"HEAL PIGNON" HEALTH EDUCATION ACTION LEAGUE FOR HAITI
ROTARY FOUNDATION HAITI PROJECT
Dr. David Ehrenkrantz is the Chair of the Vocational Training Team Committee for Rotary District 7450. He and Past District Governor Bob Lankin (both members of the Northeast Sunrisers Philadelphia Rotary Club) are working on a Rotary Foundation Vocational Training Team (VTT) Grant through their district. With this project, Rotary will send a group of nursing professionals to Pignon, Haiti to augment nursing services on that northern part of the island. They've engaged a professional training team from Queens, NY, whose leadership includes two graduate level nurse educators from NYU and Pace University, along with a program administrator. They'll be going to the island and working with a nursing team at Pignon Hospital. The Rotary Club of Pignon will act as the host club.
In addition to David and Bob, joining us in the presentation was Marie Charles from Pace University and Gretha Fievre from HEAL Haiti. In the Downloads section of the website you can explore a pdf of the presentation. Key elements focus on developing a team of 6 Nurses to be trained by the VTT and then become the Trainers for other nurses. Reminded of the parable of teaching someone to fish so the process can almost naturally expand the success. Important to note this is a totally volunteer project with the hardest part being finding good partners on the ground. The process developed follows guidelines provided from the United Nations. Click https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0D9EnF6JKYY for a short video on the project.
A real positive from the presentation was Bill Hunter was present. Bill has served as an NGO Representative at the UN for more than 20 years, and often recruits new NGOs to join. He provided a link and volunteered to support them in their efforts to achieve NGO status. Rotary works in many wonderful ways.
If anyone is interested in contributing to help this project we will be happy to provide the contact information. David and Bob are from District 7450 and are branching out to District 7430 with their efforts. As you look through the pdf you can not help but empathize with the challenges our Haitian friends have been faced with after the January 12, 2010 7.0 magnitude earthquake killing an estimated 160,000 and injuring over 300,000.
