by Jennifer Burden | Dec 28, 2015 | 2015, International, North America, World Interviews
Hello World Moms!
Today on the blog we are sharing a video and photos from our time at the UN Correspondents Association (UNCA) gala from December 14th, 2015 on the blog!
World Mom, Purnima Ramakrishnan of India, won the Elizabeth Neuffer Bronze award for “Best Reporting on the UN.” She was unable to attend due to family obligations and the floods in Chennai, India, where she resides. In her place, Elizabeth Atalay, our Managing Editor, and I had the honor of accepting Purnima’s award for her at the UNCA gala. It was an incredible night!
https://www.facebook.com/worldmomsblog/videos/1290132341031041/
Prior to the awards, I was invited to a private cocktail hour with fellow award winners, where we had the honor of meeting UN Secretary General, Ban ki-Moon!
After shaking hands, we had the opportunity for a mini photo session with the UN Secretary General.
Elizabeth and I met up with Dan Thomas, Communications Director and Spokesperson for the President of the UN. We worked with Dan when he was in Switzerland at the GAVI Alliance on a project to help raise awareness for vaccinations in the developing world. It was so fun to finally all meet in person!
Meeting and talking with fellow UNCA award winners was also a highlight of the night!
Please see the full list of the 2015 UNCA award winners at the UNCA.com site.
We are thankful to our community of readers, contributors and editors. Look what we can achieve with you all! Thank you for believing in us. We, at World Moms Blog, are looking forward to 2016 and have a lot of exciting plans to announce in the year ahead!
Happy New Year Around the World,
— Jennifer Burden, Founder and CEO of World Moms Blog
Video credit to UNCA. Photo credit of Jennifer Burden and Ban Ki Moon and the UNCA Award Winners to Jennifer Ehidiamen, whom we met at the UNCA awards.
Photo credit of Elizabeth, Dan and Jennifer to the author.
Jennifer Burden is the Founder and CEO of World Moms Network, an award winning website on global motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. World Moms Network writes from over 30 countries, has over 70 contributors and was listed by Forbes as one of the “Best 100 Websites for Women”, named a “must read” by The New York Times, and was recommended by The Times of India.
She was also invited to Uganda to view UNICEF’s family health programs with Shot@Life and was previously named a “Global Influencer Fellow” and “Social Media Fellow” by the UN Foundation. Jennifer was invited to the White House twice, including as a nominated "Changemaker" for the State of the World Women Summit. She also participated in the One Campaign’s first AYA Summit on the topic of women and girl empowerment and organized and spoke on an international panel at the World Bank in Washington, DC on the importance of a universal education for all girls. Her writing has been featured by Baby Center, Huffington Post, ONE.org, the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life, and The Gates Foundation’s “Impatient Optimists.” She is currently a candidate in Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs in the Executive Masters of Public Affairs program, where she hopes to further her study of global policies affecting women and girls.
Jennifer can be found on Twitter @JenniferBurden.
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by World Moms Blog | Nov 18, 2015 | 2015, Africa, Asia, Award, Europe, International, Middle East, North America, Oceania, Purnima, South America, World Interviews, World Moms Blog, World Voice
It is with great honor that we announce that World Moms Blog’s Senior Editor, Purnima Ramakrishnan, has been awarded an Elizabeth Neuffer Memorial prize for print and online coverage of the United Nations and UN Agencies.
Purnima is the joint winner of the Bronze award, which will be awarded at the United Nations Correspondents Association’s (UNCA) gala in New York City on December 14th, 2015 by the guest of honor, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.
As an active Senior Editor for World Moms Blog since 2011, Purnima’s posts include celebrating Day of the Girl in India through murals, her response to the Peshawar attacks in 2014, and speaking out after the Nepal Earthquake this year. Previously, she has also written about unwanted girl children in India, the Brazilian health care system, and breaking the caste system in India. You can find all of her posts at World Moms Blog on Purnima Ramakrishnan’s author page.
In addition to her work at World Moms Blog, she reported on poverty issues facing Brazil in her fellowship with The International Reporting Project. In 2013 she was a BlogHer International Activist Scholarship winner and travelled to Chicago, USA to speak on her advocacy for vaccines for children in the developing world. At the BlogHer conference she launched World Moms Blog’s successful 8 month #Moms4MDGs campaign to raise awareness for poverty issues around the world. Purnima has also been featured on The Gates Foundation’s Impatient Optimists blog, the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life blog, The Huffington Post and on Baby Center’s Mission Motherhood™.
