Wednesday, August 3, 2016

VTS Post 2

Nikhil Singhal
July 29, 2016
VillageTech Solutions
Skip Stritter

            Working at VTS this summer has been an incredible experience. Even though, as I mentioned before, we couldn’t interact directly with the people we were trying to help, VTS instead created a strong community within the volunteers to foster cooperation between teams as well as between teammates. I thought this teamwork aspect of volunteering was a vital part of the VTS experience that I’d missed the year before, since it allowed us to get so much more done with more passion for our work and the difference we could make.
            I also found that my appreciation for indirect volunteering groups (like Looma) grew because of our work and the environment. Before this summer, volunteer opportunities like this seemed like they were scarce mostly because they were so much less important, but I began to change my mind about half way through the summer. While reviewing our project, one of the VTS founders told us about all the hoops they had had to jump through just to get access to Nepali government textbooks to get material, not to mention the whole process of implementing the Looma program in public schools. I started appreciating all the work that had to be done behind the scenes to make anything happen for an organization like this. I realized that, without our work here, volunteers couldn’t do much of anything even if they were directly in Nepal.

            I think my work at VTS this summer will truly make a difference. This simple tool we created will completely revamp the dictionary, which could greatly improve their language development and be the difference needed to give them the opportunities they deserve. And maybe it won’t make as a big difference as that, but, if it helps just one child, I’ll be satisfied.

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