Liquid Life Reaches Bangladesh

Brighter Dawns, an Illinois-registered nonprofit founded by Wesleyan University students this year, launched its first public health initiative in the slums of Khalishpur, Bangladesh. The public health initiative provides Bangladeshi residents clean water, sanitation and health safety kits. 

Brighter Dawns aims to provide the slums of Bangladesh ease of access to liquid life — clean water — while empowering women and improving health conditions as part of a larger initiative.

Earlier this year, Brighter Dawns ran many successful fundraisers both on and off the Wesleyan campus. On-campus events included a gingerbread house competition, midterm and final exam care package sale, a showing of "Slumdog Millionaire" and cupcake cup bake-off. 

Off-campus community events included a 5K for Brighter Dawns, in which students, athletes and community members alike banded together to run for thirst and run for life, and a promotion at Haveli's Restaurant, in which 15 percent of customers' bills were donated to the organization.

Thanks to these successful events, student and community support, clear advisement and hard work, Brighter Dawns has embarked upon its mission this summer, constructing 10 wells, 20 latrines and distributing 1,000 health kits to help promote clean sanitation. In the past couple of weeks, the wells have been constructed, more than 700 health kits have been distributed and work has begun on the latrines.

As the recipient of the Davis Projects for Peace Grant and semi-finalist for the Dell Social Innovation Competition, Brighter Dawns looks forward to a brighter future. With feet on the ground running, CEO and founder Tasmiha Khan was excited to begin work and is delivering results.

"Throughout the academic year, Brighter Dawns has been working tirelessly in all areas," Khan says. "It is truly refreshing to see the fruits of our labor materialize."

Khan had the opportunity to coordinate and conduct a clean water and sanitation conference with Bangladeshi youth, in which she and her sister, Tarmim Khan, opened dialogue with the children about personal hygiene, clean water and sanitation in Bangladesh, and distributed health kits that included soap, cleaning tablets and sanitary napkins.

A generous donor provided the dynamic duo with Crayola crayons, markers and pencils to teach the children about sanitation and water use. Amongst conversation, Tasmiha posed a question to the children: "what is the first thing that comes to mind when I say the word water?" The children drew the first thing that came to their minds and discussed how to make sure they are practicing proper hand washing, sanitation and hygiene practices.

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