Advocacy

Wednesday, August 13, 2014

BLOG # 2

Ruba Hindi

CONF 370

3 credits (135 hrs)

Internship with Partners-Jordan, Amman-Jordan- Second Blog

By the end of the first month, I had facilitated few meetings during my internship at Amman-Jordan. The first one was with the financial Consultant at Partners-Jordan, to discuss the way of assisting local partners to advocate effectively for greater transparency and accountability in the Jordan National Budgets. Unlike the US, Jordanian government never invited or engaged the public with the pre-budget session or even provide formal details or summery about the yearly national budget. So, I understood from the meeting that the organization’s main objective is to enhance opportunities for public participation in the budgeting process as well as to improve public access to timely and accurate information on Municipal budgets and expenditures and provoke the public awareness. From my point of view, to steer the public awareness to create this closer bond with any political and economic involvement with the constituents is an opportunity to build a better relationship between the citizens and the government in order to create more responsive dialogue.

Even with the second meeting I was really impressed with the professional strategies of NGOs and their role to train some participants from different governorates in Jordan on advocacy skills and coalition building. For a moment I recall all what I studied in our field and connected with what I was hearing in the meeting and make me more curious to know more about the project. And actually I pushed myself more to be part of the team who is going to one of the rural area for the advocacy program which will be this Saturday.

Third meeting I attended, I was really happy to see the consular officer from the US Embassy, who reminded me of back home. I learned from this meeting that the donor country for any project should go through with the progress of the project between times to time. In general, by facilitating the meetings, I learned a lot about the organization, how it functions, its challenges, and much more. Most importantly, I learned any foreign fund programs placed candidates in nominated community organizations to help the developing countries internal development and sustainability. I had no prior training in development, fundraising, or grant writing, everything I know now has been learned through these meetings and through my help in drafting and proof reading the organizations’ projects.

The internship experience so far enhanced my learning skills to connect more what I have learned over the past three years in classrooms and what I am I already experiencing at the field. I think my objectives met the office’s expectation as I wrapped up my final fantastic hours at the office. But still I need to finish facilitating the field training which will be for the three upcoming Saturdays.

Posted by ruba hindi at 12:15 AM

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