Ten things to strengthen the next presentation:
Going in to the next presentation we have a lot of room for improvement and I am not afraid to admit it. Frankly I see this as a good thing, it means we are able to better think about where exactly we messed up and how we can improve going forward. Firstly, I think the main thing we can improve on is defining our target audience. We simply did not have a very compelling answer this last time around and need to hammer out exactly who we want to reach. Going off that first point the second thing we need to work on is figuring out how we want to distribute our film to our target audience. The channels of delivery are very important and frankly we have never really thought much about it. Thirdly, we need to continue to work on our actual filmmaking skills as we have no real experience and only our advisors know how to do the technical side currently. Another way to strengthen our presentation is to work on our power point coordination as we were off sometimes and were not as prepared to use examples as we should have been. Along a similar vain we also need to better coordinate who is going to be answering which questions because several times throughout the presentation we would get a question and then just look at each other until one of us answered.
The sixth way we can improve our next presentation is by making better use of the graphics and charts we use on the presentation. These are incredibly valuable in explaining just how severe the issue is but we simply did not explain them well, thus limiting their effectiveness. We can also work on the timing of our presentation because near the end it was incredibly rushed as we were crunched for time. The eighth thing we can do is work on controlling our speech patterns during the presentation itself because at times we sounded a little unsure and hesitant which doesn’t help with establishing credibility. We also started working on and have improved another major problem, the fact that we had met with few knowledgeable professionals. Granted, we have turned this around and are scheduled to meet with several soon. Finally, we can also work on the organization of introductory information as the first time around ahd us sort of cramming everything into a few slides and hoping we got it across effectively.
Does our work need IRB approval?
No, our work should not require IRB approval. This is because we are not conducting research of a sensitive nature and are at most interviewing individuals thus making our research exempt. However, a case might arise where we do wind up needing IRB approval. For instance we could end up wanting to see medical records for women in country to analyze their health relative to women in more developed healthcare systems. In this case we would certainly need IRB approval. Another case where we could require IRB approval would be if we decided to follow and observe people, especially pregnant women, going about their days. We might do this to get a better grasp of the typical life for a community and apply it to the health we observe in the population. Regardless, this type of research would require IRB review. Finally, we could also conduct research about the newborn children and how healthy they are or what the impact of having their mother potentially dying could be. In this case, since we would be working with children, we would require IRB approval.
Logic model:
Situation: The maternal death rate in Sierra Leone is the highest in the world
Stakeholders: the public health workers, the TBAs, the mothers, families expecting children, children without mothers, families who lost mothers, the women themselves, the NGOs operating in the region
priorities/issues: To decrease the maternal death rate and improve the medical system on the whole, dealing with a culture traditionally hostile to women’s issues, government lacking the resources to fully tackle the issue along with corruption.
Inputs: NGO support, government focus on the issue, recent government restructuring which may help focus on the issue (decentralization), the issues are relatively simple but they simply lack the resources required
Outputs: Raising awareness about the issue and hope to drive more attention toward it, partner with local groups working on the issue
Assumptions: Our project would be able to reach the audience we need, they would be willing to help, and there is a desire to improve within the country
Outcomes/Impact: Making the issue a conscious one in people’s minds and possibly bringing greater investment to the issue indirectly through raised consciousness
External factors: Cultural stigma against the discussion of maternal/women’s topics, emphasis on health privacy, language barriers, regional cultural barriers and the wide breadth of cultural practices.