Ullas

Hyderabad Annual Can Do workshop 2022

Following the successful completion of the Ullas workshop in Chennai, Delhi & Mumbai, we have achieved yet another triumph in Hyderabad. The annual “Can Do” workshop felicitated 291 students from 54 Government and Government-Aided Schools in Hyderabad as Young Achievers.

The workshop was inaugurated by Mr. K Govindarajan, Board Member, Ullas Trust. Our Energisers – Mr Sekhar Kammula (Film director), Ms P. Gouthami (IAS, Assist collector Mancherial district), Mr Krishna Yedula (Secretary for SCSC) shared their life journeys on how they are successful in their fields. Their messages were well received by all the Young Achievers.

Ullas Annual Can Do workshop Mumbai Chapter

We successfully completed another leg of our annual 'Can Do' workshop in Mumbai, commemorating the Silver jubilee of Ullas Trust. 554 students from 33 schools (19 Corporation and 14 Govt Aided schools) have been felicitated as Young Achievers with 30+ volunteers supporting the workshop.

The workshop started with a welcome address from our Mumbai Chapter head, Ramkumar P. The guest of honour, Shri Nitin Patil, founder of Uttung Bharari Training Academy & Foundation, motivated the students through his speech, encouraging them to live their dreams. The workshop filled the students' hearts with a "Yes I Can do it" attitude and stirred in them the ambition to follow their dreams.

The Hyderabad chapter of Ullas Trust conducted the 'Can Do' workshop on 06th Dec'22 at Eswar College of Engineering, Narasaropet, Andhra Pradesh. 170 students of 09th Class from Zilla Parishad High School of Muppalla, Bollavarm, Dammalapadu & Narnepadu attended the workshop and 10 students from each of the schools received the Ullas Merit scholarship and certificate. It was conducted by N Srikanth N ably supported by Dilip Kumar from Team Ullas.

Mr. Anne Sasidhar, Director of Software Development at FISERV, USA who was the chief guest advised students to always reflect on what they listen & learn and keep short term goals & aims in life to become successful. Shri Sharif Mastan Shaik, Managing Director of Eswar College of Engineering shared that he is very happy that Ullas Trust is conducting such a wonderful event for the Government School students in their college campus. He also said that his College would extend all support to Ullas for expanding its reach and students from his college would volunteer in the Summit programs for the school students.

College principal Dr.Naga Malleswara Rao garu also in his speech advised students to have focus on studies like Arjuna the great archer and have a dream and strive to achieve it. The ‘Diary of Dreams’ workshop concluded with students expressing their dreams of becoming a Scientist, Hindi Teacher, Aeronautical Engineer, Entrepreneur etc.

Ullas Annual CanDo workshop Delhi Chapter:

Following the successful completion of the Ullas workshop in Chennai, commemorating the Silver jubilee of Ullas Trust, we achieved yet another triumph in New Delhi. The annual “Can Do” workshop felicitated 250 students from 18 Government and Government - Aided Schools in Delhi NCR as Young Achievers.

The guest of honour, Shri. Govind Jaiswal IAS, Director, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, enlightened the students by sharing his personal story on resilience and overcoming obstacles to reach new heights in life. Curiosity and the universal conviction that "Yes I Can do it'' drove the Young Achievers to set out on their life journeys.

The Ullas ‘CAN DO' Workshop for the students of Kendriya Vidyalaya and JNV Palakkad was conducted at IIT Palakkad Agora Auditorium on 20th November by Team Ullas Ms Chandrika ably supported by Ms Parvathi in collaboration with the NSS unit of IIT Palakkad. This was preceded on the 19th Nov with an Induction program for the faculty and NSS volunteers of IIT.
About 160 students from both the schools along with their teachers and the Principal of JNV attended the workshop which was also witnessed by some of the faculty members of IIT. Dr Rositha, Coordinator of NSS wing who was also the Role model for the session shared with the students her journey of challenges and triumphs in the pursuit of her dream. The real life story of a young girl from a small village in Kerala who dared to Dream Big and go beyond her comfort zone and achieve her dream with grit and determination had the students completely believe in the Power of Dreams and the ‘CAN DO’ spirit.
An extremely interactive workshop had the students giving information on all of the role models shown including the local ones like PT Usha and Resool Pookutty.

