Research Reflection (BP 5) - GS

            When we began working at ActionAid, we were given the freedom to redefine our topic so that it was more tailored to our interests, which worked better for us because we were not totally into climate change, land acquisition and livelihood resilience. Ironically, the topic that we are studying now is directly related to those topics. After going through all of ActionAid’s priorities, we found women-led disaster management to be the most interesting and it was also the topic that ActionAid had the least information about and we wanted to make the largest contribution possible.

            As research has progressed, the project has gone through many ups and downs. In the beginning, Grace and I would go into ActionAid hoping to get more direction from our project advisor, but he is very busy since he is the boss of everyone. Whenever we see an opening in his schedule, we quickly have to run up to his office or we would never speak to him. However, these meetings still are not as productive as we would hope because he mostly validates our comments about the topic and does not give much direction. At that point in our research, our topic is too broad to just write a paper on the entire priority, which would include all types of disasters, man-made and natural. Since we were not given very much direction from the beginning, we now mostly make decisions on our own, which has positive and negative aspects about it. After a few weeks, we realized that it was not productive to go into office. The office is very loud so it is not a good working environment nor was it good place to make calls to our potential stakeholders. When we go into office now, it is mostly to show face to prove that we are still working on our project.

            Talking with stakeholders was a very enjoyable part of the project for me because I felt as though I was being treated like a real academic since we were able to meet with government officials, directors of NGOs, and program directors at the UN. Most of the conversations that we had with them were very informative. I felt like a few of the conversations were not as productive because the stakeholder did not give much information, as if they were hiding details so as their quotes were not misconstrued in our paper.

            Overall, I do not feel fully supported on my paper. Grace and I now have a clear direction on topic, paper, and presentation because we were able to speak to Tine about our project. Our advisor at ActionAid does not check on us, the person at ActionAid that is in charge of our priority has not once spoken to us about our project, and the Cornell teaching team has not checked in for a couple of weeks. The issues that we have in our research are not large enough to prevent us from completing the project, but it would be nice to talk to someone about our project who is more removed but could offer more guidance. Despite this, I feel confident enough in Grace and me to complete our project successfully because of the SAIPAR staff, Marja and Tine, who have given us support, despite not being our direct advisors.