Jennifer Van Winkle is our new Programme Development Director for Emerge Lanka, it was her birthday last week and along with the usual cake Jen had a better plan, she wanted to teach the girls how to make Macaroni and Cheese American style. We had also planned a fun day for the girls and they showcased their talents with drawings and painting, some of them drew new patterns for our future jewelry designs and others landscapes and flowers. We were surprised how innovative these patterns

…apparently our girls do! While surveying a group of potential participants we found that almost all of the girls were interested in obtaining work in a garment factory. In fact, for many of them it was their number one career choice. This came as a real shock to me. In the states, factory work is typically viewed as a form of oppression and exploitation, but after talking with the girls I started to see the industry from their perspective. First off, let me clarify that

This is my first official blog entry as an Emerge programs volunteer and I’d like to introduce myself. I am a Sri Lankan who grew up in Nigeria and currently a doctoral student at MIT, taking a semester off from school this fall and spending it in my beautiful island home. I am a biological engineer interested in vaccines, public health, public policy, and probably just about everything else under the sun (albeit to different degrees). But most of all, I am very very human. Over the past

As of this May, I was only just beginning to learn about Emerge. Now, it’s September and I’m completely immersed in all things Emerge related. The last two months have been absolutely frenetic. Emerge Lanka has become an official entity. We’ve identified and started to narrow down a list of potential expansion sites. One fantastic short term volunteer has come and gone while Jennifer, Prabhani, and I have arrived and taken over. Meanwhile, I’ve begun to get to know and love the girls at the

It has been always the girls wish to see us all in sari, ever since Ellen and April wore sari for the Sinhala/Tamil New year celebrations, the girls wanted me to wear sari. We had an excuse, it was Alia and Ellen’s going away party last week, Ellen was going back home to take up position as US Director and Alia on her way to England to continue with her studies after a short visit. We also had volunteer Prabhani who was visiting us to