What's Woody Doing Now

Attending the BUV Fundraising Event

In Crawfordsville, six churches are joining together to purchase a BUV for the Congo Water Project. Thanks to First Church of the Nazarene, First Christian Church, First Methodist Church, Christ Lutheran Church, St John's Episcopal Church, and Wabash Avenue Presbyterian Church,

Women Coming to the Aid of Women

Here's an interesting article of four (American) women working to empower (impoverished) women.  A brief summary of one woman is below. 

The article was written by Nick Kristof, a NY Times columnist and co-author of “Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity for Women Worldwide”, with his wife, Sheryl WuDunn. 

The D.I.Y. Foreign-Aid Revolution - NYTimes.com.

[Elizabeth] Scharpf is a mild-mannered policy wonk, but the more she thought about it [lack of affordable sanitary napkins], the more indignant she became. Girls were missing school because they couldn’t afford sanitary pads? Women couldn’t go to work for lack of pads? And all this was taboo to discuss? Scharpf began to scheme.

And so Scharpf joined a revolution, so far unnamed because it is just beginning. It’s all about what might be called Do-It-Yourself Foreign Aid, because it starts with the proposition that it’s not only presidents and United Nations officials who chip away at global challenges. Passionate individuals with great ideas can do the same, especially in the age of the Internet and social media.

I became interested in such figures while writing a book with my wife, Sheryl WuDunn, about educating and empowering women as a solution to many of the world’s problems. We ran into extraordinary men, like Muhammad Yunus of Grameen Bank, who pioneered microfinance in Bangladesh. Or Bill Drayton, an American who is a godfather of entrepreneurs working for social change and who now runs a group called Ashoka to support them. Or Greg Mortenson, whose struggles to build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan are chronicled in “Three Cups of Tea.”

But it struck us that women in particular were finding creative ways to help the world’s most vulnerable people, many of them also women.

Children Should Carry Books, Not Water

Yes, Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) is essential to achieve universal education and to end extreme poverty.

Here's a Press Release from John Sauer, Water Advocates.

 

Children Should Carry Books, Not Water

 

U.S. Raising Clean Hands Campaign Launched: WASH (WAter, Sanitation and Hygiene)

Is Essential to Achieve Universal Education

 

October 13, (Washington, DC) – Nathan Strauss, 17, a student at Abington Senior High School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is part of a growing movement of America’s youth who are stepping up to make a change in the lives of the students around the world who are carrying water and not books.

 

Even for those children that have the opportunity to go to school, students lose 443 million school days each year due to diseases associated with the lack of water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). Repeated episodes of diarrhea and worm infestations diminish a child’s ability to learn and impair cognitive development. This problem is exacerbated by the more than half of all schools in developing countries that lack adequate WASH facilities.

 

“I had no idea of the magnitude of the issue and I was shocked to find out the severity of the crisis and the number of students like me across the world that still don’t even have a toilet at their school. Doing something about this has become a really big deal for me,” said Nathan Strauss. “I think America’s youth has great potential to do something about this problem; if everyone gets taught the issue, we can all help. Imagine if all the students in America were a part of this; the change would be enormous,” he continued.

 

Nathan is not alone. Nearly 30 organizations launched a campaign in the United States today at an event at AED to demonstrate that providing water, sanitation and hygiene education in schools globally can help solve the WASH and education challenge around the world. Through this campaign, and an exhibit called “Bathroom Pass,” these organizations highlight the solutions they are currently implementing and urge the U.S. Government, the World Bank, and other actors in the education and health sectors to bring WASH to schools in the developing world.

 

U.S. Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Maria Otero stressed, “The bottom line is this: if we are serious about improving child health, achieving universal primary education, ensuring gender equity and stimulating economic development, we need to be serious about providing safe water, sanitation and hygiene in schools.” She emphasized the important role of students, like Nathan, to participate in service learning projects that help them engage in concrete actions to help others around the world. Earlier this year on World Water Day, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton emphasized that global water issues would be a priority for the U.S. Government.

 

Other speakers who highlighted the need to act included Carol Bellamy (Education for All - Fast Track Initiative), Clarissa Brocklehurst (UNICEF), Jack Downey (AED) and Denise Knight (The Coca-Cola Company). Jon Hamilton of NPR served as the moderator.

 

Nathan took action by helping to start a club through H2O for Life to raise funds to help schools in developing countries; the money is used to improve access to clean water, build toilets and handwashing stations, and provide hygiene education. So far 120,000 students across the U.S. have participated in H2O for Life service learning programs. Nathan’s story is highlighted in the “Bathroom Pass” exhibit, as are the stories of three students from Honduras, Madagascar and Nepal.

 

As a part of this campaign the organizers are challenging you to:

• Live for one day on the global minimum standard for water—approximately 5 gallons per person per day for drinking, cooking and bathing.

• Wash your hands at critical times: after using the toilet and before preparing food or eating.

• Start an H2O for Life club at your school like Nathan and his classmates did. Visit http://www.h2oforlifeschools.org/

 

The launch of this campaign is timed to coincide with the week of Global Handwashing Day, October 15, when 200 million children, parents, teachers, celebrities and citizens in over 80 countries are raising attention for handwashing and for WASH in Schools. Visit http://www.globalhandwashingday.org/

The Parallel between Automobiles and Electronics

Rubber from Congo fueled the automobile industry. They brought us closer together. But 20 million Congolese died in the process over 20 years.

Coltan from Congo fueled the electronic (computers and phones) industry. They brought us closer together. But 6 million Congolese have died in the process. It is still happening every day.

Why did you specifically choose grandmothers (women) for that project?

Why only train women and not men?!  Roy Bunker, founder of Barefoot College, trains poor rural women to solve problems in their communities and villages.  He answer the question below. 

BUNKER ROY « map magazine's street editors#more-9205#more-9205.

Why did you specifically choose grandmothers for that project?

Because we feel that men are just untrainable! They are restless, ambitious and compulsively mobile and all want a certificate. The moment you give anyone a certificate in a village anywhere in the world, they’ll use it to get a job in the city.

If you go to any remote village in the world you’ll find very young people and very old people. So we thought the best investment for us would be to work with a grandmother because she’s been there for years and doesn’t want to leave, plus she’s not ambitious and doesn’t want a certificate and would be a marvellous engineer.

When you train women, they like to train other women. But if you train a man, he doesn’t want to train another person because his job is threatened. None of the grandmothers have ever let me down – they’ve all stayed and become role models and change agents.

So what if they’re illiterate? Where is it written that if you can’t read and write you can’t be an engineer or an architect or dentist or designer?

That’s what the Barefoot College has tried to prove over a long period – that you shouldn’t be penalised for being illiterate. The sky is the limit and anything is possible.

 

I agree with Roy Bunker about training men.  I have seen it happen in Bulape, Congo.  It contributes to village drain.  We have to train women.