Social Service as a career option
India isn't one country.
Its actually two seperate countries within one. One of these, has as its citizens, the poor people, the illiterate, the people who survive on less than a dollar a day. The other country has people who are richer and a whole lot more educated. The citizens of these two countries though living in close proximity have extremely disparate lifestyles.
The former's thoughts are entirely oriented around survival, the latter think more about self-actualization. The former's universe is a small village, the latter's is the whole globe and beyond. The former has probably made less than five phone calls in his/her entire life, the latter designs the latest communications chips. We will have a man on the moon soon, but a large majority of our population havent travelled more than 50 miles from their place of birth.
We have the best doctors in the world and the worst medical facilities. The best programmers and horrible IT infrastructure.
There is a big gulf.
There are many theories on how this gulf should be bridged. There are proponents of the trickle-down approach which seeks to primarily help the latter country succeed in the hope that their wealth will trickle down.
And then there are the socialists who think a bottom-up approach would work better. They believe that development at the grass roots is more important, and should be carried out even at the cost of modernizing the latter country.
Both of these are good theories, but thats all they are, theories.
What we need in India is to make social service/development a viable career option. Consider the situation as is. In order to become a social worker, you have to make huge sacrifices in comfort/security. There is no clear guidance on how to get involved. There is no coordination. There is no training to be a good social worker.
Social service currently is highly romanticized/emotional in India, with movies like Swades perpetuating that image. In order for social service to stop being a cottage industry dependent on the sacrifices of a few and the guilt-driven contributions of a few more, we need to take a practical stand.
Currently, you have well meaning people with the best intentions and absolutely superb hearts running social service projects - But some of them have no clue how to market, colect funds, manage funds, organize things etc .... And thats a problem.
Social service should be treated just like any other industry. NGOs should go to college campuses and recruit bright, capable students, pay them well and make them run NGOs like a well managed organization. There should be a clear career path for young people who want to get into social service - Maybe even something like the Short Service Commission in the Army where you can serve for five years and then move on to other things, if you like.
People should'nt have to make a choice between comfort and social service. These two can co-exist.
Of course, the IIT engineer who chooses to join an NGO as Operations Manager won't get paid as much as if he/she worked at Morgan Stanley, but they arent being asked to live in a hut and eat gruel either.
We need this to happen. And quickly.
Its actually two seperate countries within one. One of these, has as its citizens, the poor people, the illiterate, the people who survive on less than a dollar a day. The other country has people who are richer and a whole lot more educated. The citizens of these two countries though living in close proximity have extremely disparate lifestyles.
The former's thoughts are entirely oriented around survival, the latter think more about self-actualization. The former's universe is a small village, the latter's is the whole globe and beyond. The former has probably made less than five phone calls in his/her entire life, the latter designs the latest communications chips. We will have a man on the moon soon, but a large majority of our population havent travelled more than 50 miles from their place of birth.
We have the best doctors in the world and the worst medical facilities. The best programmers and horrible IT infrastructure.
There is a big gulf.
There are many theories on how this gulf should be bridged. There are proponents of the trickle-down approach which seeks to primarily help the latter country succeed in the hope that their wealth will trickle down.
And then there are the socialists who think a bottom-up approach would work better. They believe that development at the grass roots is more important, and should be carried out even at the cost of modernizing the latter country.
Both of these are good theories, but thats all they are, theories.
What we need in India is to make social service/development a viable career option. Consider the situation as is. In order to become a social worker, you have to make huge sacrifices in comfort/security. There is no clear guidance on how to get involved. There is no coordination. There is no training to be a good social worker.
Social service currently is highly romanticized/emotional in India, with movies like Swades perpetuating that image. In order for social service to stop being a cottage industry dependent on the sacrifices of a few and the guilt-driven contributions of a few more, we need to take a practical stand.
Currently, you have well meaning people with the best intentions and absolutely superb hearts running social service projects - But some of them have no clue how to market, colect funds, manage funds, organize things etc .... And thats a problem.
Social service should be treated just like any other industry. NGOs should go to college campuses and recruit bright, capable students, pay them well and make them run NGOs like a well managed organization. There should be a clear career path for young people who want to get into social service - Maybe even something like the Short Service Commission in the Army where you can serve for five years and then move on to other things, if you like.
People should'nt have to make a choice between comfort and social service. These two can co-exist.
Of course, the IIT engineer who chooses to join an NGO as Operations Manager won't get paid as much as if he/she worked at Morgan Stanley, but they arent being asked to live in a hut and eat gruel either.
We need this to happen. And quickly.
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