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The last week has been eventful for me, and I have been pondering work and life overall and how to strike a balance between the two. This has shed light on some key insights that will be helpful as I move forward.

Workwise, kickstarting phase 2 for TFI Connect and overall conversations with regions have been rewarding. Just being able to put forward thoughts in a succinct manner has not only helped me identify my strengths but also helping me build muscle in the overall work.

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1. The student alumni deep dive interviews has been the absolute highlight - I have been excited about this project since day 1 but (unsurprisingly) my excitement has shot up by 50% - there's such an interesting mix of pride, anger and excitement when they speak of their past and potential future journeys with TFI.

2. Speaking with external organizations doing similar work to SAW - Shifting Orbits, Muktangan - these are folks choosing to do deep work with small sets - lots to learn and partner with

3. Staff from different teams reaching out to ask if I can help them find student alumni for short internships - great to see the folks thinking about this - will soon set up systems for this

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Diwali and the first week of November
Enjoyed celebrating Diwali, and the first week of November at home has been a memorable one.

Team call with Swetha
Inspired by hearing how the recruitment team shifted their approaches, leading to positive outcomes and measurable success.

Event at Microsoft Office for creators, builders, and women entrepreneurs
Attended a networking event where I connected with aspiring women entrepreneurs and creators. I'm excited to leverage these connections for our cause.

Team experience at TFI 15

I loved the team bonding experience at TFI15 over dinners & Luncheons but also immersing myself in the work that TFI's been doing over the last 15 years

Gathered qualitative data from fellows in Kolkata
Engaged with fellows to understand their perspectives. While they have clarity on post-fellowship goals, many are unsure about the organizations they can apply to. Increased exposure to these organizations would help boost their confidence.

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1. Was working on creating a detailed CD facing report for all our cities to track the survey completion visually. It gives them a look into how many Student Alumni have responded to the SA Survey, not only at city level but also at individual school and cohort level. :)

2. Got to witness some super excitement from our Student Alumni for our upcoming activities. It is absolutely thrilling when they personally text me asking for updates and progress with the SAW activities. Even their impatience to get on board with us is really exciting. <3

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1. Happy about Connect Phase 1 almost closing in with all the improvements and fixes, and excited for Phase 2 which is about to kick off!

2. Small wins in incorporating some feedback on microsite and shaping up the placement report with Shruti.

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Access is directly proportional to Success

When I think about society & its constructs, I fail to make sense of it holistically. Sometimes I feel that I am extremely inclined towards data & math & numbers because there's a set formula to arrive at the result. The formula would treat you the same no matter if you're rich or poor or if you belong to a certain class gender or race- the formula would ALWAYS be fair to you. Anywho, My visit to LIFI was all about witnessing Oi deliver a mini Careers Day (in Hindi )talking about PTOCs & Resumes. So much to share, but the most important thought was witnessing how many systemic barriers prevent certain classes, backgrounds, and religions from living a decent life and how time and again education has been a tool that has helped people from marginalized communities BOUNCE BACK and do life like a hero. In LIFI's context though, I realized how we take information floating around us for granted. Realizing people there didn't have LinkedIn accounts or didn't know what the app was made me sad. Made me wonder how important it is to let the information that floats horizontally float vertically. Made me wonder how important was the comms plan I was working on this week. How dissemination of communication materials can help us build a generation of leaders who can hold a multidisciplinary approach to solving problem statements.

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1. The M&E session - Level Up was an absolute highlight - from a prep, time expended and outcome POV. My favourite session till date :)

2. Small personal wins - I was finally able to calendar time way ahead by thematic areas. I have been absolutely charmed by that concept since I heard about it in the stepback, glad I was able to do it.. :)

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1. Overall, working on projects (Fellow Readiness, Partnerships and Platforms for Alumni) has been quite interesting. I derive a lot of energy from spending time with people from the regions in co-creating the plan for the year to come.

2. I am psyched to begin the second phase of TFI Connect and streamline the outreach for the entire Alumni community.

3. It is great to have Shruti in the city. Discussing the sector, our work, and the way forward while gorging on good food keeps my momentum high.

