Stop Child Brides in Nepal

Meet Kanchan. She and her mother are residents of Her Farm. Her mother came to Her Farm after her husband brought home a second wife because Kanchan's mother gave him a daughter, not a son. Kanchan has just started school in the village this year and attends morning English classes in the classroom at Her Farm each day before regular school. She's an addorable, sweet child, but she's also very much at-risk. The rural education system in Nepal is not good at all. The results of this year's SLC, or school leaving certificate as it is called were just released. Only 43% of all students in the 10th grade passed. Of the total graduates, only 28% were from rural schools such as the one Kanchan attends. It's critical that girls like Kanchan get all the education support possible as the odds are very much stacked against them. In government schools, for every 100 students, only 3 will pass the SLC. Knowing that the odds are so much against them, 50% of children in government schools drop out after grade 5. A significant number of them are girls. Of the same 100 students who begin school, only 13 will still be in school by grade 10.

Passing the SLC is akin to graduating high school and it's critical for future employment. It's fair to say that if a girl doesn't pass the SLC about the best she can hope for is to work as a house cleaner. Every year the news reports that several young girls who didn't pass commit suicide upon hearing the results. You see not passing means their families will very likely marry them off to some boy they have never met, and very soon too as the stigma of  not passing will be too great for the family to bear. Because a girl who doesn't pass has limited options in getting a good husband, the liklihood that she'll end up in poor surroundings and a victim of future domestic abuse increases as well.