“The dinner will be attended by U.N. officials, diplomats, Hollywood celebrities, corporate and cultural organizations and journalists from around the world,” according to the official award notice. We are currently (and excitedly!) coordinating arrangements with the hope that Purnima will be able to travel from India to New York City to accept this prestigious award in person.
It is also with a flood of emotions that we learned about the life of Elizabeth Neuffer, the woman for whom the UNCA award was named. Elizabeth Neuffer was The Boston Globe bureau chief at the U.N., who died in a car crash at the age of 46 while covering postwar Iraq in 2003.
An award winning journalist, she was the first to report that indicted war criminals remained in power in post-war Bosnia, where she spent a year reporting on war crimes. Early on in her career, she reported from federal court in Boston, Capitol Hill during the Clinton Administration, Moscow during the break up of the Soviet Union and the Middle East during the Gulf War. She then became European Bureau Chief from 1994-1998 in Berlin. Elizabeth also dispatched to Africa to report on the 1996 return of Hutu refugees from Zaire to their native Rwanda.
Learning about the life of Elizabeth Neuffer reminds, us, at World Moms Blog that there is so much work left unfinished when it comes to reporting on human rights and justice in the world. We will gladly carry a small spark from the large torch she lit by the example of her leading reporting. It is an honor for Purnima to receive this award as an Senior Editor for World Moms Blog. Congratulations to Purnima Ramakrishnan and the entire World Moms Blog team! We will continue to work hard to provide a voice for women around the world and speak up for those who need us most.
Thank you to the UNCA Awards Selection Committee for their selection and congratulations to all UNCA award winners!
For more on the UNCA.
References:
“Elizabeth Neuffer, 46, Reporter Overseas for the Boston Globe” and Wikipedia Elizabeth Neuffer.
World Moms Blog is an award winning website which writes from over 30 countries on the topics of motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. Over 70 international contributors share their stories from around the globe, bonded by the common thread of motherhood and wanting a better world for their children.
World Moms Blog was listed by Forbes Woman as one of the "Best 100 Websites for Women 2012 & 2013" and also called a "must read" by the NY Times Motherlode in 2013. Our Senior Editor in India, Purnima Ramakrishnan, was awarded the BlogHer International Activist Award in 2013.
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by Purnima Ramakrishnan | Dec 2, 2013 | Award, Childhood, Competition, Education, India, Inspirational, International, Kids, Life Balance, Life Lesson, Motherhood, Parenting, Purnima, The Alchemist, World Moms Blog, World Motherhood, Younger Children
“Education is the manifestation of the perfection already in man – Swami Vivakananda”
Sometime back I wrote about Abraham Lincoln’s letter to his son’s school teacher and my perspective and how it was appropriate for our lives here too. To bring up a good human being and to help him/her learn and get educated is the role of the parent and also the teacher at school.
Well, there were these competitions going on in my seven year old son’s school again, here, in India. This time it was Western Music. I am so fond of these musicals. My son sang some of my favorites and then Que Sara Sara and Rudolph the red nosed reindeer. He continued to the preliminaries, quarter finals, semi-finals and the finals. But one day while preparing for the finals at home, my son suddenly said, “Not all are going to win.”
I said, “Yes, they are not. But if you want to win, you need to practise.”
He was not the type of person who was interested to sing, but the type who loved to listen to music and songs. And I discovered this during this time.
“But amma, I don’t care.”
“Well, you should do your best. And then if you don’t get to win, that is fine. But you should not just give up.”
“I am not giving up. I just don’t want to sing.”
“Oh?”
Well, I was at a loss of words. I did not want him to do something he did not want to do. But then we were already into the finals, and I thought was it not a sheer waste if he did not even participate? This got me thinking…
The next day I found this quote in his school’s website.
Education is the manifestation of the perfection already in man – Swami Vivakananda.
We send our children to school for education and the teachers and parents are loving and affectionate and try to encourage the children to imbibe knowledge.
But then, what do they actually learn? Only what they chose to!
