Joy of Sound

Global Grant Project 

On, 11th June, we rolled out our very ambitious, $66000, Global Grant Project called the Joy of Sound. This project, in association with theRotary Club of Strathcona Sunrise-Courteney, will work towards changing the way the hearing impaired child is educated through the use of smart classrooms. Under the project, we will be supporting 2 schools for the hearing impaired, the MGR School for the Deaf and The MJC-Guild of Service School for the Deaf.

The club will work with the schools to:
1. Develop smart classroom content for classes 5,6,7,8,9, and 11. This is being achieved by training and enabling the special skill teachers to transform physical content into electronic medium.
2. Provide smart classroom infrastructure for 3 classes each at both the schools
3. Provide hearing aids to the children in the school.
4. With the support of Clearwater Technologies, provide Shoebox Audiometry testing application, that any teacher can use to carryout screening of the children and track their hearing progress.
3. Screen and identify children with hearing disability by holding screening camps in the schools.
4. Admitting children from the identified set and educating them in these schools.

20 teachers underwent training on computer and Powerpoint skills at the MGR Janaki Arts and Science College. This army of teachers, lead by the very committed and able, Mrs. Sarawathi will drive us to our goal. Many thanks to all for volunteering to take up this cause. It is a challenge and will require each of these teachers to put in many many hours of extra work to make this project a success. But I believe that each one who takes up the cause of teaching a special child, has already made that commitment and is driven to make a difference to the lives of these children they teach. While each teacher is a blessed and honoured being, the ones who teach children with disabilities, are on the top.

Special thanks to the selfless dedication of Mrs. Saraswati, our Lead Coach and Trainer (she has given her life for teaching the hearing impaired), Rtn. Mrs. Latha Rajendran of the MGR School and Mrs. Rani Gulrajani of the GOS School, for partnering with RCCK.

Many thanks to Rtn. Chip Ross and Rtn. Mike Pontus from our partner club, RC Strathcona Sunrise for helping make this project a reality. Thanks also to 3230 DG, Raju, 3230 Rotary Foundation Chair, Muthupalaniappan Shanmugama and Rtn. Jennifer Berg of the RI Global Grants team, for helping with the grant approval.

Most of all, thanks to all members of RCCK, especially Hari Ratan for his guidance, Ravi Krishnan for helping and doing all the work on the application, Mita Gorsia Venkatraman, Ravindran, Sanjay Agarwal, Ravikant Choudhry and Kalpana for being there at the inauguration of the event, and everyone else for always being there.

Small beginning and many miles to go. Happy that the trip has started.

Pres. Sanjay Agarwal on the right.

Hearing Impaired Screening Camp - MG with RC of Galesburg - ROTI Project

This matching grant project which is partnered with Rotary Club of Galesburg, Illinois, started yesterday with the first screening camp and had a wonderful response.

Many residents of close to 19 villages  surrounding the camp had come and some of them staying as far as 35 kilometers away on the outskirts of North Chennai.  The campaign for calling people to get checked was extremely effective and from these villages whose population is close to about 4000 numbers, we were able to call about 200 of them to visit in a single day.  The effectiveness of the campaigning done by Dr Sandhya Ruban (of Eternity Foundation)  and her team of volunteers was fantastic, enabling it specifically call for patients with hearing abnormalities.

We had team of the following specialists :

DR KAMATCHIPANDIAN – DOCTOR ATTACCHED TO E N T DEPARTMENT K M C

MR PRAVESH – AUDIOLOGIST

MR SANDEEP – AUDIOLOGIST

We were also honoured to have the presence of Mrs Neela Govindaraj ( Speech Therapist and Language Assessor of specially challenged) who had accompanied with Ms Uma (a social service initiator who also works with IBM).  Both Mrs Neela and Ms Uma sat for a long time and helped in coordinating and handling the visiting patients. They interacted and counseled the visitors on a one to one basis, which was really interesting to see them doing their roles in gathering more insights to the various challenges faced by the villagers.

We also witnessed misery at its lowest point  in the case of certain individuals who felt extremely helpless with their lives.  Hence we could sense there was lots to be done in terms of community service to these villages, and there was potential for plenty of them who needed to be living in standard basic amenities.

Finally coming back to hearing impairment and hearing aid cases, we have crossed 100 deserving beneficiaries and individuals cases are being discussed in a couple of days with the Doctors, to analyse and shortlist hearing aids beneficiaries.

Helping Hands - Guild of Service

We distributed 10 Tricycles and 10 Wheelchairs this morning. This project was made possible through a Matching Grant with the Rotary Club of Edmonton Mayfield with the active support of Rtn. Chip Ross of RC Strathcona Sunrise.

It is hoped that we will work closely with the guild to help the disabled.

The Chief Guest was Dr Nischal Pandey from E Club in New Delhi. He is here in chennai to make a presentation at the club meeting this evening on the work his club is doing in Uttarakhand. 

 A True Moment of Freedom - Celebrating India's 66th Independence Day at Arambakkam Village - August 15th, 2012

President Rtn. Nirmal Nahar, Rtn Ravindran
and Rtn Vasanthi handing over the Mobility
Aids at Arambakkam village

All set for being mobile

Rotary Club of Chennai Kilpauk under its Helping Hands Project in association with Rotary Club of Strathcona Sunrise, Canada, distributed 20 Tricycles and 1 wheel chair, of a total value of Rs.1,05,000/- to the disabled people of the village of Arambakkam, Gummidipoondi Taluk, with the all round efforts of our Directors Community Services, Rtn Vasanthi ,  Rtn. Ravindran under the able guidance of President Rtn Nirmal Nahar. It was truly a celebration of Independence for the recipients on the occasion of the Independence Day of the nation as well. And through Rotary, we were able to bring a sense of freedom through the Mobility Aids to the disabled.

