En liten uppdatering från Nepal (på engelska)

Namaste Sofia and Stella Star Team from Nepal,

I just wanted to give you some background information on this village so you can understand why we have decided to partner with the school in this particular area.

The village in situated in Bara District and is in the western area of Nepal, approximately 17 kilometres from the Indian border. The village name is Bakuliya 5, Vawanipur and many of the families living in this village are a part of the extremely marginalized caste known as the ‘untouchable’ caste. In Nepal, if you are a part of this caste, you are not allowed to own your own land and therefore many families have no choice but to become laborers for other village members. Additionally, children from this caste do not attend school regularly as they suffer from bullying and discrimination, not to mention the fact that any money their parents do make goes towards providing food and shelter rather than paying for educational materials. It is extremely sad that this is still occurring in our country today and unfortunately unless these children are provided with an education, the generational poverty will continue through their families.

The reason that this particular village is so important to our center, is because many of the young girls do not attend school. We want to really encourage families to send their children and in particular their daughters to school to receive an education, rather than working as laborers from a young age or being used for human trafficking. Girls are more likely to go straight into the workforce rather than attend school as their parents have the mentality that they will have to pay for their daughter’s dowry when they get married. This can be costly for these families; therefore, they would prefer to save their money for the dowry rather than pay for the cost of an education. Unfortunately, they do not have the money to pay for both, hence why so few girls regularly attend school. When talking with the girls from the village, they so desperately want to attend school and would prefer their parents to use the money to pay for their education rather than their dowry, but sadly this is not a reality for these girls. Those girls that are lucky enough to attend school are highly likely to drop out after class 6 due to the rising cost of educational materials for the higher grades.

Through being able to provide scholarships to these children, it will mean that we can pay for their uniform expenses and all other educational material which is often the financial burden that families cannot afford. So thank you so much for your generosity in not only allowing these children a second chance at an education, but more importantly a second chance at life and to change their future outlooks.

As for the school equipment that we spoke about, having visited the school and spoken to the teachers, at present there is a much greater need for school benches and basic classroom equipment. Please find below the list of items the teachers and I believe will be most beneficial to this school community.

School benches – many children sitting on floors and not enough bench space for children to sit. 30 sets school benches will need to be purchased to ensure students have a place to sit and learn. School benches are approx. 5000NRP per set.

Other educational materials – like school uniforms and books.

Once again, I can’t thank you enough for your patience in allowing me to gather all of this information for you. Your generosity is so greatly appreciated.