4. The quick trip to Sonepat last week was replete with learnings and sparked thoughts. From conducting the session in Hindi to thinking through how we build more visibility of TFIx orgs given the context is different is something that has summarised the visit for me.

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Highlights from the week :

Welcoming 650+ Fellows of the 2024 cohort - our largest cohort ever was def the highlight. Have been hearing good stuff about the quality as well. Thinking what placement for such a big number looks like for us but for now do drop a congratulatory note to your friends in Recruitment - this is no ordinary feat!

Schools of Tomorrow - One month to go for the first ever multi org led School Leadership conference in Pune.

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1. Had a quick check in with Deepika with work highlights and way ahead. Good push for thinking beyond what we have tried and how we want to go ahead.

2. The very first draft of our Student Alumni Repository of Resources ready to go out to the cities- almost!

3. We pulled off a Regional Report with an in-depth analysis of Grade 10 Student Board Results city and classroom wise!!

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1. The first highlight of the week was realising that I am nearing the probation completion. The preparation of the conversation allowed me time to reflect on the last three months and the conversation helped me with knowledge, skills and mindset for the next leg of my role/career

2. The second highlight was the anticipation and excitement that followed by planning & supporting the ASL track. Now, I am looking forward to being in Pune and reflecting/strengthening my why of staying in the sector and working towards education

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1. My highlight from the last week has been working on the external placement report which has been a rollercoaster in terms of learning & building rigor.

2. By the virtue of planning team calls, I have had touchpoints with every member of the team. It has helped me understand the ways of working of this team better.

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1. Obviously the Student Alumni survey rollout! Got bombarded by a few texts from staff who hadn't gotten the info that I rejoined till that mail went out so that was fun too :P

2. Realizing I am two months into the role now - this was a mix of emotions both happy and a sense of gotta-shift-gears

3. Looking at Maha's work with Fellow support and Swamini's with Tech on the survey :)

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1. Highlight from last week has definitely been time spent in classrooms and to see so many partnerships on ground - reminder of lot of good work is already happening and we don't need to do everything alone.

2. Connect Phase 2 - The first draft of wireframes look very good thanks to Oi and Amogh's vision and understanding of their stakeholders needs - excited about rolling out the directory to Alumni soon

3. Student Alumni Database - After a 7 months gap - happy to see this off the ground and hoping to keep the momentum.

4. Staffing - Excited to finally close on the hiring process - Prakriti and Sakshi join as consultants this month making us fully staffed now :)

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Really excited about kickstarting Phase 2 for Connect and the connect/careers dashboard is shaping up well!

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1. The Placement Report of the Cohort of 2022 is almost ready for external sharing and I am excited at the possibilities it opens in terms of partnerships.

2. I've been making an intuitive dashboard in sheets for the Organizational Database. Just the realization that I'm getting more efficient at creating dashboards have kept me happy this week.

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1. Have just been back from the Institute where I got a chance to talk to a few of our Student Alumni. Here's an amazing response I got for the prompt: What are a few things that come to your mind when you think of SAW?

2. The Student Deep Dive interviews are a blast: So many insights and stories of achievements of our Student Alumni! And what's one thing that stands out the most? Their long lasting love and conviction to learn more and contribute towards the community. :)

3. Working on setting up a Student Alumni Database Dashboard on SF. A little difficult to navigate through the 10000 different filters and fields+ millions of limitations to come up with one chart but its been fun. Definitely learned a lot more about Salesforce as a platform. Have finally been somewhat successful in creating a table that catches the live status of the Student Alumni Survey responses!

4. Have also gotten the first ever round of Student Feedback on our Post G10 Repository! So many insights on what to change from instructions, visuals, font to content.

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1. Mumbai Trip - interacting with students from Xaviers College as part of the recruitment session. Brand recall and aspiration is high, still unsure of their motivation towards our work.

2. Quality time with folks away from the desk was a big booster last week - day long drunch with tanya, lunch with our newest team member - prakriti, gossip session with an ex recruiter - Harini and catchup time with miss funny bones - Srividhya.

