The general objective of the project is to enable a number of youth (All of them from river erosion victim families) to acquire professional skills on making surveys, documentation, photographs, documentary films and above all using social media to let the world know the current situation of their community. At the end of the project, we aim to enable young people to set up a blog that covers the Southern issue and attempts to introduce the issue over a wider range. In addition, the project aims to establish a supporting network of
Topical focus:
Country:
What locality or neighborhood will your project focus on?
Bhuapur, Tangail
Describe the specific population with whom you will be working.
The project will work with the worst affected victims of river bank erosion who have taken temporary shelter in neighboring villages. Most of them are poor and disadvantaged inhabitants of the islands (chars) of the River Jamuna. Most of these char-dwellers have no e-mails, no social media accounts and do not read news on the Internet. They do not have Internet connection at home and are able to access the Internet only through computer rental shops.
Who else will be on your team to help implement the project?
Members of Local Government Institutions (LGI), authorities and individuals who are concerned about climate change issues and river erosion impacts.
What kinds of news, stories and other content will be created?
We aim to produce:
a. 2 documentary short film
b. 1 photo-essay
c. 3 Blogs
d. Building partnerships with NGO’s, grassroots community groups, and other networks to share climate solutions.
As a result of the program:
– Youth people of the community will become more empowered.
– Communities will become more resilient.
– Grassroots organizers will be able to identify which solutions can and should be replicated on a local, national, or international level.
What technologies and digital tools do you plan to use in the trainings?
Describe the connections that you or your organization have already established or plan to establish that will contribute to the success of the project.
We have established a strategic relationship with the youth and components of civil society organizations, political parties and actors to rally support to discuss these issues and get out possible solutions to resolve them through the involvement of a wider sector of the public to influence the decision-makers.
How many participants do you think will be trained in your project?
The project is aimed at training 20 young people (10 male & 10 female) from within the community. In addition, 2 people will be trained to implement the activities during and after the project period. This will also enable continuity of the activities and active participation of the youth after the project. The trained young people will be directly involved in implementing the project activities. Their contribution towards raising their voices will be recognized.
Describe which technologies, tools, and media you will focus on when training participants.
Our focus will be on training youth in:
a) Art of story telling
c) Basic camera operations: photography and videography
b) Basic video editing
c) Basic sound recording
d) Uploading content on online platforms
e) Distribution of content on social media platforms (engagement)
f) Educate them about free resources available online
Describe the facilities where you will hold the workshops.
JCDP has a medium sized office where we will be able to train the 10 youth, the facility has enough furniture for the sessions. We shall have to borrow 10 computers from any computer center to support in the training and editing training, we also have a router that can assist us in internet sharing. We will be able to use 2G/3G Internet.
What is your current relationship with the community with whom you plan to work? What makes you the most appropriate individual or organization to implement this project?
There are a lot of young people in Bangladesh who are involved in climate movement. We stand in solidarity with everybody who is trying to heal our world. Many of these young climate champions do not have adequate training or facilities available to them to raise their concerns or spread the knowledge their communities have.
We are an organization of young people and like to work with youth because they hold the reigns of the future. We are renowned, known for the work we do and youth express a sense of pride in associating with us.
What specific challenges do you expect to face when planning and implementing your project?
In the implementation of such projects, we take care to enter the community sensitively. However, with content being broadcast more publicly, there is a risk of increased scrutiny from community elders.
On the other hand, we have to convince the uneducated char dwellers about the betterment of the project.
How will you measure and evaluate the project’s impact, specifically: your primary participants, the wider regional community, or the global digital community?
Measuring success means measuring:
1) the quality of media produced by our team
2) the ability of the media to engage wider audiences. This can be checked by way of distribution our media gets, hits our videos get on youtube, people who like us on Facebook, and platforms where our media is featured
3) how effectively NGOs and other partners are able to leverage our media to build capacity. This can be done by post production check in with them.
4) the number of media partnerships or projects we are able to bag for ourselves.
If your project were to be selected as a Rising Voices grantee, what would be the general timeline of project activities in 2014?
- Three Months – Planning and preparation
– One Month Implementation 5 day Training Workshop
– One Month – Follow up,
– One Month Report Writing
Detail a specific budget of up to $2,500 USD for operating costs.
Training-1000
Internet-100
Workshop-1000
Translation-100
Travel-100
Coordinator expenses-200
Besides the microgrant funding, what other support can Rising Voices provide for your project to ensure its success?
Although, one of the activities in the project will involve training 2 facilitators to implement the project activities, mentoring of these facilitators to carry on the activities, even after the project, will be very much appreciated. Sharing of any new online technologies will also be very much appreciated.
Contact name
Babar Ali
Organization
Jamuna Char Integrated Development Project (JCDP)