Educate 2000 Underprivileged Children In India

Krishna was a 16 year old with big dreams. He dreamed of working at an upmarket hotel. He hadn’t had the opportunity to actually set foot in many of them. His routine mainly consisted of doing his diploma course in hotel management and then going back “home,” a shelter for destitute children. 

While doing his diploma, Krishna applied to one of the leading hotels in Chennai, India, for a part-time, after-school job. He passed the round of tests but because of his poor communication skills, Krishna was assigned to the kitchen as a helper. But he kept plugging along.

Then news of campus recruitments came along. That’s when Krishna approached U&I for help. U&I assigned Krishna a volunteer who was willing to take on the challenge of teaching spoken English to an older child. He tirelessly coached Krishna for the next few months. It took repeated conversations and constant practice. And, finally, it was the day of the campus interview. Krishna, nervous but determined, shined in all the rounds.

He was recruited for a front desk job. And the icing on the cake? He would be back at the same hotel where he worked as a kitchen helper. This time he would be where he had dreamed of being. And the money wasn’t bad, either!

Krishna’s is not a rags-to-riches story. In fact, those stories happen mostly in the movies. Krishna’s is a story of hard work and determination of a young man from a destitute children’s home. His story is about how lending someone a hand can make a huge difference.

U&I which runs tutoring centers all over India believes that every child has tons of potential. They just need the opportunity and a little bit of help to shine. Just like Krishna.

In the last year, along with teaching the children and investing in their dreams, U&I has been busy setting up libraries at many of our centers.

Our Library Program has sparked an insatiable appetite for books - and the eager young minds we reach can't get enough. One of our littlest students, 4-year-old Shreyas, is not quite reading yet. But he still enjoys his picture books. And he loves re-telling the story he "read" to his teacher. His favorite book "The Moon and the Cap" is about a little boy just like him. It opens his view to a world of make-believe where anything is possible.

Having access to fiction books is something these kids don't take for granted. They absolutely love their reading time. Our tutors also use books as a springboard for further learning. We spend 15 minutes at the end of every class on "book time"- when we discuss the kids' favorite books, play "what's next?" (where we ask the children to come up with conclusions to stories), write letters to authors or ask them to draw what they heard or what they felt. Our libraries are categorized into five reading levels and each child gets to borrow a book for a week. 

Like the Dr. Suess quote goes: The more that you read, the more things that you'll know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go.

With this lifelong gift of loving books, we know that our children will go places.