And also, sometimes they don’t learn and at other times they are very smart in academics. They also indulge in sports and other extra-curricular activities. We are happy, sometimes sad, and at times indifferent to various achievements, successes and failures and mediocre performances of our children. So many choices, actions, results, and yet Swami Vivekananda says we are all perfect.
If everyone is perfect, then where are the gaps? Why do only some people win? Why are there so many differences and scales of grades? ‘Manifestation’ is the significant word. What manifests out of a child is important. And whatever manifests, the society, the parents and the teachers are responsible to some extent. And then the children themselves are finally responsible. We bring up a child, giving him a lot of room to explore, think, discover and find joy, and, thereby, allow him to manifest his perfection.
I did not ask him to practise a lot for the singing competition. If he is not interested, let him not be. Maybe he is interested in building robots. Maybe he is interested in literary pursuits. Maybe he is interested in astronomy when he points out the pole star and Venus.
Because he is talented to sing, does not mean he should want to do it or become the next pop star. Whatever he allows to be manifested from himself, only will be, and I cannot force it.
And the reason for what he focuses on, no one can understand. It is his own mind acting under his own will and there are no explanations for that. So, let me not put a restraint to the manifestation of his perfection. Let him lay down his own options and channel his own interests.
In the end, he did end up participating in the finals, but without practising and the results are not out! But I shouldn’t care about the results because he doesn’t, right?
Is your child exercising independence in what he wants to do in life and what he wants to achieve? If so, are they different from what you think? And how do you handle it?
This is an original post to World Moms Blog by Purnima, our Indian mother writing from Chennai, India. Her contributions to the World Moms Blog can be found here. She also rambles at The Alchemist’s Blog.
Photo credit to Wiki Media Commons.
by Jennifer Burden | Aug 20, 2013 | World Moms Blog, World Motherhood
We Did It Again!
This just in! World Moms Blog is listed for a 2nd year in a row by Forbes Woman in their “100 Best Websites for Women 2013“! The news came to us through a Facebook Fan, and we are literally OVER THE MOON across the continents abuzz with the great news!
Forbes says, “We couldn’t be happier to present the fourth annual list of FORBES 100 Best Websites for Women than we are today—for this year more than any other this has been true collaborative effort by dedicated staffers, contributors and ForbesWoman readers. For that reason it just might be—dare we say it—the best list ever.”
What does Forbes Woman look for in choosing their top 100? They say, ” Informative and compelling content, sure, but also smart design, engaged communities and a voice that speaks to and for the female reader.” And also, “these 100 websites look to educate, inform and entertain you in ways you won’t find in the mainstream.”
And what Forbes said uniquely about us, “For a truly global perspective on motherhood, World Moms brings together writers from the US and Canada to Australia, China, India and Japan to discuss parenting across cultures.” Here we are in pictures on the Forbes site, too.
Saying we’re honored is an understatement.
Congratulations to all of our amazing editing and contributing staff; you, our dedicated readers; our life-saving web designer and tech support; and the organizations that have acknowledged our work such as BlogHer, Forbes Woman and the NY Times Motherlode; and also those organizations that have supported our campaigns for social good such as the UN Foundation & Shot@Life, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, ONE.org, GAVI Alliance and more!
The support of this award motivates our mothers to keep doing the work that we do according to our mission statement:
- Connecting mothers around the world through their stories.
- Promoting understanding and tolerance of other cultures, religions and nationalities.
- Encouraging discussion of important motherhood, parenting, cultural and human rights topics.
- Creating a support system for mothers via the web site.
- Helping to promote our writers.
- To strive to create opportunities for social good to make the lives of mothers and children better around the planet.
I wish I could hop a plane around the world and hug each and every one of our World Moms today! I really, really mean that! Well done, ladies.
Today, we celebrate. Tomorrow, we work toward new goals and becoming even better with this honor, “Forbes Best 100 Websites for Women 2013” as our motivation. We’re not stopping. Let’s do it, ladies!
— Jennifer Burden, Founder, WorldMomsBlog.com
Jennifer Burden is the Founder and CEO of World Moms Network, an award winning website on global motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. World Moms Network writes from over 30 countries, has over 70 contributors and was listed by Forbes as one of the “Best 100 Websites for Women”, named a “must read” by The New York Times, and was recommended by The Times of India.