The dreams shared by them was also interesting which varied from IFS, IPS, Cardiologist, Genetic Engineer, Vet, Fashion designer, Criminologist to becoming the Prime Minister of India.

The workshop was followed by an energetic and informal feedback session by the Principal, teachers and students with Team Ullas.

The afternoon session of the day had the NSS volunteers of IIT being given training for Summit 1.

The exposure for both, the ‘Can Do’ workshop and the newly designed IIT Palakkad campus followed by the soon to be held Summit session surely opens up a world of opportunities for the young minds to explore.

Our heartfelt gratitude to Dr. Rositha, Dr. Arya, Ms.Tessy and Ms.Pravallika for making all arrangements for the smooth conduct of the workshop and trainings. We are also extremely thankful to Dr.Ganesh Natrajan Dean Administration who took time off from his busy schedule to be with us and encourage the students.

Also a big shout out to all the NSS volunteers for attending the sessions in spite of their busy schedule of academics and to Mr Srikanth from Team Ullas for co-ordinating and restarting this wonderful collaboration with IIT Palakkad which started in 2019.

After a gap of two years Ullas restarted it's College Connect program with the NSS unit of IIT Tirupati.
As the offline workshop was taking place after two years post pandemic NSS volunteers and Team Ullas were very excited and 150 students from various schools in and around Tirupati had gathered for the Can do workshop. Incidentally it was also the National Education Day. The workshop was conducted by Ms Savitha Raman ably supported by Ms Parvathy Sriram of Team Ullas.
We had the Director of IIT Dr Kalidindi Satyanarayana address the students. Mr Debasish NSS Faculty Advisor encouraged them to learn and listen attentively.
The students enthusiastically participated in the session. The workshop ended with students sharing their dreams varying from doctor to IAS officer to police and finally a good human being.The students were inspired to dream big with conviction and perseverance through the Can Do workshop.
The entire IIT NSS team led by Mr Mahesh Kumar NSS Program officer and Ms Chandini student coordinator were extremely supportive and ensured all arrangements for successful workshop. We also had a young IItian Mr Ganesh Chandra who shared his dream to study in IIT and achieving the same.

Ullas offline Summit 1 program for 1000+, 9th grade students from Corporation, Govt. and Govt. aided started off this morning across multiple venues in Chennai. The students were selected after they wrote the Ullas Entrance Examination and were felicitated last Saturday as Ullas Young Achievers at the Annual Can Do workshop conducted in Music Academy. After the successful attendance at the Annual Can Do workshop the Young Achievers came in eagerly on time, keen to learn and see what happens in the class.
It was a great feeling to conduct the program after two years and there was great happiness and joy for all. The mentors were super excited to be part of the classes and meet the bright young minds. It started off with an activity and there was lots of laughter and cheer as they participated in the games.
They were then taken through the class and it was all about Identifying Positives. The students participated actively answering all the questions, there was great team bonding and was a mix of students from different schools.
The parents patiently waited outside and were happy to hear about what was taught in the Summit class. The Ullas Higher Education Scholars took it on themselves to see that everything was arranged and helped the Young Achievers participate, encouraged and motivated the shy ones to come forth and share their ideas.
The mentors also felt the satisfaction conducting the classes as the last two years they had done it virtually. They enjoyed being there in person and interact with the students.
The Alumnus who were also once a student like these Young Achievers shared about their journey inspiring the young students. The young students were looking up to their Akkas and Annas as their role models.
The Summit classes will continue for another four weeks and these Young Achievers will continue with Ullas till their 12th grade and few from them will be selected as Ullas Higher Education Scholars.
The session ended with the students wanting more and eagerly waiting for next Sunday.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/ullas-trust-celebrates-silver-jubilee/article66082467.ece

Ullas Trust celebrates Silver Jubilee As part of its silver jubilee celebrations, Ullas Trust, a Polaris Foundation social initiative has

The CAN DO Workshop on October 15th, 2022, at CMR College of Engineering and Technology (CMRCET) was attended by 220 students coming from 12 Zilla Parishad High Schools in the Mechal district of Telangana State.

