Back to School

Meher and the other students from Project Why have headed back to school! As you can see from the photograph, they are all doing well and are excited to be back.

New Pictures of Meher at School

This is a long overdue update, but Meher is doing extremely well at school, as she always does, and continues to receive straight A's. Even more importantly, she is very happy (as you can see from the pictures) and healthy and is enjoying herself immensely.

Emmy Nomination for "A Future For Meher"

The documentary about our project, A Future For Meher, has been nominated for an Emmy award in the Community/Public Service (PSAs) category. The final revised version with the new score is here:



Many thanks to Joshua Avila and Ron Swanson for all of their work in putting together the final version.

New Score for "A Future For Meher" Documentary

Thanks to Ron Swanson and Joshua Avila, musicians from Illinois who graciously volunteered their services to help support our efforts for Meher, the documentary now has a new score which sounds amazing!

You can view the film with the new score here:




Original Score Written and Performed by
Ron Swanson

Music Recorded and Mixed by
Joshua Avila
DUB VOX Studio Services
www.DUBVOX.com

Also, thank you to Rahul Chadha, our film editor, for putting the new version together.

Project Meher Chess Tournament and Fundraiser is a Huge Success

On Saturday, April 30th, Chess Without Borders and Hough Street Elementary school held a chess tournament and fund-raiser for Meher's fund. The tournament was an enormous success, with both children and adults competing, raffles, and a concession stand.

Special thanks to Maggie Gruber and Canary Chia for organizing the event and of course, thanks to all the volunteers, competitors, and other supporters.

Documentary Featured at GiSCA Palooza at Teachers College

On Saturday, April 23rd, A Future for Meher, the short documentary about our efforts to help Meher edited by Rahul Chadha was featured as part of the Global Initiative for Social Change Through the Arts (GiSCA)'s Spring Palooza at Teachers College, Columbia University.

The invitation to the event describes it as:
"The Palooza is GiSCA's signature annual spring event, a participatory, creative, meaningful, humorous and fun attempt to provoke and be provoked. Social Regime Change Begins at Home Too!! Join us to refill the soulful energies of students, faculty and staff to do effective work, while reinvigorating our commitment to living daily lives that resist and transform structural injustices in our communities and broader society.
The Palooza evening goes like this: we have a few 3-8 minute acts (theater, music, film, visual arts, sculpture, you name it), and then we have facilitated audience dialogue, then we repeat. Refreshments and an after-party round out the night."

The film was a big success and many people asked me about Meher and our efforts in India after the screening.


Program from the event (above)

Visit to Metropolitan Expeditionary Learning School

Today (Wednesday, April 13th) I visited students at the Metropolitan Expeditionary Learning School in New York. The school is part of the Outward Bound network, and students and teachers embark on expeditions (similar to interdisciplinary units) as part of their curriculum.





Their current expeditions is called "Taking a Stand" and Ms. Shiney, a teacher at the school, invited me in to talk about fund-raising and advocating for Meher. The students had already learned a lot about India, Meher, and activism, and had great questions and ideas to share with me. After our discussion, the students made posters to show what they had learned and explain the issue and solution to the rest of the school.





It was a wonderful visit and I really enjoyed sharing Meher's story with the students.

Another Excellent Report Card

Report cards have been issued and Meher has done excellently yet again. Her grades are straight A+s! She is now graduated from Prep (Kindergarten) and ready to enter first grade next term.

Happy Belated Holi!

Here are some beautiful pictures of Meher getting ready for the Holi holiday (Festival of Colors that signals the beginning of Spring!) courtesy of Austen.

Spring Break

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Meher is back from school for a short break. She goes back on April 3rd, when the school will announce the end of term results. Then she will be entering Class 1! She is happy to be home and spending a lot of time at the Women's Centre, as always.

Visiting Day and End of Term

Shanti Gyam International School's year just ended and all the students are now at home. Meher and Utpal will be returning for a little less than a month for a summer camp the school is running this year.

Here is a picture of Meher with Austen, a volunteer from Barrington who is working at the Women's Centre.

School Visitors Day

Recently, Anou and Austen went to Meher's boarding school to see all of the Project Why kids. They are all doing well and receiving good grades in school as usual. Meher and Utpal may stay at Shanti Gyam International School over the summer, as there is a special summer camp program available this year.

Save the Women's Centre!

I am including a link to a post from Anou here in an appeal to save the Project Why Women's Centre- due to lack of funds it is in danger of being shut down. It was while I was teaching at the Women's Centre that I first met Meher. 300 children, most of them little girls, are being educated there and countless work to benefit the surrounding community and women in particular takes place there.

http://projectwhy.blogspot.com/2011/03/save-our-women-centre.html

Documentary Completed!

The documentary chronicling the story of our fund-raising efforts and the partnership between Chess Without Borders and Meher is finished. The first screening of the movie took place Saturday, January 29th at a chess tournament in Barrington.

You can view the film here:

A Future For Meher from Gorilla Face on Vimeo.

Special thanks to Rahul Chadha, our film editor.