so close to their homes and for a few hours so that their daily
chores could still be finished. Women who had no one else at home brought their
babies along and we encouraged that so they could still attend classes. This
was the first time most of them were doing something for themselves and it was
all new for them and we tried to accommodate them in every way. We have also
had a lot of pregnant ladies attending school and I felt they were the keenest
to grasp classwork before their due dates.
We met with the ladies
weekly and they are all exceptional women who had to fight the society barriers
and some had to overcome family resistance to seek basic education and now they
are on the mission to impart it to others.
Safiya who is forty years
old was the teacher in one of the schools in the first session. According to
her it felt like a party every day at her house and she wishes she could
continue teaching. Twenty women started coming to her house from her lane and
she did it as she wanted her neighbors to become more aware of their
surroundings and learn new things. She said she felt proudest when her students
graduated and now they are texting her and taking care of their expenses on
their own. Her fond memory is of her student Zahida who was thirty five years
old and came from a different block every day and was keen to be called to the
blackboard and when she got it right she would dance on her way back to where
she was sitting. Safya informed me that earlier when she used to visit her 50
year old neighbor Nasreen she would only be slicing onions and it made her so
happy that when she visited her yesterday she was holding a pen and writing
about how much she spent when she bought onions and potatoes that day.
Shakira, a twenty five year
old fierce student had always been my favorite. She had attended school in the
village before she got married at 13 years of age but could not continue her
studies when she came to the city. She told me she could not read properly
earlier but because of attending the session she now can read newspapers daily.
Cooking recipes are her favorite now which she tries on special occasions for
her family. Her husband who is a mechanic also looks for old cook cooks at the
hawker and gets them for her.
Jantaba, a 30 year old
student told me how she used to set up a small stall outside her house to sell
chips and candies. On most days she would end up losing profit as she could not
subtract properly and would end up returning extra change. Now she can subtract
properly whenever someone hands her Rs. 100 and she is making profit now. The
best thing according to her is that she can read the rates when she goes to buy
chicken at the store.
Another 40 year old teacher
Mudassir told us that she was proudest of her student Fozia who could not see
or hear as well as other students but had the most determination and surprised
her when she cleared the session with the best marks.
Nimrah and Ayesha, the
sisters who ran the school together in block 2 said most of the students that
graduated from the classes are interested in coming back for a higher level
curriculum now. She said it made her very happy that her neighbor told her that
she exchanged the box of medicine at the pharmacy which was expired and asked
the shopkeeper to give them the right medicine. Another success story for them
is their neighbor Fatima who was not allowed to attend school there initially.
She insisted and her family eventually let her and now the family is seeing how
much it helped her in a few months that they are sending the rest of the
children in the family to school now.
Another 16 year old student
said that now her father allows her mother and her to go to shopping without
him as she can read the bus numbers now and knows which buses to take on the
way.
The backbone of the entire
program is the 32 year old Shehla Baji who is from the area and an employee of
the Family Medicine department at PHC for more than fifteen years. To me she is
a Super Human and I am so grateful that she is my friend. She has a killer work
attitude and no one matches her drive to improve the community around her. She
came from Kohat with her family members and has seen very tough financial
times, including the time when her family was eating one good meal a week.
Since she was educated she started teaching the children in her lane. After her
son was born with cerebral palsy she was often at the clinic to get him
assessed. When she heard there was an opening at PHC for a woman from
Sikanderabad, she immediately signed up to learn more for her son and to help
her community members. Since we set up the schools, she was in charge of their
smooth running. Each day after winding up morning clinic work from PHC around
10 am she visits two different schools, one nearby, and the other a block far
away. There she checks attendance, asks the teacher if they are having any
problems, then she asks the teachers to leave for a while and asks the students
if they are having any problems with the teacher. She says initially the women
were very shy and could not hold the pencil properly but as the days went by
and she asked them to come to the blackboard to write the answer, they have
become much more confident. Not only does she teach them about the daily course
work, she even has discussions on how to cross the road, how to cook different
foods and basic humanity etiquettes. In the afternoon Shehla Baji is back at
PHC ensuring that the school, sewing class and computer class is run smoothly.
Out of all the teachers, her favorite Teacher is Ayesha who according to her
went beyond her course work and taught the ladies extra stuff and even few
lessons in English.
Shehla Baji says this prize
has helped her fulfil the dream of providing education to those who had no
access to it and she will forever be grateful for it. A lot of university
students join her for various sessions to these schools where they talk about
health and hygiene and tips for disease prevention. Most students also chip in
money to pay school fees of children enrolled in the private schools in
Siaknderabad. Even for the hygiene camps, they take in soaps and toothpastes
for distributions.
I conduct sessions at PHC on
health topics and I am so grateful that they are taking control of their health
and suggest me topics about which they want to know more about. Among our major
sessions were those from the CompassionIt.com curriculum from Sara Schairer,
visit by Nusrat Hidayatullah from 42 Day Challenge and Skype session with Zain
Maken, a teacher from Teach for Pakistan in Islamabad.
The MacJannet prize money
has ended but we have anonymous donors funding the program now so that the
mission keeps on going. What has started off as a much step in the right
direction will continue to create ripples and impact more women. Educating one
woman and informing her about healthy habits means one family will face less
disease burden and live better consciously.
Like Shehla Baji we all our incredibly grateful to
Talloires Network for encouraging us to do more in the community. And as she
says “I do not understand a person who eats three full meals a day and fails to
notice that their neighbor is hungry since the morning”. She hopes that people
stop living in their bubbles and take a moment to look around them, there are
always people around who need help but are shy to ask for it.
By Zainab Faiza