Volunteer Shyam Gnawali visits Nepalgunj and reports back on life and progress in one of our sponsored schools.
|
|
|
|
Image: Sujal & Sonam during Shyam Gnawali’s visit to Nepalgunj
Catching
up with five students in Nepalgunj, Shyam got a chance to ask a number
of questions about the school year, how students were doing, and how
NCEF has contributed to their success. The students—Sonam, 8; Sujal, 7;
Pabitra, 6; Kamla, 6; and Trishna, 5—came from distances of up to 17 km
away to be at school that day.
By
their own accounts, the students are finding subjects such as Math and
English quite challenging. They are confident that they will get passing
grades in these subjects, though they won’t find out their grades until
the end of the term. Thanks to NCEF, they have all received necessary
school supplies such as uniforms, books, pens, and geometry boxes.
In
speaking with our Nepalgunj area coordinator, Ms. Apsara Khanal, about
the status of the program and the challenges they face, Ms. Khanal
outlined various problems. Timely document delivery is an issue because
of the political status of Nepal, as well as holidays and standard
delays. For example, regular power cuts and poor Internet connection can
cause scanning and emailing documents to take a few days, especially
when the scanned document are large. Inconsistent volunteer performance
is another major challenge. This is an expected challenge because no
volunteer is paid for the effort required to do necessary field work;
some volunteers quickly lose interest. However, our program in Nepalgunj
continues to run thanks to the dedication of a few volunteers who
continue to put in their time and energy to help students despite the
lack of remuneration.
|
|
|
Currently, our volunteers in Nepal are collecting applications for the coming school year. Next month, we’ll announce the progress of the 2013-2014 student selection process and profile one of our generous contributors.
|