Welcome Speech by Suresh Ram, HOD, CEER-CMRCET
- I am glad to conduct Ullas workshops for government school students on our campus continuously for 3 years. As part of outreach programs, CMRCET is also supporting government schools in organising Atal Tinkering Labs and other infrastructure support. He also mentioned that CMR College is ready to facilitate a tour of the college for students and also do career guidance and student counselling through CMR Volunteers and faculty. Lastly, he said he and his team, with support from college management, have made all arrangements for a workshop so that students from schools get an opportunity to visit campus and aspire to pursue higher education in such prestigious institutions. He wished students to make the best of this opportunity to draw inspiration and become good engineers, doctors, leaders etc.

Role Model: Dr.S.B.Fatima Mary, Dean-Faculty & Students Affairs, CMRCET)
She said that character building is very important for students, which will help them to develop winning personalities. She also advised students not to be afraid of failure, but rather to reflect on why they failed and try again with a different approach but genuine hard work.They also said that if we start to love anything, we start doing it with more attention and dedication, so students should develop a love for reading, which helps in studies also.

The Diary of Dreams was conducted by Ullas Social Connect lead Srikanth, with great support from Team Ullas members Srinu and Dilip. On asking about their dreams the students expressed them. Some wish to become agriculturists in order to provide nutritious and healthy food for all people in the country; one wishes to become a software engineer and make his parents proud; others wish to join IPS in order to do public service; and a few wish to become teachers in order to educate students to become responsible citizens.

Save the Date : 29/10/2022

Ullas is celebrating the 25th Annual Can Do workshop on 29th October 2022 at Music Academy. Let us gather and welcome the new batch of Ullas Young Achievers and be a part of this celebration of "Igniting Young Minds". Let the Magic of Ullas continue.

Ullas Can Do workshop

We had the Ullas Can Do workshop at Sairam Engineering College yesterday for Somangalam Hr Sec School and Sri Sairam Matriculation at their college auditorium.
It was indeed a pleasure to see the students participate in the workshop, interacting and listening with rapt attention. We had Ms Ambal Saravanan, our FOU from Intellect, who was the Energiser and started the workshop by lighting the lamp along with the other dignitaries from the college.

We had our Ullas Young Leader, Kothasri, as the emcee, who gave the welcome address with confidence and set the tone for the workshop.

When Ms. Ambal took over the stage, there was silence as they heard her share some stories, and I am sure the talk will be etched in their memory forever. When they grow up, they will surely remember the session and say, "Once, when I was in the 9th grade, I had this Ma'am who came and helped me with the knowledge that "I Can Do It" too.

Mr. Benjamine from Team Ullas conducted the Ullas Can Do workshop for the students with his impeccable style and instantly connected to the students.

We also had our Alumnus, Varsha, who enthralled the students by sharing her journey, and it was welcomed by one and all. An Akka, who like them has achieved her dream and is doing wonders in so many ways, kept them spellbound. She set a belief saying that Nothing is impossible when you have the drive and courage to confront the challenges.

It was an overall wonderful session with great coordination between the NSS unit and Ms. Vijayakalyani from Ullas, who made this possible and we continue to spread the Magic of Ullas.

ullastrust # cando # sairam # somangalam # saimatriculationschool

The speaker for the 68th Talks was Sirisha who is pursuing her B.Sc. Nursing from Sigma College of Nursing. She is a very quick learner and has a photographic memory.

She believes before starting any good work, a prayer is a must and accordingly she started the session with a lovely song in her mesmerizing voice. She has a passion to serve people suffering from various diseases and always helps them recover to their best selves.

