Rohan Gurram '17

In July 2013, my family and I traveled to India visit my relatives. When I reached Kakumanu, the home village of my parents, I noticed the appalling economic conditions that surrounded me. The village was tremendously poor, with the majority of the residents living without electricity, clean water, and houses. Curious to learn about the educational system in India, I visited an elementary school in the village. The school was shockingly impoverished; I approached the Headmaster who informed me that many parents do not send their kids to school to avoid buying necessities including books, bags, and clothes. Many children were sent to work in miserable conditions instead of having a proper education. I wanted to step up and provide a proper education for the children. I felt that every child deserved to have an opportunity to succeed in life. A great education is the first step towards success. I made a permanent commitment to support the school. First, I convinced my family and relatives to support my endeavor. Initially, I relied on my family to implementing my ideas, as I was new to the surroundings. My family conveyed my intentions to the school staff and village community leaders. Subsequently, I worked with school staff directly to identify annual school fund requirements. The school staff and community leaders agreed to assist me in procuring all supplies required from local sources. After raising 2000 dollars from relatives, I ordered over 200 notebooks and 100 backpacks for my first distribution. I recruited enthusiastic relatives to undertake the secure storage of the supplies distributed to school. The school staff provided immense help in supporting me by rallying parents to support the cause. In 2014 and 2015, along with the annual distribution, I organized special events in the schools for motivating school children and for creating awareness of education among parents. These meetings were highly successful as large crowds of about 200 were drawn, and local media published articles covering my work. My most recent effort was organizing several sports activities for all the school children to celebrate Universal Children[?]s Day on November 20th, 2015. The difficult part of my service was communicating with local people and traveling several times to India from America. I have made a commitment to continue into the future. I want to continue my work and expand all around India to several different types of schools including middle and high schools. More than 100 elementary school children and their parents were benefited by my volunteer activity. All the school children are now highly motivated as they now attend school regularly and dress well. The parents are now aware of the importance of education and have started to support their children[?]s future. The impact on the community is immense, local leaders and media continue to support and cover our work. Most recently, the service was published in two prominent newspapers in the area. The new profound success is unbelievable. The students are more engaged in the classroom and now are pushing themselves to reach their potential. With the newly received materials and the renovated surroundings, the school is running better than ever.