Education Kits for 21,000 children in Pakistan

It is reasonable to feel like you’re stuck between a rock and a hard place when you want to see your children educated, but the closest school is several kilometers away. That was exactly the situation faced by the residents of the community of Abdul Salam Thebo, in Tando Allahyar, Sindh. The closest school was in Dasoru, 5 kilometers away, with the next one in Goth Village, 10 kilometers away, and parents were wary of having their children travel such considerable distances every day.

Fortunately, in early 2017, we opened a SABAQ Centre in the village. The children now had a place to study and parents were quite at ease that their children were spending their days productively, and eventually, forging a better life for themselves.

About 4 kilometers away from Abdul Salam Thebo, in a village called Saleh Mohammad Thebo, Mr. Khem Chand wakes up early and starts preparing for his day. He gets dressed and makes his way towards Village Abdul Salam Thebo to teach the kids at the Centre. He loves children and greatly enjoys teaching, making him the perfect candidate for the facilitator position.

Mr. Chand, however, also suffers from polio and has not been able to walk without pain for as long as he can remember.

Despite the lack of conveyance to the village, Mr. Chand is nothing but pure positivity. With the help of his walking cane, Mr. Chand walks for an hour and a half every day to reach the Centre, teaches children from 8 am to 2 pm, and walks an hour and a half back to his home. He has had the same routine for the last year and a half. He is one of the few people in the surrounding villages who himself has received higher education. As such, he finds himself in a position where he has the opportunity and drive to give back to the society he grew up in. He hopes to see all his students achieving learning outcomes of at least the equivalent of formal grade 5 education.

Mr. Chand and Mr. Ramshu, the other facilitator in this village, oversee the education of 90 students, a majority of whom belong to the same village, with around 10 students from nearby villages. His determination to teach children, at such great personal toll, arises from the fact that he considers it a moral duty. “I won’t deny that it’s not physically taxing, but what else can we do? These children will only be able to succeed and teach their young ones if they are educated themselves,” Mr. Chand tells us, “The rewards are exceptional, especially when I see them learn and understand lessons they had previously been struggling with.”

The disbursement of Education Kits in this Centre has left Mr. Chand overjoyed. Not only are the kids receiving the kind of education he is proud of, but now they are equipped with additional resources to reinforce their learning. “We’re in school for a limited time. These resources make sure all kids are learning simultaneously - that one child doesn’t have to be done practicing his tracing for the second child to begin. It has already improved the management and resource distribution in this Centre.” With his commendable resilience, Mr. Chand is an excellent example of the kind of fortitude displayed by our facilitators. It is due to your generous donation to our cause that Mr. Chand can take an even greater pride in the work and progress of his students.