Presentation time: around 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM
About 40 people attended
I started off with a little introduction of myself, my school, and what a thesis is.
- I explained how thesis is a year long process where I have to research something I am interested in and then present a product or proposal or research at the end of the year. I notified the audience that they were going to take part in my thesis product right after my presentation.
Then I talked about my process throughout the year and how I came up with what I did (a forum called "Sheroes and Heroes Unite.")
- I explained why I chose women empowerment and gender equality. To me, it was a big deal because I thought of it as a root issue. If genders cannot get along, we cannot expect other differences to not make us upset (races, ethnicity, religions). Also, gender is a very large audience. A problem that affects almost everyone means that the issue needs to be addressed. I made it my job to address it over the year.
- I explained how, in the beginning, my idea was to create a self defense workshop for women. I was thinking more along the line of "safety" than "empowerment" and "gender equality." However, I realized that I did not want to support feminism as much as I wanted to support women empowerment because there is a difference.
- So, I did some research and realized where these disparities occur the most. They happen mostly in the workplace and in homes and workplaces of citizens in LDCs. Since I wanted to focus abroad, I had to know what my role was in abroad aid. Therefore, I took a course called "EdGE" by Omprakash. It is a 12 week course that explains my role as an abroad volunteer. Most of my research comes from this course. It helped me get the idea for my project. It taught me to pay attention to who I was helping more than my ideas to help. That made me realize that this isn't only my problem to fix. It is everyone's. Therefore, everyone, especially the inferior women, should have a say in the solution to "gender disparity." EdGE also gave me a global perception. It gave me facts and numbers to corroborate what I said to my audience.
- EdGE comes with its own mentors. At the end of every week, we are supposed to write in a forum about what we learned or what we wanted to add or share. All the volunteers write and express. This gave me the idea to make my own live forum called "Sheroes and Heroes Unite," which would focus on gender issues. This forum helps to close the gap without labeling. It is to bring people from all walks to express their ideas, get inspiration, and search for a solution (long-term or short-term)
- For every problem, I made 4 steps that can be summarized with the acronym: RISE.
- R- realize, I- identify, S- speak, E - execute
- Then, I let the audience know that "today is about knowing your voice counts and connecting the women here and bringing more next time."
Then, I explained RISE more in depth:
- Before starting the actual live forum, I want you [audience] to know why we need to have a forum about it in the first place.
- R-realize. I explained how we will never have any problems if we just simply believe they do not exist. Most of us have ignored problems. So, today is about letting them in. Today is about connecting with the problem and making it yours to solve. Usually, we do not acknowledge a problem because we cannot relate with it or it's too far off. I did simple exercises with the audience to teach them how to make a matter personal. I used "Jyoti Singh Pandey" as my example. I have done lots of research on her. She was the victim of Delhi's 2012 gang rape case. To this day, she has not gotten justice because rapes still happen, the court hasn't settled, and women are still seen inferior to men (in this case, we're talking about India).
- I explained how "Jyoti" is my friend's mom's name. "Singh" is my best friend's last name. "Pandey" is my last name. Something that happened 3 years ago, many kilometers away, has now become my issue because I made it so. So, the "realize" step is to acknowledge the problem, make the matter personal, then make it arguable.
- I- identify. Once, a person has made it their personal problem, they will have to dive deeper and identify where the problem actually is. They have to look at facts: do their research. "Why do women need to be empowered in the first place?" We need to be empowered because we feel and we are "less than." I had a couple of slides that gave credit to this fact. The first image was the "global gender gap" that ranked countries from the least gap to the most gap. India was 105 on that list. The list had 135 countries. This explains how not only do the genders differ from one another, but different women from different countries may have more or less than women from other countries. So, identify is where we take all of this into account. The next two images showed how the gender gap is big enough to laugh at. The first image explains how the wage gap is about 23% between men and women. Although, there are some legitimate reasons behind this percentage, there are some other reasons that only prove that a disparity does exist. The last image is a satiric remark about how girls cannot do math. So now, we have some facts to back up our reasoning to stand up and fight in the first place.
