Editing January 30 meeting: the details: by Vipul (section)

==Other issues==

''The ordering of these items has been changed from that in the [[Agenda for January 23 meeting|original agenda]], and is faithful to the order followed in the actual meeting. In particular, the item on payment to student volunteers has been shifted out to another section''

===How to attract the kids===

''Agenda points'':

The general impression on Saturday and Sunday was that if the kids were sufficiently enthused, we could get them in large numbers. Mr. Rajesh distributed toffees after our session on Sunday, and said that toffees would provide an important incentive to the students. However, the eagerness of the students indicated that toffees were probably a very negligible incentive compared to the other incentives/issues.

It has been suggested that we try to convince the students and parents of our keenness and seriousness. This could be done in various ways:

* By talking to the parents and gathering their feedback, trying to get them more on board
* By giving books etc. to the children and offering the parents some concrete gain that the children have got out of it
* By attaching to us an organization such as AID India

It has also been suggested that we offer a more substantial end-class incentive or ''reward'' than a toffee, something that could be seen as being of value to both the kid and the parent. No suggestions have yet been received as to what that reward could be.

''Discussion'': All the agenda points were strongly agreed with, and it was pointed out that books as well as association with AID-India could go a long way in convincing children, parents and the project office of our sincerity and (?) professionalism.

Bodhayan felt that though toffees may not be a major incentive, they may be a minor attraction that would keep the kids from leaving when their attention was waning.

''Decisions'': Bodhayan would be the ''toffee manager'', viz he would arrange for the toffees. The toffees would be arranged from Spark funds.

===Interfacing with the project office===

Mr. Rajesh, the safety in-charge, said that given our ability to communicate in the languages that these people knew, we could help him in giving an orientation session to the workers on issues, of hygiene and diseases so that the workers could cooperate with the efforts to maintain cleanliness in the area. This way, we could also gather more feedback from the workers.

The project office was also keen to provide us other support, such as a better teaching area. It is up to us to convince the project office that our work is capable of producing real results.

{{Jayanth}} raised the very important point that CMI Spark members should be careful not to talk against the project office in any way, or appear to be sympathetic if the construction workers talk against the project office.

It was generally agreed that CMI Spark members had no reason to talk against the project office given the sincere efforts made by them to support us.