Can you donate to help build a new school (and donate in November)?
During the month of November only, Room to Read has an anonymous donor who will match all on-line contributions. This is huge news. So, if you donate $100, $200 gets credited toward our project. If you donate $20, $40 gets credited. I am very excited about this opportunity, and I hope you are too.
Let’s use the matching opportunity to raise the rest of the funds during November. Could you donate $100 today? Can you donate more? If not, could you donate $25? Everything single dollar helps. Here’s what to do:
To donate and get credited toward the school (this is important), use this link: https://www.roomtoread.org/SSLPage.aspx?pid=184&source=PS-Hovland07
Donate by November 30 to double your money-go ahead and make a tax deductible donation today. Once you click the link, select the amount you want to donate, put in your billing and payment information, and you’re done!
Please email me if you donate so I can make sure it gets counted toward the school
Namaste,
Val
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Stories about education from Nepal (spring 2008)
There were five of us crammed into a tiny little white car, journeying a few hours into the countryside of Nepal, just outside Kathmandu. We were going to visit a few schools and libraries that Room to Read has created over the past decade
. ‘We’ included Rajeev, in charge of libraries for Room to Read across all of Nepal, a new Nepali woman in charge of monitoring and evaluating how the schools and libraries in this region are doing, and me. On the way out of town, we drove past gas stations that had lines of cars waiting, occupants waiting almost a day to get fuel. Slowly we left the craziness of Kathmandu and began to see more and more space. Fields of green appeared, growing beans or corn, wheat or sugarcane. After all, three-quarters of Nepalis are dependent on agriculture for their living, so you would expect to see a lot of it.
We wound through one small town, back into the countryside, and again into another town. The paved road became bumpier. Eventually we turned off of the paved road onto a dirt road. Then the dirt road became bumpier. So eventually we stopped and got out on foot. We were on our way to see a Room to Read library. Along the way we saw women working the rice fields, a group from the village all working together in a line, wearing brightly colored dresses, their feet in water. A few boys were nearby, working an ox to help plow the fields.
After walking for another half an hour along the road, ducking into the nearest building for a little cover from the rain shower for a few minutes, we made it to the library. And that is where the little girl in red in the attached picture likes to hang out.
She lives in this remote village, her parents undoubtedly farming nearby. She had access to a school, but until Room to Read helped out, she used to have almost no access to books. Do you remember when you were little and got into reading for the first time? Maybe you were reading in your kitchen to your mom, or outside in the sun reading about an adventurous young girl or boy, or maybe you were engrossed in a book sitting your school library. Now the little girl in red has the same opportunities. The library
had its own small ‘block’ for a building, that being donated by the community as part of the community challenge grant (where Room to Read partners with the community, both parties putting effort into realizing the school or library). Most of the books were in Nepali, but some were in Nepali and English. Hundreds of books had been checked out and checked back in. From colorful ones to engage younger students through technical ones to help the teachers and community members learn more and change the way they do things. Many little things add up to big things. And the sign on the wall with colorful elephants and tigers and a little girl says, “All of the animals are in the library reading books. Where are you?”
In another village, there was a school. A newly reconstructed Room to Read school..jpg)
The old school had been almost falling down. Can you picture going to school and trying to learn in a room where if it rains, the incoming water might make you stop? In global education-speak, the quality environment just wasn’t there. In a country where almost half of the people are unemployed, and almost a third are living below the poverty line, it can sometimes be hard to keep up a school. But the desire to do so is great. And that is where Room to Read came in. In conjunction with the community to help reconstruct the school and with Nepal’s Ministry of Education to provide the teachers, Room to Read built a new school in 2008. It was a primary school, complete with a room for every grade, bright colors on the walls, a stocked library with sections for young kids, older kids, and resources for the teachers. They even thought of little things like having a shorter chalkboard for the first grade class, so the children could reach it and see it easily. And that school is where the kids in uniforms
with the huge smiles on their faces in the attached picture went to school. We were there during a time where almost all other schools were not yet in session as they should be-this was due to a delay in books being delivered to the schools because of Nepal’s national election in April 2008
(resources had been diverted from printing school books to printing election materials instead). So at a time when almost no other kids were in school, these kids were in school. They were lining up to go into the library. They were studying in their classrooms. And as we could see, they were really happy to be there.
. ‘We’ included Rajeev, in charge of libraries for Room to Read across all of Nepal, a new Nepali woman in charge of monitoring and evaluating how the schools and libraries in this region are doing, and me. On the way out of town, we drove past gas stations that had lines of cars waiting, occupants waiting almost a day to get fuel. Slowly we left the craziness of Kathmandu and began to see more and more space. Fields of green appeared, growing beans or corn, wheat or sugarcane. After all, three-quarters of Nepalis are dependent on agriculture for their living, so you would expect to see a lot of it.We wound through one small town, back into the countryside, and again into another town. The paved road became bumpier. Eventually we turned off of the paved road onto a dirt road. Then the dirt road became bumpier. So eventually we stopped and got out on foot. We were on our way to see a Room to Read library. Along the way we saw women working the rice fields, a group from the village all working together in a line, wearing brightly colored dresses, their feet in water. A few boys were nearby, working an ox to help plow the fields.
After walking for another half an hour along the road, ducking into the nearest building for a little cover from the rain shower for a few minutes, we made it to the library. And that is where the little girl in red in the attached picture likes to hang out.
She lives in this remote village, her parents undoubtedly farming nearby. She had access to a school, but until Room to Read helped out, she used to have almost no access to books. Do you remember when you were little and got into reading for the first time? Maybe you were reading in your kitchen to your mom, or outside in the sun reading about an adventurous young girl or boy, or maybe you were engrossed in a book sitting your school library. Now the little girl in red has the same opportunities. The library
had its own small ‘block’ for a building, that being donated by the community as part of the community challenge grant (where Room to Read partners with the community, both parties putting effort into realizing the school or library). Most of the books were in Nepali, but some were in Nepali and English. Hundreds of books had been checked out and checked back in. From colorful ones to engage younger students through technical ones to help the teachers and community members learn more and change the way they do things. Many little things add up to big things. And the sign on the wall with colorful elephants and tigers and a little girl says, “All of the animals are in the library reading books. Where are you?”In another village, there was a school. A newly reconstructed Room to Read school.
.jpg)
The old school had been almost falling down. Can you picture going to school and trying to learn in a room where if it rains, the incoming water might make you stop? In global education-speak, the quality environment just wasn’t there. In a country where almost half of the people are unemployed, and almost a third are living below the poverty line, it can sometimes be hard to keep up a school. But the desire to do so is great. And that is where Room to Read came in. In conjunction with the community to help reconstruct the school and with Nepal’s Ministry of Education to provide the teachers, Room to Read built a new school in 2008. It was a primary school, complete with a room for every grade, bright colors on the walls, a stocked library with sections for young kids, older kids, and resources for the teachers. They even thought of little things like having a shorter chalkboard for the first grade class, so the children could reach it and see it easily. And that school is where the kids in uniforms
with the huge smiles on their faces in the attached picture went to school. We were there during a time where almost all other schools were not yet in session as they should be-this was due to a delay in books being delivered to the schools because of Nepal’s national election in April 2008
(resources had been diverted from printing school books to printing election materials instead). So at a time when almost no other kids were in school, these kids were in school. They were lining up to go into the library. They were studying in their classrooms. And as we could see, they were really happy to be there.
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