R's Bangalore Notes - #2 (Profiling)

R's bangalore notes on profiling...

Continuing with my notes...

Although we had initiated various modes of documentation in the past, most of them were activity based. I strongly feel the need for Student based profiling. I noticed quite a few issues regarding the information we have about the students at V.

(I'm bringing in some history here & there, coz I feel it would help the new vols with some orientation; Pls feel free to crib if you don't want it)

There was a time when the average weekly interaction of a regular volunteer with the kids was nearly 5 - 6 hours and atleast 50 % of the time dedicated to academic teaching. As a result, vols thoroughly know the capabilities of the students and their weak spots, and teaching-activities were more often than not tailor-made and dynamic to suit the needs.

The reduction in time spent and the nature of activities being conducted now poses a lot of challenges. I feel these points below are some of them.. How imposing each of the challenge is, is something the vols can input.

-> Individual focus and attention goes low
-> Specific difficulties in learning can go unnoticed
-> The scope of discussing personal issues takes a beating
-> Continuity of overall progress at individual level is unclear
-> Volunteer - Student mutual accountability at individual level (..I know this is a sensitive one)

I am sure you have got the gist of what I am trying to put across. To overcome this, as has been suggested earlier, I favour taking up the task of individual student profiling.
It means that

-> We maintain a database wherein each student's information is regularly updated.
-> Standard info - age, class, past academic progress, extra-curricular achievements if any, spl skills, etc (you can think of more)
-> Background, Management remarks when admitted - lets debate on this

The above is static info; now for some dynamic stuff

-> Need to identify areas where we can define the progress of the student qualitatively like language & communication, participation, leadership qualities, career interests (these will and should keep changing), role models, etc.. (brainstorming needed)

-> Problem areas: (Personal, academic, general) - needs defining

-> Vibes: What they feel about V, Warden, their school, environment, friends/foes,
teachers, (Cribs & praises)

-> Progress: (Academic, lifeSkills, problems handled, overall periodic review)

Maybe what I have listed above are rather broad lines, but I would like the group to initiate the debate on this NOW, so that by the time the academic year starts we have some idea of what we want to profile. But we need to answer these questions first.

1. Are we agreeing to have this?
2. Who are the action owners? (A suggestion is that one person can co-ordinate the database, while we have people taking responsibility for primary, secondary, high-school levels) Names please
3. Format of the database?
4. Other finer aspects like time & resource involved in setting this up.

I guess its enough fodder for now. Can we have these questions answered asap, and also action-owners decided soon.

Let me end this mail with what I feel is the underlying philosophy for the need of profiling; that is to see to it that the kids don't stray away. This is one of the ways volunteers can be more active in this, since the individual involvement with the kids could go a long way in relationship building with the volunteers and feeling more secured and responsible.