- We made it our problem, we have the facts that prove that it may be a problem for more than one person (in this case, millions of people) and that it is an actual, factual problem, so, now it is time to share it and speak with other people who have gone through "R" and "I" themselves.
- S-speak is the most important aspect. This is where the forum begins. The first two steps can be done individually. However, this step's vital aspect is people, especially like minded people, preferably who have gone through "R" and "I" of RISE.
- Nothing can be done about big problems, if people who want to do something about it just keep it to themselves. How come gender (women) is such a large population, yet cannot do much about their inferior status even after so many years? It is because no one speaks. So, this part of RISE is almost the most important. You may have to literally rise and give yourself the courage to speak. No one can understand a women's problem and gender disparity more than the people who are victims of the crime. I cannot be the only one solving this because I do not know what it is like to be on the other side of the spectrum. Thus, we need the victims, all different people, plus more who are not victims, to share their sides, stories, and ideas. Just speaking about an idea proves that it was worth enough to talk about. It gets gears turning and it spreads the message.
From here, I transition to the live demonstration of my product: Sheroes and Heroes Unite. It is a forum where people get a chance to do the "S" part of RISE. Technically, the acronym "RISE" is also part of the product. RISE is a wholesome approach to a problem like gender disparity, women empowerment, etc. However, "Speak" is the more visual part of the product. I have video recorded my presentation and as much of the "speak" portion that I could.
Speak:
Today, I introduced them to a problem, made the audience make it their problem, and showed them some facts to agree with. The problem was women empowerment. I showed them the Delhi gang rape example. Here, Jyoti Singh Pandey still hasn't gained justice. Then, I showed facts where women in India have a hard time participating in the economy, receiving an education, and being politically active. This shows why women need to be empowered in the first place. Now, I showed a video called "My Choice" by Vogue Empower that tried to address women empowerment. I linked the video in my previous blog posts. I showed an edited version of it since there were kids in the audience. I have also shared the edited video in the same blog post. I showed the video and then asked the question, "was this video empowering?" In the age of social media, videos like these can have huge impacts if done correctly. Our goal was to see if this video was done correctly. If not, how can we improve this video to spread the right message. I numbered the audience by "1" and "2." The "1"s had to support the statement, "yes, this is empowering." Then, the "2"s had to support, "no, this is not empowering." This was so everyone could see different perspectives. Even if they did not agree with their sides, they tried to dig in and support their sides. I had the audience for a "U' shape with a gap in the center where the bottom of the "U" would be. In the middle were two chairs. Each chair faces one half of the "U." I put one of my friends on one chair facing the "yes, this is empowering" side and another friend on the other chair facing the "no, this is not empowering" side. I gave these friends (Mah-ro and Tanvi) two giant sheets of paper. They had 5 minutes to discuss within their sides about points to support their argument. My friends were writing down all the input their sides of the audience were contributing. After 5 minutes, instead of talking to my friends, they were debating with people on different sides of the "U" and thus different sides of the argument. They could refer to the paper, which my friends left on the chair facing their sides or bring up a new point. My friends would just have to remember to add this point. If the debate got slow, my friends added their points of view. After one member from one side was done talking, another member from the other side was given a chance to express their feelings about their side. It was very organized and Socratic. Almost everyone go a chance to speak. The debate was supposed to last 18 minutes, but it was so good and moving that the IANT board members allowed it to go to 25 minutes. The winning side would be the side with the most participation and points on their paper. However, both sides won since there was an equal amount of participation and points on the paper. The reward was "Hershey's Kisses." Throughout the debate, I was recording with my camera. At some point, my memory became full, so I just observed instead. I would give people the chance to speak by calling on them or call time. My role was minimal. The audience had the greater role in the "Speak" portion." Overall, it was a success. My friends who joined me helped out a lot and enjoyed my workshop/forum as well.