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1. Spending time with regions and building depth in the work: spent last week conducting an All Regions POC call and collaborating building on relationships more. Im hopeful this will enable our work with the regions.

2. Starting something I truly enjoy: Edvantage with renewed zeal and rigour :)

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1. PES for Hyd is on - Had the opportunity to facilitate a session. Also able to observe the rest. The first debrief was an absolute learning.

2. Thoughts this past week - Grateful that I get to work in groups that hold space and accountability for rigor. Life is a lot more zesty because of that.

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This is a snapshot of Kolkata rains from the new office in town. Rain, for me, signifies new beginnings (contrary to what most folks feel) and energy.

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1. Enabling the execution of College Fair instilled a sense of possibility for the FR work. Given the multiple challenges that inundate this work, hearing Alums speak about the importance of Readiness during the space acted as fuel.

2. I spent a good amount of time with Pradipta and Shohini from the Kolkata team (POCs for all three sub-verticals that I am leading), who gave me a lot of perspective from the ground.

3. An addition to this would be Shruti completing her probation successfully replete with reflections and clear next steps.

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1. Designing SoT and meeting Alumni from different cities. Successful completion of the SL Track Alumni with the first cohort graduating and getting placed in schools.

2. The Campaign for Student Alumni Database designed by the SAW team - looks comprehensive - excited for the team to take this on

3. Saturday Art Class showcase in Pune where i had the opportunity to meet donors and alumni in the region.

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1. I had tons of fun working with the facilitator for the College Fair deck and questions. It has always given me energy to work with people who put in a lot of effort and are on task at all time. It was quite a learning to watch how it transpired on ground too.

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1. Traction on campaigns towards database updation. Hopeful of a ~1k (5%) increase by Aug end.

2. Eka Fellowship visit - gives me confidence to see on-ground deep intervention models for student alumni.

3. Excitement from student alumni that we have connected with when they ask 'what's next?'

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Sri Sri, I know we got just those few days to spend together starting from that full-flop prank you tried to pull till dinner at Toit - and that's special. I wish you discover and grow all that you need and want over the next few months. Take good care of your spirit and body. - Sam

Second time today, checking in - but Sri man you are missed so much... The PJs, the critical thinking and the camaraderie... all of it... Sending across loads of love - Maha

Hey, Sri. Miss your sunshine energy. Lots of love & take care 💙 - shruti

Sri - Missing your mischief in the office! I hope you feel better cause i know you will be bored of Bangalore soon. Hope you use this time to catch up on all your reading, your Cult membership and just taking care of yourself - Love, DG

Hii Sri!!

Really really missing all those mysterious opening sessions about surviving on a deserted island with cannibals, in our team calls lol! I hope you are having a wonderful break to immerse into all the blissful activities you missed on to revitalize your mind and soul!! Hope to see you soon in the office. <3

- Lots of Love and Wishes,

Swa

Sri: Missing your sporadic PJs, your reels about "you know what" and overall your crackhead energy! Hope you get travel galore, eat some scrumptious meals and take good care of yourself. You are dearly missed <3

Love Oi

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1. It's just great fun setting up SAW because I get to think and work on multiple dimensions and see how they all flow together - across tech, user research, comms, platform - exciting to envision where we will get to by EoY.

2. Discussions with Deepika have been great : loving the backward thinking and push to be very clear on where-why effort is going.

3. Swamini and I pulled together a few quick wins like the G10 regional report and the repository set-up. Lots more to go but a start is always a moment to celebrate.

4. Tiny check-ins with Oli and Shru now and then - much love! :)

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1. Thinking and brainstorming spaces with Alumni for Careers ( Sakshi and Sri) and SAW team was fun and productive last week ( Tanya and Sam ). Walked away with a lot of clarity on what the next quarter could look like

2. Tim Davis workshop on Confusion to Clarity - felt lighter, clearer and more connected to the community :)

3. Feedback for the Directory - reading comments from Alumni on how cool this feature is has been such a relief and proud moment.

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1. Worktime with Deepika and Tanya. Enjoyed the depth of thought and balancing simplicity and impact in choices. Very excited for this quarter's sprint and the years ahead of SAW's evolution.

