Video Volunteers
Video Volunteers based in Goa is working towards creating a sustainable global ‘community media network’. Their innovation is the Community Video Unit model. The organization devises models of sustainable, locally owned media, and develops training programs that give communities journalistic skills, critical thinking and creative skills to run these units and giving the poor a voice that reaches the relevant authorities. Each Community Video Unit (CVU) is started and funded by a local NGO that has chosen to invest in the vision of creating a ‘Global Social Media Network.’ Currently there are 8 CVUs across India in six states, ranging from the largest slum in Asia to the most remote tribal regions of the country. Through these CVU’s Video Volunteers empower communities to lead, connect and change.
What we deliver
The community video unit helps its various participants in a number of ways 1. Community producers, who are from some of the most marginalized communities and sometimes lack basic education, develop higher-order critical thinking facilities as a result of the training provided to them in the CVU’s. Such education is probably the only education which can be said to make good citizens. As a result of the training, they also pick up a life-skill which would make them employable. 2. The community which till today did not have a platform to voice their concerns, now voice their concerns through trained journalists who are from their own communities and thus have greater stake in making their voices heard. 3. In the process of developing a public image for themselves through videos, communities are able to question the very social hierarchies they are embedded in. 4. The community not only makes their voices heard through the video magazines created by the community producers, they also decide the topics which are important to them through the editorial board. 5. The NGO’s and the participatory media world benefit by the new sustainable community participation model developed by VV.
Why is the project unique?
One of the few community video projects designed as a sustainable model. VV constantly assesses the CVU to see how to support it in becoming more financially stable and community-owned. 2. It is not a short term project but is designed to be an ongoing and autonomous community based institution. 3. The media content is designed and produced by the community. Unlike most video projects which are owned by NGO’s with at best participation of the community, a CVU is owned by the community. It is designed to respond to the needs of the local community. 4. The model is scalable as is evident from the number of units we have managed to set up. Currently Video Volunteers has created a ‘social media network’ of 100 producers working full time across the country in different NGOs 5. Social media networks – All CVU’s are linked up and regularly interact with each other sharing best practices and increasing skills. 6. Leadership development of producers—VV provides full-time training for 18 months, making this the most intensive communications training given to the poor anywhere in the world. In contrast, most other media programs are conducted in workshops of one week to one month duration. 7. Significant scale and reach—community screenings and broadcasts reach more than 50% of a village in many cases, sometimes increasing an organization’s reach ten-fold.
Roadmap
We believe that community media will become a revolution in the near future. With the role that citizen journalism played during the Iran elections, community media came of age. The enthusiasm we see on the part of NGOs to engage with community video suggests to us that people see the subversion of technology by communities as the next big revolution in social change. This revolution will empower the poor to come up with their own solutions, spread best practices, and advocate for themselves with authority. This is what low cost technology, which is now affordable to most mid-sized NGOs in India, can enable.
Contact
Video Volunteers
Jessica Mayberry
600/1 Retreat House Road, Baga-Calangute
GOA, India, 403516
URL/Website – www.videovolunteers.org