She explained the importance and the role that nurses play in treating patients as they have to handle many different things while also being compassionate towards the patients. They also need to make sure the patient is comfortable at all times.
Talking about her varied experiences, Sirisha shared with the young students her journey as a nurse so far and you could hear the passion in her voice to help people and how much she cares for her patients.
This was a very interesting and inspiring session where students got to visualise the experience of being a nurse.

ULLAS 'CAN DO WORKSHOP' at SSN College

In continuation to the association with the Sri Sivasubramaniya Nadar College of Engineering (SSN) NSS unit since 2018, Ullas Trust conducted the "Can Do Workshop " on the 1st of September 2022 at the college auditorium.

A total of over 450, 9th grade students from Government schools participated in the workshop and they are mentioned herein -
1. Government Boys Higher Secondary School, Tiruporur
2. Government Girls Higher Secondary School, Tiruporur.
3. Government High School, Paiyanur
4. Government Higher Secondary School, Kelambakkam

The workshop started off with Thamizh Thaai Vaazhthu and lighting of the lamp followed by a welcome address by Ms. Kaythry, SSN NSS program officer. Next in line was the SSN College Principal's address and then the role model Dr. Sathyanarayan, Intervention Radiologist and Medical Practitioner took over and was a great inspiration to the students. He spoke about how teachers play an important role as Influencers in a student's life, guiding them to make their dreams come true and to believe in oneself and the importance of hard work and focus. The Diary of Dreams was conducted by
Ms. Chandrika of Ullas Trust and the next on the agenda had the students share their dreams. They were excited and interactive after initial inhibitions....Ullas Alumnus Rohini spoke about her journey and the entire program was very well anchored by Ullas Young Leader Arun
We at Ullas wound up with a great feeling of having ignited another batch of young minds.

ORIENTATION for FRESHERS at DB Jain College

Today we had two sessions of Can Do workshop/Orientation for the freshers (class of 2022) of DB Jain college. It was a full house in both sessions with 920+ students attending the workshop. Ms. Chandrika R from Ullas conducted the workshop and was ably supported by Ms. Parvathi S and the Ullas Young Leaders👏👏.
At this juncture we have to thank Dr Karunakaran, HOD Maths, DB Jain College and the Management for all the support and coordination needed to make this a great success.

A special Thank you to the Ullas Young Leaders Hemant, Archana, Nagavalli, Janardhan and Mekesh for supporting us in the workshop & for beautifully sharing their Ullas journey with the 920 freshers of the college..it was such a proud moment for us to see the way each of our Young Leaders inspired the Young students. Special mention about Ms Viji and Ms Jeevi for coordinating with the College and the Young leaders.
It was a fulfilling and heart warming day Igniting another batch of Young minds.

The speaker for our 68th Talks@Ullas was Rishi Babu, the young and supremely talented music producer and sound designer in the film and video game industry. Alongside many other notable accomplishments, he also co-created Fluid codes which won the Mini Innovations Award 2022.

Rishi talked about how having a passion is important for one’s happiness and how to pursue it as a career while facing societal pressure. A passion gives you a reason to keep learning and to work towards mastery.

“If there’s something that you are genuinely passionate about, there will be ways to scale it and achieve a deeper sense of accomplishment from within” said this 21 year old with a great sense of maturity.

Rishi also told the youngsters “Exposing yourself to different niches will help you explore things you didn’t know you were passionate about. It gets you to do the things necessary to grow and improve and at the end of the day it is about what you are good at and things that contribute towards your goal”. He also shared about Ikigai and how he follows that and advised all to try and understand that as it will help in all walks of life.

This was truly an inspirational session with many interesting takeaways especially with regards to one’s goals and realization of the same.

The speaker for the 66th Talks was our very own young leader Varsha S, who is pursuing her Higher Education in Architecture from Mohamed Saleh Academy of Architecture. A multi talented youngster since childhood Varsha enjoys Content creation and Volunteering while also pursuing her passion in Bharatnatyam.

She kicked off the session by playing a beautiful video of a deep dive into the ocean with the Navy team and gave the listeners an interactive scenario to think about what we would do without our devices for an entire night stranded at sea and spoke about her own experience.

