By Daniella Flores | Student Vice President
The past months have seen motivating action from our group members. Funded by the Obama Singh Initiative and hosted by Mahatma Gandhi University, we will be sending two students from the Brown team to perform on-site research in Kerala this summer. We hope to accomplish various goals throughout this trip, including the hiring of a Program Director to oversee all field operations, the streamlining of our tank construction process to facilitate large-scale expansion, and the revision of the management and financial systems currently in place.
Continuing the 2012 alternative construction material research and following up on the prototype, the plans for this summer include the evaluation of a pilot tank built using coconut fibers. Additionally, we plan to explore simpler construction techniques that can be more easily replicated.
Together with the new Program Director, we plan to train all employees on frequent monitoring of financial data. We will be training our management team in India on basic computer literacy to digitize records, making them more accessible. Further, we will reinforce communication systems between the Brown team and the India team to strengthen our partnership.
Both teams are continuing efforts to improve the project’s sustainability. The Brown team has met with new mentors that have served as financial advisors and networking connections. The India team has scouted new locations where residents are eager for the project to be implemented. Together, this will bring allow our group to impact a larger population while maintaining a sustainable business model.
Finally, fundraising continues to be a priority as we approach larger scale impact. The Brown team has applied to a number of grants and kindly thanks all donors over the past year. Monies raised have allowed for 6 new tanks and will soon serve as capital for another round of construction. By the end of next year we hope to complete construction in the Achinakom village, totaling 40 tanks servicing 150 households.
Once again, we thank you for your support and will continue delivering exciting updates from our summer activities on our website.
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