Namaskar,
intussen ben ik in Kathmandu, een hele mooie stad, maar ik ben homesick for India...
Na een tiental pogingen heb ik eindelijk een internetcafe gevonden dat zijn naam waard is. De data die in de blog zullen verschijnen, kloppen dus nog minder dan ervoor.
De titel van dit stukje is een hele mond vol. Dit was dan ook het grootste werk dat Charlotte en ik gedaan hebben. Ik knip en plak hieronder de introductie en interessante info uit het rapport.
Thanks to Opus III, the Indian project managers, the staff and the guardians, many children in Jaipur get the opportunity to go to school. Now there are already 4 Fun and Child Schools. FCS I isolated in Hasanpura A, FCS II in Hasanpura C, FCS III in Chomoriya near Amber Road, and FCS IV in the V.K.I. Area, the industrial area.
Despite of this opportunity, there are many dropouts, pupils who stop school. There are also many irregular and absent pupils. Opus III and the Indian staff are very concerned about this and wanted to get more insight in the reasons why this happens. Beside that there are complaints of some Belgian guardians: the children they sponsor stopped school, so other children were assigned to them without getting much background information. For all this reasons Director mister Mansingh and Opus III asked us to make this survey.
We stayed 2 months here, so we had time to get to know a little bit the Indian mentality and way of life.First we talked with each head teacher, and checked the registers. We searched for pupils who dropped out, who come irregular or are many days absent. We asked the teachers to make a general overview about the number of dropouts and days of absence.Together with the staff we did family visits in the neighborhood of the different schools. We interviewed approximately 6 to 8 families of each school. We talked with the parents and the children. We asked questions about the family composition, religion, life circumstances and of course the reason why they dropped out or were absent. We also asked their opinion about the school and the project.
The second part of the survey are the parents` meetings. To reach more parents we organized a meeting in the schools. There was a big attendance. We asked the parents if their children come regular and motivated them to send them every day. We also asked questions about their opinion about the school, the teachers, the subjects, what they would like to change and their dreams for the school. After each meeting we talked with the head teacher about what was important for her and what things she could improve herself.
Here are the reasons for dropout, we start with the most important:
- Financial problems, children have to go to work, mostly boys
Reasons of financial problems: low income, many children (they want boys), many fathers have an alcohol problem and drink their income, mother or father deceased, …
- Parents move back to their village because they don`t find a job here
- Girls who have to help in the house, for example babyborn, mother or father deceased, …
- Engagement or marriage, especially girls, because they go and live with the husband`s family
- Parents , especially fathers, that want their Muslim children to go to Urdu school
- Not interested in school
- Failed and no more motivation
- The children go to another school: for better education, more math and science or English, because they move, …
- Learning difficulties
- Mental or emotional problems, for example because father or mother deceased, emotionally neglected, …
- Sick for a longtime
There are much more pupils that are absent than there are pupils that come irregular. Here are the reasons for irregularity and absence,we start with the most important:
- Sick
For example: malaria, fever, belly ache, stomach problem, eye problem, skin problem, toe problem, lung problem
In this season (September) a lot of sick children because of the changing of the season
- Parents go to their village
Reasons: to visit their family, to visit a sick family member, because someone is deceased, to take care of the crops, for a marriage, for festivities (if for example 2 days holiday in 1 week, they stay a whole week), the mother has to give birth
- Girls who have to help in the house, for example sickness or operation family member, baby born, mother or father deceased, …
- If one brother or sister is sick, all children stay home
- No one to prepare the children for school, because parents at work or in the village
- Financial problems, so the children have to work temporarily
- Not interested in school
- Prefer to work
- Small children that want to stay home sometimes
- Working at home to prepare Divali, for example painting
- Help family , for example: to build a house
- Special occasions in the family
- Help with the cattle (especially FCS III)
In this season (September) a lot of families go in the hills with the cattle because there is more water there
- Concentration problems
We went together with project manager mister Kumawat to each school to talk with the parents about their opinion, remarks, dreams and expectations about the
school. In this part of the survey we will give an overall view about the topics that to the parents are most important in all 4 schools:
In general the parents are satisfied with the school, the education level and the teachers, bags and copies which are provided and the school building (except of FCS II).
They are really happy their children have the chance to go to school. They have this chance because they are sponsored, otherwise they couldn`t afford it.
· They all want school uniforms to be provided for the children for free. Or at least a dress code so they can make a uniform themselves (but misterKumawat said this is not possible for poor families).
· They also want toys, so the children can play on the playground when they have a break.
· In every school they ask for more classrooms, but in FCS II there is a real urgent need for improvement of the building (flooding during monsoon, too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter ).
· Most of the schools also want the school to be furnished
· They would like computers
· More admittance (not enough places for all children)
· The level of education should be improved, especially English. They also want more hours of English class.Some would like that English is totally taught in English.
· In several schools they asked for technical education or a job training (job center).
· Extra tutoring lessons for pupils with learning difficulties
· Many parents want classes to learn to read and write
· Higher classes (up to 12th) so they can finish their education in the same school and for free.
· More practical education in general, not only theory
· Practical computer lessons
· More learning by playing, especially in nursery class, for example games, learning English by drawing, …
This problem was only mentioned in FCS III but is very important. The transportation to the school should be for free because now a lot of pupils stop school because the parents can`t pay for the transportation and they live to far from school to go byfoot.
· Medicines should be free for the pupils.
· Medical camps in every school not only in the neighborhood of FCS I. This is too far for the other schools, especially for FCS IV.
The P.R of the schools could be better, this was mentioned in FCS III because the school is not known in the city. So they suggest events on holidays in the school.
The parents agreed to send the children more regular to school and understand the importance of school. They also agreed to try to help their children with their studies
if possible and inform the staff about their whereabouts (for example: We go to the village for 4 days or he is sick, …)