2. The grand work Praks and Swa have been doing with onboarding Student Interns. It's one of my favourite project plans so far. Clear goals, solid resources.

3. Tim's workshop. What a fabulous facilitator. Depth and lightness is a tough balance to sustain and he embodied it effortlessly. The two-days pause to be with Self came at the right time.

4. Getting to meet folks I have been only connecting on email and zoom, felt wonderful. Nitesh, Sitara, Sarthak, NLCs to name a few.

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1. Both the people cluster dinner and the meeting with Tanya were insightful. Dinner was interesting because I got to know about Vishesha's and Aditi's work. Meet with Tanya was a lot of 'food for thought'. I was able to discuss the projects in the last quarter and some of the projects for the next quarter.

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1. One of the highlights has to be the launch of the directory and getting to see the platform come together one screen at a time. The feedback has also been refreshing.

2. I think another highlight would be the depth that Shru and Maha have begun to put in: be it the user journey portal spearheaded by Shruti or the nuanced selection rubric designed by Maha, I think we are on the right track.

3. Getting some appreciation for my work in the last year through some rewards has to be a personal highlight from the week gone by.

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1) Working on the Career Portal has been an extremely rewarding experience in terms of my learning. Have willingly spent more time on it because I enjoyed it ALOT

2)Working on TFI 15 Memes (Look out for them this week) & Registration Analysis has been fun

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1. I think one of the highlights would have to be a conversation with Tanya on what I need to do to be able to kickstart an idea from its nascent stage to execution mode.

2. Finally, getting to see Mentorship take off, I am quite hopeful of it.

3. I have come to value my check-ins with team members as it is actually a breeding ground for new ideas and approaches.

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1. All set to roll out our 2nd Newsletter for Student Alumni with exciting opportunities!

2. UWC admissions finally kickstart for this year. Wishing our students luck to get selected for the program!

3. We have reached 3000 Responses on the Student Alumni Survey!! Finally!

4. First call with ASCRs done, so city focused work is kickstarting. Hoping to see a shoot in the percentage completion for the survey.

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1. Listening to IAS officer Anil Swarup at the LFE Symposium on flaws in implementation of policies esp NEP. Check out his book "Not just a civil Servant" if you get a chance :)

2. Meeting the Rotational Residence Fellows and Learning Grantees - excited to see how they draw learnings from these amazing experiences and share with the larger community.

3. Strides that Student Alumni wing is making across projects :)

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1. The ACSM meet with the Careers Hyd conversation was quite insightful. I definitely took time to pitch Fellow bucketing

2. The TFI narrative space as well enabled me to understand current context better.

3. I am actually beginning to look forward to the separately scheduled brainstorming spaces for FR projects. There's always some food for thought at the end of the meeting and I enjoy that.

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1. Looking at the love the team has been getting from different stakeholders (ext and int) for all the great work across FR, Alum and SAW! Careers Team - Capable Team!

2. Progress we are making at SAW - been consolidating the past 4 months for an SLT-alignment space and damn. Much awesomeness has come alive - way more ahead.

3. Exciting partnerships coming through for Student Alumni - just feeling confident about the folks out there wanting to do good work.

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FINALLY met Vaishnavi! someone I deeply admire for her conviction about teaching in underserved communities. I keep wondering how can we create / nurture more Vaishnavi's.

Space with Learning Grantees -- Incredible to hear about how they have been able to leverage their learnings and apply it.

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FINALLLY met Vaishnavi! Someone I admire deeply for her conviction to continue teaching in underserved communities :) I wonder how can we create and nurture more Vaishnavis.

Meeting the Learning Grant Recipients -- hearing about their learnings and how some have already started applying their learnings.

I finish a month of being back at work :)

On a personal note, I am very grateful to three friends -- one who is now my morning buddy (2) another friend who despite her own challenges made time and checked-in on me. She spoke to me for two hours and that's a HUGE energy investment for her (3) A third friend who was my sounding board and gave me more confidennce.