E - execute:
This is the last step of my method to approaching gender disparity. The "E" from RISE stands for "execute." Now, that we have discussed our sides, our points of view, and our mutual agreement to this problem being a problem in the first place, we must further the forum to include solutions. They call it "problem solving" because the problem must be "realized" before seeking out a solution. The "S" in "RISE" is cyclical. You have to speak and talk and share until you arrive at a solution. You cannot just speak about a situation once. That's what "headlines" in a newspaper does. For a couple of weeks, Jyoti Singh Pandey and her rape case were in bold and in huge font. Afterwards, things quieted, her justice still lingers, and there are millions of subservient women who could participate in making a better world, but do not know how to break out of precedents and bondages. After bringing the problem into daily conversation, the problem becomes truly personal and important to you. When a group of people, especially women, do this, it empowers them to "thrive" and come together to find a better solution to better lives. Women here have a special type of power. They have the power of social media and organization. They can be the voice for the voiceless until they come up with a solution to return these voices back. However, if women everywhere are voiceless, pleas will never be heard, and women should not even expect to be heard. However, for the day, the "execute" step was to take the whole process home and share it with their family and friends. Hopefully, kids (grassroots) will tell their friends, and these friends will tell their parents, etc. Another part of the step was to ponder upon the question, "how can we empower more people in our community?"
Overview:
Lastly, I went over everything I said briefly. The audience did not know the whole acronym was "RISE" since I was introducing the letters separately. They thought that the steps were easier to remember with such a clever acronym.
Last Steps:
I thanked my audience for participating in the "RISE" workshop by the soon-to-be organization "Sheroes and Heroes Unite." I explained how I was trying to file a 501-c to make "Sheroes and Heroes Unite" a non-profit organization. I am in contact with Jasmit Dhaliwal to help me with these steps. "RISE" was just my first approach/workshop/forum under this "soon-to-be" organization to introduce the topic that is more than important to me: gender equality and my solution to finding the "ultimate solution." My idea is to give space to gather all the common men and women to have a say in solutions as important as these. Although "Sheroes and Heroes Unite" can discuss any problems, I wanted to start with gender equality since that's what I am most interested in and did a year's worth of research about. I want to go step my step. After the sheroes and heroes find some solution to this problem, then we shall move onto another global crisis: one step at a time. I thanked my judges and the audience again.
Questions:
I opened the floor for questions directed to me. I was asked where I got the inspiration. I replied saying that frequent visits to India made me realize how "doing your best" is subjective when it shouldn't be. Women in India have to "do their best" in situations they are forced into: housewives, prostitution, etc. It inspired me to do something to at least give these women an opportunity to change their lives and achieve their full potential. Another audience member asked me, "will you do this again?" I explained my trip to India over the summer to volunteer with the organization "People for Parity" and how I wanted to learn more about volunteering abroad and helping abroad before I took anymore steps. However, I am in touch with FunAsia radio and wanted to bring "Sheroes and Heroes Unite" to the radio. This way, people do not have to physically come to workshops and events like these and can be constantly aware of the troubles around them. One of my judges asked me, "did you feel empowered during your thesis process?" I replied, "yes, I was very empowered. I felt as if I had control over at least my own life. I was doing research, typing, and executing everyday. I was in touch with my EdGE mentors and my thesis mentors, who helped me come up with "RISE" within "Sheroes and Heroes Unite." Everyday, I was learning something new. I made connections with people here today and throughout my thesis, which reminds me that I am not alone on this long journey I have ahead of me." That was it for the questions session for me. I allowed my friends to come up, introduce themselves, and talk a little about their reflections on my thesis and on the event overall. They did great as well. I thanked them as well. The IANT organizers gifted us with some cash and lilies. (:
That was it for the presentation overall. I enjoyed it a lot. My judges were sweet as were the audience members. I gave them my contact info in case they had any new ideas or feedback. I am glad the presentation part of my thesis is finally over. I have been working on my process paper ever since.
