My experience with New Media

Source:http://tinyurl.com/cvkayeb

Believe me, the course on New Media added a new dimension to my education. It helped me to bring a new perspective to the table for discussions in my other courses.

I got to experience with blogging and microblogging. Initially I wasn't quite happy when my professor made it a requirement for the course. I had to sign up in Twitter and start a blog to meet the course requirements. When I was excited about writing a blog (as I had wanted to do it from a long time), I wasn't quite impressed with Twitter. It seemed to be a waste of time. Following people seemed to be a bit odd when I wasn't quite interested in others perspectives. Tweeting to an empty space felt more like a one-way conversation until others (whom I hardly knew) who were interested in the same topic replied to my tweets and shared their views. I got to meet new people and learn more from their views and opinions. I am also a part of different communities where we have same interests.  From my own experience I realized how powerful and efficient micro blogs are. I got to know why there is a rising popularity for social media sites. Gradually, I got to realize what my professor meant while wanting us to experience new media. Whenever you research on a specific culture or community, you want to be an ‘insider’ rather than an ‘outsider’. Being an ‘insider’ is about actually knowing what you are studying. It was quite effective to analyse new media as an insider- one who has experience on the platform she is studying about. Now when someone says that when minds interact, new ideas emerge, I can clearly hear that person.

This overall experience has helped me in thinking and processing information differently. My thinking patterns have changed. It has also changed the way I interact with others.

In this fast evolving social media world, the course has equipped me with specific tools that one needs to compete on the new media landscape.

You can find the facebook page linked to this blog here.

Is there always a "trigger" in the act of volunteering?

In this post I would like to introduce you to one of the inspirational student volunteers at my university. She has initiated her own organization – WE CARE. We have a couple of similar leaders in our university. Her story is slightly different because it is her childhood experiences that have influenced her to initiate WE CARE.

She started on by volunteering with Volunteer for Bangladesh (VBD). She joined the group two years before as an Asian University for Women (AUW) representative. Her role was to attend the meetings organized by VBD officers and to promote their programs within AUW.  She says that it was Volunteer for Bangladesh’s (VBD) promotional video that inspired her. She has been quite successful in getting the word around as we had around 150 AUW students volunteering in the Universal Childrens Day (UCD) campaign 2012.

For her, the incentive is self-satisfaction. She says that by stating “if you don’t give, you don’t get back” and explains how the initiative of one professor has changed her life. She doesn’t want to take that help as granted. Rather, she is committed towards lending helping hands to as many lives as possible.  She had some of the worst experiences in her life just because of her stammer. She never used to talk in class under the fear of embarrassment. Her advisor who came to know about this talked with the university’s authority and managed to send her to Mukundapur medical hospital in India for a three week program.  In this program, they identified her level of stammering and helped her in figuring out the letters that were uncomfortable for her to speak. She was lucky to get into this Indian government sponsored program which was open only for Indians.

This event changed her life. Don’t misunderstand me. The program wasn’t a miracle. It did take time for her to be the person she is today. From the program she realized that there is no cure for stammering. She had to accept it. She successfully got over it and eventually got a scholarship to go to third One Young World summit in Pittsburgh (2012,) where she represented Sri Lanka.

For her rather than the nationality it is the subjects that matters. She chose to work with kids and subjects with special needs irrespective of the communities they are from.  She views volunteering as serving people regardless of boundaries. At the same time she admits that there are challenges in being a Sri Lankan and volunteering in Bangladesh. The main challenge is language. Also, in a cross-cultural program she is always titled as an ‘outsider’ though she has tried her best to be an ‘insider’. Therefore, she has to put an extra effort to gain the subjects’ trust.

Her future goal is to get a post-doctoral degree. She prioritizes education over everything else because she strongly believes that without education people will not recognize you. WE CARE is been sponsored by One Young World and she is devoted towards making a change with her organization.

You can read more about her here.

Volunteerism at Asian University for Women (AUW)

Asian University for Women (AUW) provides liberal arts education to young women from diverse cultural and socio-economic backgrounds to become service-oriented leaders and promoters of intercultural understanding. Most of them are committed towards contributing to a change. Here are some pictures of recent community activities in which these young women were involved in.

V'ism useful tips

Photo Credit: Jyothi Nair

Whenever you ask someone why he/she is volunteering, you will get many answers; for a good cause, it’s fun, it’s a good experience, etc.

Taking initiative for a better cause does seem to be a structured plan with a well-defined objective, but in reality Volunteerism is never black & white. Always there is an absence in absoluteness. It is messy and at the same time it is a great experience. Usually most of us interpret it as going somewhere, doing something and finishing the work we have initiated. Most often times it doesn’t work that way.

One of the important character traits a volunteer should possess is patience. It is the key. You might encounter many unexpected challenges on the field. Things might not go as you plan. You might not get to do what you wanted. Sometimes you ‘can’t’ as you ‘want’. Having expectations while volunteering might hurt you as there is a high possibility that it can’t be met. People out there might not want your free help.

What a volunteer needs to understand is that the main objective of volunteering is ‘helping’ which is doing good and making positive footprints. In that case presence itself is huge. Knowing that you are available itself makes a huge difference. It is all about that special drive to do something great. It is always about people you are helping, not about ‘us’ or ‘credit’.

Here are some other tips on volunteering wisely.