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1. Lots of exciting things going on at the backend for Career Fair Prep. Learning things about M&E while building context & sheets for Career Fair M&E. Been working on Career Fair Brochure as well

2. Excited about tracking MY LBS and tracking shifts.

3. Learning so much about designing learning spaces for large groups over zoom through the People Cluster Call Plans & Getting to know different people outside of the vertical is fun

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1. I spent quite sometime on ground last week with Deepika being in town. The immersions and overall spending time with Deepika were a respite from the daily hustle.

2. Facilitating Careers Day in Delhi and having an external facilitator be a part of it. Witnessing the power of someone being in this sector for so long conduct a session for Fellows. Rahul, Co-founder Arthan actually executed certain pieces for Careers Day in Delhi.

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1. This week a standout was just being a part of the conversation that focused on aligning co-facilitators for one of the Workshops for TFI 15. The way Ram smoothly navigated the conversation to ensure all the facilitators are aligned was quite a learning. I have always been apprehensive about navigating conversations that have multiple people collaborate wherein each of them belongs to not only different schools of thought but also are not very flexible. Immense learning and an absolute highlight for sure.

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1. Nate getting the Lighthouse role :)

2. EiE space at TFI15 is 80% done, was inspiring to meet all the panellists (and learn that chicken gets sold on streets in Dhaka)

3. It was nice to be seen -- a couple of staff reached out to me to be their sounding board recommended by their managers

4. Met Payoshni, a predecessor to Alumni and Careers team. She gave me a lot of food for thought from a retrospective place. Lots of good nudges.

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1. Student Alumni spaces - meet-ups, upskilling sessions co-led by Student Alumni in planning, kickstarting next week. So excited for this.

2. With Database Updation project, as certain channels and campaigns have gotten exhausted, I am curious to see what this-is-mad strategies we can play out now.

3. Check-ins with D and T have been valuable in seeing the long-term for SAW and anchoring in what I'd want to build a case for so what are the pilots to run in the next 6 months

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1. I spent delving into LBS data and making correlations.

2. I look forward to planning and executing a meaningful Stepback towards which I am working along with Sam, Sri & DG

3. I am also excited about testing the career fair portal. We have realigned on requirements & timelines with the tech

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1.Spending time with Shru, Oi and Sakshi in Delhi was definitely the highlight from last month

2. Being able to take a break to recuperate before the ops madness begins for TFI15 and APAC

3. Careers Day in Delhi - good to get some face time with 2023 Fellows

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1. Careers Day- Hyd

Insights and learnings both from a content and needs perspective.

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Yet to experience highlights this week :)

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1. Working on the Career Fair Portal end to end and seeing the changes come alive was a highlight too big

2. Got a chance to moderate for the first time in this role. Was a big learning experience

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I think this week a highlight for me would be seeing Shru problem- solve and manage multiple priorities. Be it issues with the portal or ensuring correct data comes to us, I feel there has been a long learning curve for her :)

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Excited for Kiwa's space on 31st

More to come(?)

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Database report is coming out so well! GO PRAK!

Witnessing Swa get more excited and take initiative within SAW - and how quickly she learns with critical feedback

Pehel on Sunday!!!

Planning for stepback - psyched about that week together.

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Drafted v.1 of the SAW data report! P cool looking through all the data we've collected over the last year.

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1. I was able to stay on track with GSC execution and ensured that I had planned ahead enough. This resulted in me closing everything before my leave. This was a definite highlight.

2. I am excited about the learning space for mentees. The discussion on the session flow was very exciting.

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Highlights were definitely seeing the team lead the network breakthroughs at the people cluster call this week! Folks are so intrigued by our work and also eager to collaborate !

My other highlight was watching the Army Day parade and getting covered as audience on Doordarshan haha

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I feel this year is my year hahahah.

I feel very happy working lately. There's right amount of stimulation for me to thrive.

By creating dashboards, tracking numbers and helping ffellows real time with their grievances- I feel I have come a full circle or the circle is going to complete like really soon <3

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Working on the SAW report! Drafted v.1, sm fun!

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1. Have been on the ground for almost 2 weeks now. Have been working closely with the Panaah Team on Pehel.

2. Have been working on a secret pilot project lol stay tuned!

3. Designing our own microsite!! :)