E - execute:
This is the last step of my method to approaching gender disparity. The "E" from RISE stands for "execute." Now, that we have discussed our sides, our points of view, and our mutual agreement to this problem being a problem in the first place, we must further the forum to include solutions. They call it "problem solving" because the problem must be "realized" before seeking out a solution. The "S" in "RISE" is cyclical. You have to speak and talk and share until you arrive at a solution. You cannot just speak about a situation once. That's what "headlines" in a newspaper does. For a couple of weeks, Jyoti Singh Pandey and her rape case were in bold and in huge font. Afterwards, things quieted, her justice still lingers, and there are millions of subservient women who could participate in making a better world, but do not know how to break out of precedents and bondages. After bringing the problem into daily conversation, the problem becomes truly personal and important to you. When a group of people, especially women, do this, it empowers them to "thrive" and come together to find a better solution to better lives. Women here have a special type of power. They have the power of social media and organization. They can be the voice for the voiceless until they come up with a solution to return these voices back. However, if women everywhere are voiceless, pleas will never be heard, and women should not even expect to be heard. However, for the day, the "execute" step was to take the whole process home and share it with their family and friends. Hopefully, kids (grassroots) will tell their friends, and these friends will tell their parents, etc. Another part of the step was to ponder upon the question, "how can we empower more people in our community?"
Overview:
Lastly, I went over everything I said briefly. The audience did not know the whole acronym was "RISE" since I was introducing the letters separately. They thought that the steps were easier to remember with such a clever acronym.
Last Steps:
I thanked my audience for participating in the "RISE" workshop by the soon-to-be organization "Sheroes and Heroes Unite." I explained how I was trying to file a 501-c to make "Sheroes and Heroes Unite" a non-profit organization. I am in contact with Jasmit Dhaliwal to help me with these steps. "RISE" was just my first approach/workshop/forum under this "soon-to-be" organization to introduce the topic that is more than important to me: gender equality and my solution to finding the "ultimate solution." My idea is to give space to gather all the common men and women to have a say in solutions as important as these. Although "Sheroes and Heroes Unite" can discuss any problems, I wanted to start with gender equality since that's what I am most interested in and did a year's worth of research about. I want to go step my step. After the sheroes and heroes find some solution to this problem, then we shall move onto another global crisis: one step at a time. I thanked my judges and the audience again.
Questions:
I opened the floor for questions directed to me. I was asked where I got the inspiration. I replied saying that frequent visits to India made me realize how "doing your best" is subjective when it shouldn't be. Women in India have to "do their best" in situations they are forced into: housewives, prostitution, etc. It inspired me to do something to at least give these women an opportunity to change their lives and achieve their full potential. Another audience member asked me, "will you do this again?" I explained my trip to India over the summer to volunteer with the organization "People for Parity" and how I wanted to learn more about volunteering abroad and helping abroad before I took anymore steps. However, I am in touch with FunAsia radio and wanted to bring "Sheroes and Heroes Unite" to the radio. This way, people do not have to physically come to workshops and events like these and can be constantly aware of the troubles around them. One of my judges asked me, "did you feel empowered during your thesis process?" I replied, "yes, I was very empowered. I felt as if I had control over at least my own life. I was doing research, typing, and executing everyday. I was in touch with my EdGE mentors and my thesis mentors, who helped me come up with "RISE" within "Sheroes and Heroes Unite." Everyday, I was learning something new. I made connections with people here today and throughout my thesis, which reminds me that I am not alone on this long journey I have ahead of me." That was it for the questions session for me. I allowed my friends to come up, introduce themselves, and talk a little about their reflections on my thesis and on the event overall. They did great as well. I thanked them as well. The IANT organizers gifted us with some cash and lilies. (:
That was it for the presentation overall. I enjoyed it a lot. My judges were sweet as were the audience members. I gave them my contact info in case they had any new ideas or feedback. I am glad the presentation part of my thesis is finally over. I have been working on my process paper ever since.
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