Education Bangladesh Project #23862

Educating the slums

by Maria Cristina Foundation

Project Report | Nov 30, 2021
AMAZING INCREDIBLE NEWS

By Maria Conceicao | Founder

3RD November 2021 is very special day for these 9 butterflies!

Today they finally enrolled at Al Sadiq Islamic English School, an Athena Education School.
8 of the girls are on a scholarship, which was offered more than 2 years ago when the girls visited for summer camp.
Thankfully and amazingly, Athena kept their promise, despite the many obstacles we faced to get the girls in a position to attend school in Dubai.

Many people told me that it would be virtually impossible to get residence visas for the girls - but I always believe that if something is worthwhile, there is always a way, keep trying and you will find a solution.

It took me 1 year to train for and summit Mount Everest - this took over 2 years of constant hard work.

But of course, so many people have helped to achieve this, and I am sure that many more people will help to ensure that it continues successfully. Despite difficult times with Covid etc, it is amazing how the Dubai community, be it businesses or individuals, look out for and help others. Thank you, Dubai and others, outside of Dubai who have helped them.

Thank you to some of our older students and volunteers in Bangladesh, who helped to arrange the 'difficult to obtain' paperwork in Bangladesh, required for them to travel.
Thank you to the UAE embassy who were amazing in their help and support, without their valuable help even the first steps would have been impossible.
Thank you to many people who have sponsored flight tickets or visit visas for the girls and their mothers to get them here.
Thank you to those who have helped with the visa processes and the many renewals needed.
Thank you to the many people and companies who have helped with groceries, essential items, tutoring classes, activities - there have been so many
Thank you to the amazing companies who have provided jobs for the mothers, enabling them to sponsor their daughters' visas.
Thank you for those who have helped with school uniforms, books etc (also many thanks to those who will hopefully help soon )
Thank you for those who helped sponsor the residence visas for the girls and those who made it happen, such a difficult task.
Thank you to those who helped with furniture and essential items for their accommodations (also thanks to those who will hopefully help soon )
Thank you of course to Athena Education for keeping their promise, despite our difficulties and delays.

Of course, it is not over, there will be many more challenges ahead, but thank you to anybody who has been involved in any way to help and support these girls and their mothers. You can be proud that you have helped to change their lives for the better, for good, by laying a path with so many opportunities ahead.

For sure they will do their best to make you proud.

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Feb 17, 2021
The Challenge is Immense, but we are determined.

By Maria Conceicao | Founder

We want to make history. Obviously as a charity we want to help the poor, give better opportunities etc, these are everyday goals for us. But long term we want to do something new, something that hasn’t been done before, something that people will look back on and say, wow, that is how you create change and have an impact. That is how you transform people’s lives for the better.

So we feel that our work is history in the making - but until we get those long term results many, many people tell us that we are trying to do too much for these people, or that there are easier tried and tested ways to help people in smaller ways and we don’t need to do so much – but, that doesn’t help us to reach our goals, the main one of which is to provide an educational stepping stone to all of life’s opportunities for our students, no matter what situation they are born into.

There are some, who believe in our work, in our vision, they are amazed at what we are doing for these families and they do everything they can to help. These people are special, these people are many of you who are reading this. So, we really want to thank YOU for your continued help and support. This is what enables us to keep doing what we do to reach our long-term goals.

We currently have 5 families from Bangladesh staying in Dubai, 5 mothers and 9 girls all from very difficult backgrounds in Dhaka. The girls aged 10 to 15 are bright and ambitious, they have been studying with us in Dhaka since grade 1.

We have school scholarships for the 9 girls in Dubai in a great school and we are just trying to secure their residence visas and living situation to make this move semi-permanent. We are helping the mothers to develop so that they can find work, to be independent.

It is an extreme challenge, the everyday effort to help them develop, the costs, the logistics, the powers against them in Dhaka trying to prevent them such an opportunity, the legalities and regulatory issues that make residence in Dubai difficult for them.

But the results and changes to the lives of these girls will be huge. They will have the opportunity to reach their full potential without prejudice, even to follow their hopes and dreams to study at University and later to work in the career of their choice.

If you can help, whether it is support for living costs, clothes, transport, visa costs or anything else, please do, join us and be a part of history in the making.

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Oct 26, 2020
Maria Cristina Foundation report

By Katrin Winter | Project Leader

2020 The Year That Keeps on Taking!

To say it has been a struggle would be the understatement of the year. Besides the obvious issues, faced in many countries, families losing their income, schools being locked down etc (thanks to some amazing supporters we have been able to provide food packages and help the students with online schooling), still, the challenges just keep coming.

For the families we help, their development is severely suppressed by society, it always has been, especially for the women. Even when we develop new projects to help these suffering families, it seems that society tries its best to stop that too.

Even just to leave the country (Bangladesh) is extremely challenging for women, despite having all the right paperwork (of which there is a lot).

We recently tried to bring some female students (adults) to Dubai for internships, we made sure that all paperwork was in order but at the final gate, Bangladesh immigration would not let them leave - the reason given, "we don't believe you; how could YOU get such an opportunity?".

We understand that a level of protection is needed to help prevent human trafficking etc but if the paperwork is in order and there is no genuine reason for concern, then this should not happen, these humans have rights. To have an official stop them, because in his or her selfish or suppressive view the student doesn't deserve such an opportunity, is simply criminal in our view.

On that occasion somebody from MCF had to travel to Bangladesh and with the valuable help of the UAE embassy we made sure that these girls got on the plane to Dubai, where they gained a fantastic work experience. But without our help, they would have been stuck, suppressed, held down and simply treated as if they have done wrong or do not deserve anything good in life.

The challenges haven't ended, we have more projects, trying to bring single mums and their daughters to Dubai for work and amazing scholarship opportunities - the authorities in Bangladesh are making it impossible. Creating mistakes in thier documents making it impossible for them to travel and then refusing to correct it (or asking for ridiculous amounts of money to correct it).

Also, students wanting to take up university offers in Portugal have found it impossible, either for the same issues as above, or because education authorities' wont issue their certificate or because it has become virtually impossible to obtain their student visas for Portugal. Already before the procedure was so unfair for them, students have to travel to India to apply for the visa and wait up to 40 days for issuance, there is no solution in their home country. We had hoped and requested that with COVID19 making it virtually impossible to travel, there may be a better solution, even if its temporary, but no the Portugal Embassy or visa authorities insist they have to travel to India - obviously increasing the risk of them contracting COVID 19 (and of course potentially carrying it to Portugal), I really hope these people have a rethink and adapt like the rest of the world has.

We could go on, because the challenges have been countless, but the important thing to note is - WE WILL NOT GIVE UP!

Thank you so much for your valuable support to make things happen and to make changes in our World.

Links:

http://www.mariacristinafoundation.org/

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