Technical Assistance

“The great thing about India is…everything you hear about it is true.”  An Indian told me this today.  He meant everything.  That it is overcrowded; that it is hot; that the food is delicious; that the food will make outsiders sick; that there are many, many poor people; that it is chaotic; that there is a terrible beauty amid the chaos…and I have found in the first few days that he is right.  Especially the getting sick off the food—this incapacitated me yesterday—I spent 20 of the 24 hours in bed.  But I am full strength today!  Pratham, my host, took me to Subway for dinner tonight.  A “safe” call, he said.

Thought of the day: so in microfinance, there is a common back-up of “technical training.”  That is to say, I will give you this loan, but you have to come in for once-a-month business classes and I’ll help you run a business.  In the education finance industry, it would look like this: we give you the loan, and we give you a value-added proposition of  teacher training, school administration help, and more.  Here’s the problem: people who run a business don’t want to be told how to do things better if they think they are doing it fine to begin with.  It’s as if we were playing a pick-up basketball game on a playground, you and I had just met, and I took you aside for free throw lessons.  It might make you marginally better, but you’d rarely listen!  That’s why it’s difficult to pair “technical assistance” with microfinance.

ERB

 

Soccer, languages, chaos, and more

So the first weekend has come and gone. After my first day of work, I spent the weekend getting adjusted to the chaos of India, adjusting to the heat (though it’s no worse than back home in Georgia), and meeting the other folks here. There are a lot of expats in Hyderabad. It is the nerve center for a lot of the microfinance/social investment/development work that is done in India, so there are a lot of people here, most of whom are on jobs much more permanent than mine. A lot of people thinking outside-the-box and spending years on the ground making it happen. Most of the firms here are for-profit; a controversial part of development, but the people here believe that it’s the only way to go.

Having a for-profit development firm means, according to some, that when you have corporate investment in the very poor in India, you have it as a revenue-seeking device, not a “marketing” device. And if the investments turn a profit, it means that people won’t jump ship when times get tough. Many NGOs start, last a couple of years, and fizzle out (if they don’t have a deadline, say, an election or a campaign, or a permanent funding source, it’s REALLY hard)–so people believe that the capital inflows and investment will be HUGE if there are reasons other than simple change-the-world mindsets going on. I am sure I’ll expand more on this later. I am still thinking through what I think.  Your thoughts?

This weekend was a blast. I am glad that I have had this time to get settled–I feel “adjusted” now. The streets are packed with people, moto-rickshaws, cars, scooters, bikes–anywhere you can fit a person or a vehicle, there they are. Hyderabad is known for biryani, as I said–I tried it today, and it was very good. Hyderabad also has the largest Muslim concentration in India, and we went and visited two of the biggest mosques; a beautiful part of the city. I met this one street-kid who was brilliant. He was eight and spoke about 7 languages. I mean, he knew how to say “Hello,” “How are you,” and “Goodbye” in all the languages I knew, and he was proficient at the languages I knew better (English, Spanish). He said he followed foreigners around all day when they came through and asked questions. I wanted to talk to him all day.

There is a ten-year-old in my neighborhood that runs a convenience-store stand. He is learning English and he also wanted to talk, so we chatted for an hour today. He goes–you guessed it–to a school that charges $6 a month in the neighborhood. This afternoon, I played soccer with Pratham, my roommate, and a bunch of guys my age from Cameroon, Nigeria, Kenya, and Cote d’Ivoire on a dusty vacant lot. And that’s the weekend.

I visit my first school tomorrow afternoon. Till then, stay dry–monsoon season starts this week.

ERB

 

Day 1

Folks,

Greetings from Hyderabad! As you notice, we’ve got a new title, a new look, and a new topic. Biryani, not barbecue, is the famous dish of Hyderabad, India, and I am sure I’ll have plenty over the next span of my life. I am writing from my new apartment in a section of the city I am not nearly well-enough acquainted with yet. India is explosive. The sounds, the chaos of the streets (I had to sprint across several streets today, nearly avoiding bikes, moto-rickshaws, and cars), the honking, the spices, and the smells are all suffocating—as is the heat and humidity. Georgia prepared me well for the weather, but not for the chaos.

I will be here for the next five weeks. On the 20th of June, I leave for my other big project, Vote From Home–I will write more about it later, but you can check it out at www.votefromhome08.com.

I have been traveling for the last 24 hours for my new job, which I’ll be doing the next five weeks. Hyderabad is the micro-finance capital of the world, and I am working in education finance, which is a cutting-edge development in provision of education for the very poor. Microfinance works like this: banks or agencies will give very small loans to individual entrepreneurs—usually very poor entrepreneurs, like a woman selling handmade baskets at a shop, or a group of women selling vegetables at the market—and the individuals will repay it. It has revolutionized small business in very poor places, and Muhammad Yunus, one of the fathers of microfinance, won the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize. Microfinance has its downsides, to be sure—to be profitable, microlenders charge as much as 28% interest—but very poor people are getting economic opportunities that they wouldn’t get otherwise. I am learning about this enterprise every day, and I will keep posting my thoughts.

The program I am working for is really exciting, though. I am working for an education fund set up by the largest individual microfinance investor in the world. He has traveled across India dozens of times in the last ten years, and came across a phenomenon—low-budget private schools for the very poor. He has had a lot of success with microfinance, and is applying the principles of microfinance to systematically supporting these schools. Educational entities in India cannot get funds from the government. When the University of Virginia wants to build a new library or basketball arena, it floats a bond with the Commonwealth of Virginia—that can’t happen here. In India, and in Hyderabad, particularly, education is a very high cultural value (especially in Hyderabad, because it is on a plateau, and there is really no agriculture—education is many kids’ only ticket to success—the jobs aren’t there otherwise. Sound familiar?) But the state provision of education is terrible. The schools only teach in Hindi, and parents and kids want to learn English. Class sizes are upwards of 90 at times. Teachers often don’t show up.

