Project Homecoming

Project Homecoming is a rebuilding effort of The Presbytery of South Louisiana in partnership with Presbyterian Disaster Assistance. They are committed to rebuilding homes devastated by hurricanes Katrina and Rita for those families who are low-income, uninsured, underinsured, disabled, and elderly.With the help of volunteer labor, the make rebuilding affordable for those who would not otherwise be able to return home. The administrative costs are fully funded by Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, so 100% of all donations go directly to building materials, professional services, and furniture for the homes.

What They Do:

Project Homecoming manages reconstruction of homes in greater New Orleans for home owners with verified need. The coordinate, house, and train volunteers from across the country and the world to work on these homes. They also collect donations for unmet needs.

Who They Are:

1. A nonprofit organization with headquarters in New Orleans.

2. Staff of The Presbytery of South Louisiana.

3. Long term and short term volunteers with Presbyterian Disaster Assistance.

4. Long term volunteers through the Young Adult Volunteer program.

5. Long term volunteers through Americorps‘ Louisiana Delta Service Corps program.

What they’ve accomplished:

Since the beginning of 2007, The Presbytery of South Louisiana has:

Housed over 6,500 volunteers.
The volunteers coordinated over 265,000 hours.
Completed work on over 80 homes.
Continued work on over 20 homes.

The history of gating Start:

After hurricane Katrina hit on August 29, 2005, and the flooding due to levee failures abated weeks later, local Presbyterian responders began meeting to determine what to do. With limited communication available, team plans began and PDA had their first meetings in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Emergency supplies, housing, and personnel were linked to Baton Rouge (75 miles from hurricane landfall) and outlying churches for support. Two months after Katrina, hurricane Rita hit the western parishes of Louisiana near the Lake Charles area. Presbyterian churches now had to put a second response plan in effect which was done in the area of the First Presbyterian Church of Thibodaux, which set up food and basic necessities for western parishes. As soon as it was safe to travel in the Katrina-impacted area, First Union Presbyterian Church in Luling set up FISH Camp with temporary housing and food to support the hundreds of volunteers coming in to help. Soon, other Presbyterian churches joined in to offer housing, tools, and protective clothing.Throughout 2005-2006, most of the work involved gutting and removing debris. The work was physically and emotionally taxing for both homeowners and volunteers. Some churches began rebuilding plans late in the year.The rebuilding program breakthrough came when the Project Homecoming organization was formed with the plan to rebuild homes of the neediest who wanted to return. A week long building “blitz” kick started the efforts with training and guidance from Hosanna Industries, Inc. Rebuilding went into full swing with the hiring of construction managers and administrative staff and a case management partnership with Catholic Charities‘Katrina Aid Today program. Long term volunteers were provided through Americorps and PC (USA) Young Adult Volunteers.

Why Help is still needed:

Almost 200,000 homes were destroyed by flooding in the New Orleans area. Eighty percent of the City of New Orleans was flooded. There are uncounted families dispersed across the country wanting to return home.

We have got it from this website:

http://projecthomecoming.net/

Sayra Khan, Kazi Rabeya Basri, Mehedur Rahman, Saleh Ahmed.

Media AdvoCacy

What is Media Advocacy?

Media advocacy is the strategic use of news making through TV, radio and newspapers to promote public debate, and generate community support for changes in community norms and policies. Advocating for the goals of safe, healthy and prosperous communities, identifying barriers to strategic policy implementation, and sharing current research through news making all help policy makers and the general public to more fully engage in creating systemic changes that improve the world we live in.
Reference: http://www.publicstrategies.org/ips_media_advocacy_new_02.htm

Media advocacy refers to collaborate with other organization and the massage sent through mass media like Television, radio and newspapers etc and motivate to changed higher-level policies. Media Advocacy does not work in individual level; it works for the mass people. They communicate with the mass people through the mass media. They change policies by motivating the people who are the policy maker. They are not working for individual changing; they are working for the long lasting environmental changing. At the result, by this process there happen a mass changing in the society.

Media Advocacy is part of a strategy to exert pressure on those whose decisions influence that environment, a strategy that uses the mass media appropriately, aggressively and effectively to support the development of healthy public policies.
-Lawrence Wellack

What are the elements of Media Advocacy?