A Sense of Freedom - Driving
away their tricycles after RCCK handed them the
Mobility Aids at Arambakkam village

One of the Tricycles handed over
by RCCK at Arambakkam

Hearing Impaired

We had received requests from 15 people for hearing aids. These children were not able to hear and their parents believed that they would start hearing if they were able to get them hearing aids.

The date was fixed for the 13th of December and these children came into Chennai with their parents. Rtn. Divyesh Palicha had arranged for audiometry tests at Eljay Agency- a business that deals with hearing aids. Tests were carried out and results were ready and Divyesh called me and said "Let us meet at Eljay so we can go through the results and make a decision on the apparatus and further tests if any are required"

Children waiting for their audiometry tests

We met at Eljay Agencies and sqw the results, 11 were ready for haring aids, 2 children had to meet a ENT and 2 had to go through BERA tests (Brain Evoken Response Audiometry) this test was required as the 2 children were actually infants and were not able to respond properly to the audiometry tests.

Sukanya after experiencing sound

Sukanya a girl who was ready for her hearing aids was called in to see how she responded,a hearing aid was taken and affixed to her ears and then she experienced magic, she was for the first time in her life able to hear a sound though it was only our voices. She was asked what her name was and she could not answer, she was asked what her father's name was and she responded "sgumpore" mumbled, unclear. She had never spoken continuously in her life and now she had to listen and then speak, a great and wonderful task. Sukanya was used to sign language and now she could hear and the sounds in her ears made her cry. She could not belileve that it was possible. Sukanya ran out with the hearing aid to her father and mother and asked them to speak - for the first time she heard her mother's voice and then her father's, this was joy and a smile quickly followed by tears. Sukanya then heard something that we tend to ignore, a passing car playing music, she listened and then turned to look at the car and then she heard for the first time in her life, music. It did not matter  that the song was in a language that she did not know, it was music and a new experience.

Emotions were high and many children who had come for the tests realised that they too would be able to experience sounds soon.

the orders for the hearing aids have been confirmed and these 11 children will get their hearing aids on 23rd of December evening. A few days before Christmas, the gift of sound, the gift of music. To be able to listen to music, listen to the voice of their mothers', to be able to respond to ones own name.

Great project and very very satisfying.

Thanks to Rtn Divyesh Palicha for making this happen.

Helping Hands

Sunday, 27th November 2011 - 30 Tricycles and 3 wheelchairs will be distributed to poor and needy disabled. The distribution will take place at 10:30 AM at Uthukottai near Chennai. 6 Tricycles will be distributed in Chennai next week.

Tricycles and Wheelchairs

The RC of Chennai Kilpauk has recently provided Mobility Aids to the following villages:

15 tricycles to Mepur village, this village is about 30 Kms from Chennai and is off the Chennai - Bangalore Highway

Arambakkam village which is 65 Kms from Chennai on the Nellore Highway
13 Tricycles
4 Wheelchairs

Snegithan- Association for the welfare of the physically handicapped
10 tricycles and 4 wheel chairs

The disabled who benefitted from this project were poorest of the poor and are cmopletely deserving of these aids.

These mobility aids would enhance their lives and empower them by making them mobile and independant as regards their movement. Also increasing their chances of obtaining gainful employment.

This project was made possible with a MG with the RC Strathcona Sunrise with special thanks to TRF and Rtn, Chip Ross who is the primary contact with the RC of Strathcona Sunrise.

Our plans for reaching out to the disabled

Over the next few months there will be a number of camps by which we will distribute artificial limbs, calipers and mobility aids. Salem, Madurai, Orissa, UP are some of the regions where these camps will be held.

Having heard that Karnataka has a large number of disabled who need help, I made some inquiries which reveal that this was true. I have sought more information and help in organising camps in the State of Karnataka.

I would dare to think that there would be atleast one camp every month over the next few months. By these camps RCCK will distribute over 700 calipers / limbs over the next 6 months.

Personally I am toying with the idea of reaching out to the disabled by conducting mativational workshops. Would it work?

A few days ago I was driving down to Pondicherry and stopped by on the road and noticed a quadraplegic running a tea shop. He was not even able to count out the change for his customers and had to be helped.

I told him to go to a camp that we were conducting and gave him the address and location and instructions on how to reach the camp. Also wrote out a letter for him. He never came. Why? Was he not able to find someone who will mind his shop for the day that he would be away?

Life is difficult.

Chip Ross Digital Learning Centre

In the current year 10 disabled girls will start their new and exciting journey into learning computers and seek a new life for themselves with greater opportunities.

This learning will provide them with the skills that they would require to get for themselves better jobs and more than anything else give them a feeling of great self worth.

Plans are being made to commence training for these girls in the middle of this month.

Helping Hands Phase III - Update

No news from TRF as yet on release of funds for this Matching Grant which has been approved.

I do hope that the monies will be released shortly so work can start.

We hope to contact Rotary Clubs in Orissa and Bihar and in rural Tamilnadu and provide prosthetics to amputees loiving in these areas. These people have little access to aid and specially for prosthetics.