NGO internships for Symbi……Prachi Nayak
Students of the Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communication (SIMC) have embarked on the mandatory six-week internships with NGOs all over India. The postgraduate programme students will be marked on their fieldwork; and they will share their experiences with their fellow students.
A 10-member committee was formed to place 225 student-interns in NGOs. “We felt that it was necessary for students to gain hands-on experience and help solve social issues,” said SIMC director Ujwal Kumar Choudhary.
Since SIMC students are aspiring communication professionals their fieldwork will relate to helping internal and external communication of NGOs. “Students will undertake fieldwork related to improving and helping internal and external communication of NGOs. We want to help them in creating posters, brochures and enable them to garner more funds,” said Vaishali Chopra, an organising committee member for NGO internships.
Chopra is interning at Freedom Foundation. She takes care of 28 Aids-affected children housed in the foundation and has volunteered to teach them after school hours.
Prajakta Deshmukh is interning at Muktangan, a de-addiction centre at Pune. “An aspiring PR professional, I’m working on organising workshops, rallies and media campaigns for the NGO,” said Deshmukh. She also plans on conducting a communication audit to assess awareness among the public about the organisation’s activities.
Another student Shreya Shroff is interning at NGO HelpAge. She is a part of its mobile unit. “The medicare unit will tour 40 centres in Mumbai and Thane. A doctor will help over 150 patients above 50 years of age at a nominal amount of Rs10 per patient. A health check-up and disbursal of free medicines are also included. We will visit each centre twice over the next few weeks and monitor patients,” informed Shroff.