The elements of media advocacy are:

1. The first element of media advocacy is that our goal to create awareness in the society. Because we are the part of the society. We are working for creating awareness in mass people from HIV/AIDS virus. Gradually the people are affected this virus because of unconsciousness. So we are trying to make conscious among the people.

2. The second step is that the target audience. Everyone in the society is the target audience of our project. But most especially target audiences are the young generation who are about to HIV/AIDS virus, sex workers and who are drug addict. They are the main victimized and disseminator of HIV/AIDS virus. And also the pregnant women who are affected with HIV/AIDS virus.

3. Our massage is for mass people to live healthy and safe life from HIV/AIDS virus and our slogan is ‘Bachte Hole Jante Hobe’.

4. The fourth step is to go for the opinion leader, the educated people, religious persons and the health workers in the villages to motivate them and by taking their help we try to create awareness in the society. On the other hand, in the cities, we go for the health ministers, teachers, and health related persons. At last we go for the mass media like.

5. Basically we are trying to create awareness in the mass people. So we should used mass media like television, radio and newspapers. Also publishing posters, leaflets, billboards, calendar, stickers, and festoons, for creating more awareness in the society. We can also arrange seminars, concerts for creating awareness.

What are the things you will keep in your mind when you are planning Media Advocacy?

In every work, planning is very important. I will follow a strategy when I am going to prepare for media advocacy.

First step: Identify the issue:

Creating awareness from dissemination of HIV/AIDS issue could be 'many people affected by this virus because of unconsciousness, physical relation with an HIV/AIDS affected people, blood transaction with used syringe, and also affected women's baby could be affected.

Second step: Identify the policy solution:

For creating awareness, in cities, we need to go for policy maker or health ministry. Firstly we motivate the ministry level. If they permit us then we go for second step.

On the other hand, in villages, we are going to the opinion leader, teachers, and the mollahs (of the mosque), and we are trying to motivate them by interpersonal communication. Because the villagers are not educated so they could not understand. We motivate the village's leader by interpersonal communication.

Third step: Identify who has the power to create and adopt the policy - the primary intended audience(s):

If we need to create awareness in cities, we make a policy like (Bachte Hole Jante Hobe) and the policy will adopt by the policy makers and the health ministry.

On the other hand, in village the policy will adopt by the opinion leaders. The opinion leaders are much believable for the villager people.

Fourth step: Explore who has the power to influence the decision makers - the secondary intended audience(s):

We can also involve with the organization who are related with the health issue, we also can involve with the organization who are related with drug addiction issue because HIV/AIDS spread the people who are drug addict.

The mass media (Television, radio and newspaper) are an important secondary audience in media advocacy efforts. Also the media can be played to create awareness like we publish posters, leaflets, billboards, calendar, stickers, festoons and much commercial advertisement in Mass Media. It can also motivate the mass people and the policy makers.

Fifth step: Research the implementations of adopting or not adopting the policy:

We are going for research after implementation of adopting the policy or not adopting the policy. We find that the policy makers and the ministers are motivated and the general people also adopting the policy.

Sixth step: Research what the intended audiences (primary & secondary) already know and feel about the issue:

After investigation, we see that people aware of this issue. They (audiences) can understand all the facts about the issue. They are supported the policy solution. We understand that people are talking about the problem of HIV/AIDS, people are aware of this, people make physical relation safely by using condom, people use intact syringe while blood transaction, and also the people who are drug addict they also aware of this.

So I think people are getting aware of HIV/AIDS.

Seventh step: Learn about the different ways to access the types of mass media that the intended audience(s) attends to:

The people who can afford television and radio so they see the commercial advertisement over there they are getting aware of this. It happens basically in the cities.

The people who can afford newspaper they see the adv over there.

Besides that, publishing of posters, leaflets, billboards, calendar, stickers, and festoons also can create awareness in the society.

Result:

We see that after motivating the ministers, making commercial advertisements and publishing posters, leaflets, billboards, calendar, stickers, festoons, creating more awareness in the society. We think it will be successful because people adopt our policy and they respect about their safe and healthy life.

My name: Sayra Khan
My partner: Salahuddin Muhammad and Saleh Ahmed.