In response, the poorest people in Hyderabad want good education, but can’t get it. There seems to be a market. Many entrepreneurs have started low-budget schools (schools that charge 600 rupees a month—about $14—or, in some cases, as low as $4), and parents are flocking to them. I am working this summer for a firm that is figuring out ways to invest/systematically support these schools, so that’s the project. This model could support millions of low-income kids across the world if done well. This world has got a lot of problems—we need the collective ingenuity and creativity of humanity to solve them (meaning the best schools possible). No pressure, right?

A side note: I am a strong defender of public education in the US. I am against school vouchers simply because I don’t think that the private sector can meet the demand for the public sector, and the poorest Americans won’t have access to private schools—and a mass diversion of public resources will only exacerbate the problem. (I am a strong supporter of the charter school movement, in many cases—I think it’s one of the best shots we have—but that’s another discussion.) But this India case seems to be a place where my intuitions about budget private schools were wrong. In some ways, it seems too good to be true—so I am going to investigate if, in fact, it is.

India is exciting and exhausting, probably mainly because I have been traveling for 24 straight hours. Stay tuned—you’ll notice some changes in the blog (because we are no longer in The Mother Country—in fact, we are in the former Crown Jewel)—and now that I am actually doing something, the blog is a lot more topical.

ERB

 

BIG CHANGES

Big Changes around the blog.

As I have taken a week post-exam hiatus from blogging (rest, packing, and an amazing trip to Krakow), I am moving on to India tomorrow.  I am working in an education finance organization that is looking for innovative solutions to education of the very poor.

COMING THIS WEEK:

A New Theme.  Since I will no longer be in The Mother Country for the next five weeks, the theme of the blog will change.  I will be in the (Former) Crown Jewel of the British Empire, India.

A New Topic.  Since I won’t be studying, but will actually be DOING things on a day-to-day basis, there should be more evolving action.  Probably less politics and more on-the-ground, in-the-trenches, education in Hyderabad, India.

A New Location: India!

Stay tuned,

ERB

 

On the front page of every Economist worldwide…

America is doing well for itself.

 

The Pound

and I don’t mean the British currency.

This article talks about how the Obamas are revolutionizing campaigning by bringing the “pound” (the “fist bump”, the, as the New York Times calls it, “Closed-fisted high five,” or the “fist-to-fist thumbs-up”) to pop culture.  Already popular in sports (the British golfers love to make fun of how Tiger always fist-pounds his caddie after a great shot, and it’s more popular in team sports)–it’s penetrating pop culture now.

ERB

 

This Week

I’ve been a bit quiet this week, as I’m reviewing for my exam on Monday.  Oxford has very few evaluations throughout the year—just a three-hour exam where anything from the term is fair game.  I’ve been tackling questions such as:
What are the main factors of democratic stability?
Do federal systems encourage or discourage majority representation?
What are the main causal effects of electoral law?
“There are no perfect ways to compare governments; just strategies that work better or worse under certain circumstances.  Discuss.”
And much more.  This is what I’ve been learning in class this year.

Earlier this week, I spent the day in London.  I went in the morning to get my visa to travel to India, and I stayed the rest of the day. We’ve got our finals coming up in a bit, and London is a great place to get some work done, if you know where to go.  I could walk around London without running into anyone I knew—a welcome distraction.

St.-Martins-in-the-Fields is a famous old church right by Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery.  It is home of some of London’s most historic moments, and served as one of the largest bomb shelters during the Blitz.  In the basement, the crypt—with vaulted ceilings and tombstones—has a café with bottled Cokes and free wireless internet.  Enough to make me happy!

And Wednesday, we had a fundraiser for the project I am working on now: Vote From Home (more on this in a bit).  We raised over $1,000, so it was very exciting!

ERB

 

I just got this e-mail from a friend in Africa who speaks about twenty words of English

can I vote for Obama? How?

All the world wants this change for your country.

 

Congratulations!

Congratulations to Cooper Swift, my friend who is now the 2008 canoe poling national champion for the Intermediate Slalom and Intermediate Wildwater.  He beat contenders from all across the country over the weekend in Missouri. Way to go!

 

Obama is the nominee

I don’t know where to start.

Although Hillary hasn’t dropped out yet, the international media is overwhelmingly declaring it “Over.”

I have received e-mails today from China, the Middle East, and across Europe–the places I’ve traveled this year and the people I’ve met–congratulating me on the Obama win.  One reads, “We’re just excited as you are.”  One e-mail from the middle of Europe reads, “You should see how happy people are here.”

I love my country very much, and it’s amazing to see the rest of the world responding the way they are.

Living abroad and studying our country in the global context this year, I am consistently faced with one theme: we have big problems.  But we also have the greatest country in the world.  The line around the U.S. Embassy in London stretches for hours, as people await their chance to enter our country.  We do so much that is the envy of political scientists and citizens everywhere.  But we face a lot of problems, and it’s going to take a lot of will to get through those problems.

I think of how I felt this January, just five months ago, in a cold gym in Iowa with thousands of people chanting, “We’ve got hope.”  It will take more than hope; it will take a commitment from a lot of people to do what’s not always easy.  Obama is not perfect–the last five months have shown that–and he’s not going to change everything completely, but he is very, very good.  And that’s a start.

“Because if we are willing to work for it, and fight for it, and believe in it, then I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal; this was the moment when we ended a war and secured our nation and restored our image as the last, best hope on Earth. This was the moment – this was the time – when we came together to remake this great nation so that it may always reflect our very best selves, and our highest ideals. Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.”

–Barack Obama last night