She was also invited to Uganda to view UNICEF’s family health programs with Shot@Life and was previously named a “Global Influencer Fellow” and “Social Media Fellow” by the UN Foundation. Jennifer was invited to the White House twice, including as a nominated "Changemaker" for the State of the World Women Summit. She also participated in the One Campaign’s first AYA Summit on the topic of women and girl empowerment and organized and spoke on an international panel at the World Bank in Washington, DC on the importance of a universal education for all girls. Her writing has been featured by Baby Center, Huffington Post, ONE.org, the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life, and The Gates Foundation’s “Impatient Optimists.” She is currently a candidate in Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs in the Executive Masters of Public Affairs program, where she hopes to further her study of global policies affecting women and girls.
Jennifer can be found on Twitter @JenniferBurden.
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by Jennifer Burden | Jun 21, 2012 | World Moms Blog
From New York to Kuala Lumpur to Tel Aviv to Chennai to Toronto and around the globe our contributors were thrilled to hear the news that Forbes Woman has named World Moms Blog on their list of “Top 100 Websites for Women 2012!” Wow!
Forbes chose their list based on, “Informative and compelling content, smart navigable design, engaged communities and, of course, a voice that speaks to and for the female reader that’s kept fresh, timely and in-the-know by savvy staffers and impassioned writers.”
Also Forbes considers, “Does it [the website] have that amorphous and often indefinable quality that inspires us to share–with our social networks and in e-mails and conversations with our moms, sisters, friends and colleagues.”
To receive such an accolade in our first year and a half is such inspiration. Here are some of our accomplishments so far this year and our dreams for the future:
- Expanded our contributor reach to over 20 countries
- Pitched and started work on a documentary with the GAVI Alliance in Switzerland for global health
- Raised over $4000 and held offline advocacy events for life-saving vaccines for children in the developing world through the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life campaign
- Quoted in American Scientific
- Invited to speak by the UN Foundation in Times Square in NYC alongside actress Amanda Peet, the executive director of the World Health Organization and the managing editor of Living Simple magazine to launch the PSA for the Shot@Life campaign.
- Increased our international editing and social media team with Martine from the Dainty Mom, Diana Stone from Hormonal Imbalances, Ruth Wong from The Mommy Cafe and Jennifer Johns, a fan of the blog! Kyla P’an, one of WMB’s longtime editors, has taken on a managing role of weekly editors, too!
And, we’re just getting started! Here’s what we have planned for the future:
- Our mothers around the world have been leading the discussions on our new web design — we can’t wait for it to come out!
- We are talking about planning future conferences, developing multicultural lessons and assemblies for schools, camps for children with a global emphasis of understanding.
- We are continuing our exciting work this summer on our international documentary with the GAVI Alliance. Grass-roots parties have and are being filmed in India, South Africa, Kenya and various places in the USA to start!
The possibilities are endless.
We are truly honored and this new accolade boosts our inspiration to keep up our work in telling the stories of mothers around the world and coming up with new ways to inspire and make the lives better for mothers and children around the world. And thank you Forbes Woman. You have no idea how much this recognition means to us.
— Jennifer Burden, Founder of World Moms Blog
Jennifer Burden is the Founder and CEO of World Moms Network, an award winning website on global motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. World Moms Network writes from over 30 countries, has over 70 contributors and was listed by Forbes as one of the “Best 100 Websites for Women”, named a “must read” by The New York Times, and was recommended by The Times of India.
She was also invited to Uganda to view UNICEF’s family health programs with Shot@Life and was previously named a “Global Influencer Fellow” and “Social Media Fellow” by the UN Foundation. Jennifer was invited to the White House twice, including as a nominated "Changemaker" for the State of the World Women Summit. She also participated in the One Campaign’s first AYA Summit on the topic of women and girl empowerment and organized and spoke on an international panel at the World Bank in Washington, DC on the importance of a universal education for all girls. Her writing has been featured by Baby Center, Huffington Post, ONE.org, the UN Foundation’s Shot@Life, and The Gates Foundation’s “Impatient Optimists.” She is currently a candidate in Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs in the Executive Masters of Public Affairs program, where she hopes to further her study of global policies affecting women and girls.
Jennifer can be found on Twitter @JenniferBurden.
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