June 2010 Archives

Marcus and his wife, Amina Evangelista Swanepoel, are in the early stages of founding a new reproductive health NGO in the rural Philippines, Roots of Health. This is one in an occasional series of blogs about their experiences.

"Who can tell me the answer.... Marcus?" I hear the voice of my second grade teacher calling on me to answer a question to which I have no answer. The feeling of humiliation that I'd feel still haunts me today. In class I would always sink into my seat when my teacher uttered those dreaded words. At that point of my life, school was stressful for me, and I didn't like going. My negative experiences regarding school however, pale in comparison to those of the children at Pulang Lupa [in the Philippines].

By Meg Davis

Next month, Asia Catalyst is supporting a delegation of Chinese AIDS activists to go to Vienna for the International AIDS Conference. Like (no doubt) many of you, we've spent a fair amount of time sitting through boring conference presentations around the world. But making a conference presentation valuable and memorable is possible. Here are ten tips we came up with:

By Loretta Wong

When it comes to grassroots AIDS advocacy at the local level, I used to be a fierce lion and fearless tiger in the old days. But I rarely got what I wanted from others, and government stakeholders tried their best to avoid me.

Now that I am getting old(er), I realize that elements of advocacy such as inter-personal relationship, trust and communication are important, too. These may be Chinese, but I do not think these elements exist solely in Chinese culture. I am pragmatic - I really want to see change and improvement as soon as possible. Here are five things I try to keep in mind about grassroots AIDS advocacy.

On June 14-15, the United Nations convened informal hearings in the General Assembly for NGOs on the Millennium Development Goals. The hearings were to prepare states for the more high-profile summit on the MDGs scheduled for September 20-22. Unfortunately, while the NGO presentations were diverse and international, turnout by member states was relatively low.

Since March 2010, we've received a flurry of calls and emails from reporters, donors and lawyers asking about the new regulations on NGOs in China. Here's our take on the regulations that have been causing trans-Pacific headaches, and a few thoughts on what this means for Chinese NGOs in the future.

Asia Catalyst and friends from China and Thailand are going to Vienna in July for the International AIDS Conference in July. Here's where we will be, hope to see you.

GLOBAL VILLAGE

Stop by our "Crossing borders" booth for a packet on how to plan your own human rights research mission, mini-trainings on human rights research, and cool gear from China & Thailand!

By Adam Froiran and Meg Davis

This is the final part from our manual on volunteer management.

In order to run your organization successfully, a core leadership group can have many advantages.  Training volunteers and employees to develop strong leadership skills bolsters your organization's opportunity for growth and sustainability.  Encouraging leadership at all levels of your organization allows for a greater sharing of responsibility and translates to work or projects being consistent, even if somebody has to drop out.

By Josh Clarkson and Meg Davis

This is part four of our manual on volunteer management

It's not easy to keep up motivation among volunteers, that's why positive management is essential to making effective use of your organization's volunteers. Some of the steps detailed below can also help to avoid volunteer burnout.

by Meg Davis

This is part three of our manual on volunteer management.

Now that you have a plan for the volunteers, the next task is to find them, which you can do by talking up your volunteer program in social situations, giving out flyers, sending out emails, posting an ad on your website, or holding volunteer recruitment meetings.

When you have found someone who is interested in volunteering, you should have a set of steps that you can follow for interviewing and "hiring" the volunteer. The steps should be a procedure that is the same for each person, whether the volunteer is someone you just met on the street, or a friend you've known for 20 years. Making everyone follow similar steps for recruitment, and having everyone begin and start at the same time, creates an ethic of fairness in the organization and avoids the impression that the organization is run by cliques (more about that in our section on management).

By Meg Davis

Before you begin recruiting volunteers, you should come up with an outline of the projects you need help with, and create a schedule that involves a few different volunteering opportunities. Different organizations have different schedules for their volunteer programs. Because Asia Catalyst volunteers are mostly students, we usually follow a four-month term.

One of the issues groups ask us about often is how to recruit and manage volunteers. Based on our experience (a lot of our work is done by student interns), and some manuals we consulted online, we are putting together a manual on volunteer management and posting chapters from it to this blog. Please share your own suggestions by posting a comment.