She encouraged the young students to get involved in various niches, to explore and discover more about themselves and to develop a skill and get better at it. Concluding the talks, Varsha told the young audience “You can achieve and become whatever you want to be. Even though it may seem impossible, all it takes is for you is to get started. Please discover and create your own destiny.”

This was a truly inspiring session with plenty of takeaways from the speaker’s experiences.

This 65th session of Talks@Ullas series was heartwarming and informative for students to absorb and reflect upon.

The speaker was Baskar S Ayer who is one of the leading qualitative researchers in the country, with more than 3 decades of experience and a multifaceted personality.

He spoke about how giving the best in whatever you do develops ones potential gives happiness.
His advice to young students was to study well, try different activities and expose themselves to opportunities around them, which will help them discover their strengths and focus on becoming a better version of themselves and added that making mistakes helps a person learn out of it, and grow further.
He also shared to the students how a career in marketing and Sales and a change of environment helped him.become an extrovert.

He concluded the session by saying one of the biggest resources is learning from other people’s experiences, taking guidance from mentors and expanding your network.

The Delhi Chapter of Ullas successfully completed the Ullas Entrance Examination-2022 on August 6, 2022. Around 1800 Grade 9 students wrote the Merit Scholarship test across 18 different centres (schools) in Delhi, Gurgaon and Noida. This mega examination could not have been held in such an organized and disciplined manner without the amazing support the Team received from Intellect Associates including first time volunteers and all Friends of Ullas.

The incessant rains on the day did not deter our 55 Super-heroes to rise as one team and reach the venues to help the young students with their first OMR based entrance exam. It was also a proud moment for Team Ullas to see their Alumni and Young Leaders leading the program from the front and all this would not have been possible but for the wonderful support extended by the Heads and Teachers of the schools.

Team Ullas extends its heartfelt gratitude to every individual who supported and cheered the young students as they took their first steps in the journey of Ullas.

We had the Ullas Entrance Examination in Chennai on July 31st, 2022 and it was a joy to see the students do the program in an offline mode after two years.

The exam was written by 3040 Grade 9 students from 191 Government, Government aided and Corporation schools across Chennai in four venues at Gamma Process Hub Ambattur, Govt. Girls Higher Secondary School Ashok Nagar, Govt. Model Higher Secondary School Saidapet and DB Jain College Thoraipakkam.

This was supported by 175+ volunteers from corporate Intellect, Friends and Alumnus of Ullas, New Volunteers and family members. Also leading the exams from the front were the 120 plus young leaders of Ullas.

It was a walk down memory lane of their UEE days for all of the Ullas Alumni and Young leaders . There was tremendous joy in all the venues and the veteran volunteers felt that this time the joy of seeing the young students took precedence over all other things. The new volunteers were overwhelmed with all the arrangements and the professional way the exam was conducted and can’t wait to be part of the future programs of Ullas.

We also conducted UEE for the 80 plus students from St Louis Institute for the Deaf and Blind, The Little Flower Higher Secondary school for Deaf, The Little Flower Higher Secondary school for Blind and The Clark School for the Deaf wrote the exam.

Ullas Entrance Examination is like a competitive exam - the foresight of the founding team to conduct the exam with OMR type / MCQ gives students exposure to writing professional exams in the future.

And once selected they receive the Ullas Merit Scholarship and Weekend Enrichment Programs over 4 years (Grade 9-12), that instills “Can Do” spirit, nurtures their potential and skills through mentoring.

The Ullas Entrance Examination for Mumbai Chapter was conducted a week ago and it was a joy to see the young minds coming into write the same. Post pandemic this is the first offline event from Ullas and it brought immense joy to everyone who were part of this event!

The Ullas Entrance Exam is for Grade 9 students of BMC / Govt-Aided Schools of Mumbai - those who have scored 60% and above. This year Ullas Mumbai Chapter added 7 schools - total of 1400+ students from 19 BMC Schools and 14 Govt-Aided Schools took the exam.

