Help disadvantaged Bengali children + young people

In my last report I wrote about one of the female students who had passed her Board Exam with flying colours. The whole class of Year X at the New Life Centre School did well scoring between 87% and 75%.

Quite a few of the students were sponsored by HATW and Alindra has enabled them to go onto further education in Senior Secondary schools locally. As well as Nilima who I mentioned last time Abu is another student who was sponsored throughout his time at the school.

The photo below is of Abu when he entered the school in 2012. He had the same sponsor for 9 years and so the sponsor has watched this young man develop into a well-educated confident teenager. It is always a privilege for me to see the difference a good education makes to these young people when I visit, and watch them grow in confidence throughout their time at the school.

On my last visit in 2019 we took a parachute with us, and although Abu looked ‘too cool for school’ as a teenager in his ‘shades’, he enjoyed joining in the parachute games, as seen above.

Now he has left school and as I said is in a Senior secondary school, where his important beginning at the New Life Centre school has laid the foundations for a life better than his parents could ever have imagined for their children, thanks to Alindra.

Thanks so much for your support and if you'd like to find out more about sponsoring a child in India, please contact jane@hatw.org.uk.

The New Life Centre school has been closed since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020, but Mr Naskar and his dedicated staff have kept in contact with the older school children either through their phones or by hard copies of work. This has been no mean feat in an area which is isolated and prone to flooding.

Priority has been given to the older schoolchildren, particularly Class X pictured above who were in school briefly to prepare for their Board exam, the equivalent of our GCSEs. Initially the Government hoped to hold the exams, but in the end they were assessed from their Class IX exams in school.

Nilima on the right of the photo below has been at the school for nine years, and has always worked hard and obtained high marks in her work. Nilima scored the top result in her year group, 87%, outstanding for her year. Nilima’s father is a tailor and has a small plot of land for their personal needs, but as with most of the families in the school this tends to be a subsistence living. Nilima has been sponsored throughout her time at the school through Hands Around the World, and the benefits are clear to see.

Nilima is ambitious and wants to become an English teacher after completing Sixth form studies then University. She has expressed her desire to return to the school in the future as an English teacher, in appreciation of the education she received.

Wouldn’t you like to sponsor a child and expand their horizons?

Links:

• https://hatw.org.uk/donate/