Astha Site Visit: Site Visit Date: Feb 10th, 2006. Meeting Members: Krishna (Astha), Yogita (Asha Seattle) and Tarun (Asha Seattle). Observation: Astha center works with children with mental retardation and multiple disabilities such as Cerebral Palsy and Autism. Astha is currently supporting 25 children in its main center in addition to running a community outreach program. The main center is located in the LIG colony of Govindpuri, Delhi. The main center definitely seemed cramped instead of the small size of the student community. The covered area of the center is small in the first place. Then, the administrative and teaching staff shares this space with the classrooms. The reason for having this small center was availability of this place at very attractive prices from NDMC. Further, Krishna communicated that before they moved into this building they were under the impression that they would be able to expand the current building, however, once they gained occupancy any further construction was stalled because of some political constraints. Another observation was that the resources seemed to be overworked and the administrative staff was stalling some of the key initiatives due to the same. Hopefully, the situation is different with the teaching staff (something that we plan to clarify over a conference call). Furthermore, the Astha Helpline plan has not moved forward anywhere from our last communication, the primary reason seems to be the unavailability of resources. This is the other thing that we plan to talk with Radhika (one of the founders) about. The idea is that we want to solve the problem of resource crunch, as it seems a resource crunch along with the cramped space is keeping Astha from performing their activities efficiently. On a positive note, Astha center seems to be evolving their model of operation. They seem to be moving away from one center specific model to community based service model where they have these community specific rehabilitators, who go out in the community and work with them. The organization seems to clear on the idea of not increasing the student community and thereby devoting good time and attention to each of their students. Finally, some specific #s with Astha: # of kids: 25 # of physiotherapists: 6 # of social workers: 2 # of community based rehabilitators: 6