And to ensure smooth conduct and invigilation of the exam we had 40+ volunteers from Corporates (Intellect, Morgan Stanley, Ex associates from Intellect, and Virtusa) and their friends and family participated too!

Additionally: Ullas Entrance Examination is designed similar to a competitive exam - the foresight of the founding team to conduct the exam with OMR type / MCQ gives students exposure to writing professional exams in the future.

And once selected the Young Achievers as they are called, receive the Ullas Merit Scholarship and Weekend Enrichment Programs over 4 years (Grade 9-12), that instills “Can Do” spirit, nurtures their potential and skills through mentoring!

We are off to an awesome start with the exam - meeting Young minds and volunteers in person was magical!

The Speaker for the 64th Talks was Preenu Ashok a qualified therapist specialising in behavioural and psychological issues in people across various age groups.

As someone who is passionate to work in the field of mental health issues from an early age Preenu volunteers with many non profit organisations and her expertise in psychoanalysis has healed over 500 clients. She told the students it is crucial in life to connect with other people and to build one’s network. Keen on making the session an interactive one, Preenu conducted a small game for the youngsters to get to know each other a little better.

Talking about her varied experiences, Preenu shared with the young students her journey as a therapist and how she helps social workers connect and exchange ideas on a digital platform. This was surely a very interesting and inspiring session where students learnt how to explore their passions and do things that makes them truly happy.

The Speaker for the 63rd Talks was Priyanka Mohan an Engineer who began her career as a project Engineer at Wipro.

As someone who is very passionate about the development sector, Priyanka was keen to enlighten the youngsters in the session with her knowledge and experiences within the field. Professionally trained in many art forms, Priyanka specialises in Yakshagana, a traditional theatre form of Karnataka.

She spoke about how the environment in which one grows up has an impact on one's decisions and the path one chooses in life and explained how she managed to balance both her academics and passions. As an artist, she said a lot of what she is as a person today is because of performing arts and told the students to achieve one’s goal or to be good at something, it is important to be both consistent and disciplined.

Priyanka concluded her session by telling the youngsters to try performing arts or do something that they are passionate about, since it is bound to impacts their lives positively in many different ways.

This session of Talks@Ullas was an extremely inspiring one with students taking away quite a few life lessons from the speaker.

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We just completed with our Virtual Summit session for our 12th Grade Ullas Young Achievers from Chennai and Delhi Chapters. It was an action packed three weeks and was thoroughly enjoyed by all.
We would like to thank all our Mentors and Friends of Ullas Aziz, Bharath Reddy, Chamu, Deepak Rao, Devanand, Ganesh Visveshwaran, Hema Narayanan, Alumnus Jai Shankar , Alumnus Nishanth, Alumnus Padmavathy, Pari Bhaskar, Sainath Govindan, Sathish Kumaar, Sandhya Ganesh, Sharmila, Shivani, Shyamsundar, Sudha and Sukanya.

The last three Sundays saw the Summit classes in full swing with great support from all our Mentors, Ullas Young Leaders and our Alumnus participating with great fervour. There was 75% plus overall attendance in all the groups.

The chat boxes were getting filled with answers to the quiz set by the Young Leaders. The questions asked by the Mentors had the students answering them even before the questions could be completed.

Today the Day 3 was a new one on the World of Advertising and the sessions created great memorable interactions and shares by one and all. The Young Achievers gave us so many nostalgic moments when they spoke about their four year journey with Ullas, truly heart warming stories and memories.

Today the Graduation day was very memorable as we had Guests of honour from our Friends circle, our Alumnus and surprise guests. They made the students swell with pride and joy, that this special day at Ullas will be etched in their memories forever.

We are looking forward to having hybrid sessions in the future as online has its advantage too. There was a student who joined us from Rajasthan and told these sessions helped her so much, as due to the pandemic she had to move to her native but she could still be connected to Ullas and that made all the efforts by each and everyone worthwhile.

We would like to once again thank each and everyone who were part of the virtual sessions with your participation, good wishes and prayers.

Magic of Ullas continues !!