A Room to Read with Unmesh Brahme
A Room to Read's Country Director Unmesh Brahme had quite a bit to tell us about his different paths in our 9 Questions interview with him.
BY Achala Upendran | 18-02-2014
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| Unmesh Brahme |
But first and foremost these days, Brahme is the Country Director of education venture, Room to Read, which focuses on providing support to underprivileged children to will enable them to pursue education through literacy programs.
Braingainmag.com caught up with Brahme at the recent Salwan Media One Globe 2014 Knowledge Conference, to chat about the different projects he’s been involved in, and the path he’s taken to get here.
- Can you tell us a little about the Climate Civics Institute?
- How can students get involved in this venture?
- How did the Yale World Fellowship help you build upon this idea?
- You’ve shifted a great deal within your professional life, but stuck more or less with sustainability initiatives. What started you on that path?
- How do you think this has helped you?
- How did you get involved in the Room to Read project?
- Can you tell us a little about that?
- Do you think CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) is a career path students can take to right after graduation?
- Do you think you require a specific background to get into this field?
At the Institute, we’re interested in finding out about the impact of climate change on communities, on the ground. We want to document how grassroots communities adapt to climate change in their own way.
Students can get internships with us. But since it’s mostly a research institute, I don’t know how interested they might be. I don’t know many students who are into climate change research.
It’s a very transformational program. As a Fellow at Yale, I not only attended classes, but also taught and did seminars. The Program really challenges you. You interact with people who are leaders in different fields and faculty interaction is very important. It’s a program which allows you to enhance the leader you already are, to become a better leader.
I was wildlife enthusiast, and that’s where my love for nature and this domain came from. I’ve since applied my interest in sustainability to various aspects of the corporate world, like advertising and marketing, even heading sustainability initiatives for HSBC. I began my career with Oxfam, so I’ve seen sustainability thinking across various spectrums.
If you wear lots of different hats, you become a better person. It’s harder for people to take you for a ride as well. Also, it makes it impossible for people to pin you down. I love going to a climate change conference and presenting my education card. People always ask “What are you doing here?”!
I was looking for organisations which focus on the fundamentals. At Room to Read, we don’t have any bombastic jargon. We simply focus on enabling children to read, to go to school. Many children want to go to school, but they can’t for various reasons like domestic violence, abuse, lack of essentials like food or clothing. At Room to Read, we are known for our literacy program, but we also run a mentorship program for students.
This is a program for female students between the grades 7 to 12. Every girl in the program has a trained mentor, who functions as a role model and is available both for remedial academic help, as well as to listen to their problems. Our intention is to ensure that in the six years the girls are with us, they complete schooling and can apply to college, or get a job that leaves them financially independent. Today we have alumni who have finished their college degrees and are working—no one would have thought that possible, especially the girls!
Why not? I’ve lived all my life in CSR. Especially now, with the regulations that call for the opening up of CSR departments in every private sector company, students have a lot of opportunity to get into this field.
I don’t think so. You need guts and the ability to think quickly. I’ve hired people in CSR from diverse academic backgrounds. If you can work with people and genuinely care about making a difference in the world, CSR is a good place to be.
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