Cymraeg
Education for Life: Big Give Christmas Challenge 2024
The following are just a few examples of the way our Education for Life programme helps children and their communities improve education, health and welfare, and helps children fulfil their potential, in Madagascar.
It takes a village to raise a child. We’d love you to become part of our village, by sharing this page, and donating to the Big Give Christmas Challenge from 12pm on Tuesday 3rd December to 12pm on Tuesday 10th December, at: https://donate.biggive.org/campaign/a056900002TPTbIAAX.
Access: finance
Meet Alexandre. Alexandre – Alex to his friends – is a 13-year-old student at Ambohibary I Primary School.
Alex is an orphan, looked after by his grandfather. He attended school like any other child, but like many Malagasy children, poverty forced him to leave; in his case because his grandfather could no longer afford to pay the school’s tuition fees.
Our Education for Life programme stepped in, supporting Alex and others with school fee payment and school kits, which have enabled him to return to school, where he is now progressing well.
Alex’s story is not uncommon in Madagascar: four in ten children here never finish primary school. That’s far too many, and Our Education for Life programme – and your Big Give donation from 3-10 December – will help reduce that, by enabling more children like Alex to attend school and build a better future.
Food
Tsiry‘s life and school marks have already been changed for the better by Education for Life and our partner Mary’s Meals’ school canteens project.
‘My name is Tsiry.
‘I am in eighth grade at EPP Manerinerina.
‘Before, I was very hungry at school and when I came home every day. I live 30 minutes from the school, about three kilometres.
‘We don’t eat food in the morning at home because my parents are very poor, and school lasts until 12:30.
‘Now, thanks to the new school canteen I am no longer hungry when I come home.
‘My studies are also improving because before I had an average of 9/20 at school but now I have 12/20.’
Some 83%of Madagascar’s rural population, like Tsiry, live in poverty – on less than £1.50 per day. Nearly 50%of Malagasy children under five suffer from stunting caused by malnutrition, and 40%of Malagasy children never even finish primary school, including because of poverty, while others fail to achieve their potential because of hunger.
Your donation can help change this. Education for Life provides Tsiry and many other children in her position with their first meal of the day, every school day. With your help from 12pm on Tuesday 3rd December, we can reach many more, promoting health and education with the food children need.
Access: Infrastructure
In Amboasarikely, Ambalalava Fokontany, in Madagascar’s Itasy region, children had been unable to even reach school in safety during the country’s rainy season, because the old wooden bridge which was the only route from their homes to the EPP Amboasarikely (Amboasarikely Primary School).
Failing to attend school because of safety concerns, or risking their lives trying, was an unacceptable choice to force on these children, so Education for Life funded the building of a new bridge, constructed from durable materials and designed to withstand changing weather conditions, to ensure they can now safely attend school every day.
The bridge opened in June this year, and is helping not only children, but adults in their community, too.
Rakotoarisoa André, President of the bridge construction committee, explained: ‘Previously, if a woman was going to give birth or if someone was sick, we couldn’t cross the river and had to take a longer route to get to the hospital. It was a risk to people’s health. This bridge is like a lifeline.’
Water
One other factor the programme works on is water provision.
In the village of Amboanana, and surrounding villages, water is extremely hard to access during the dry season, with community members travelling two kilometres for any kind of supply. Even then, what they can bring back is sufficient only for drinking and cooking: most people often had too little water to wash clothes or even themselves.
Young people registered at the Amboananakely Primary School were regularly unable to attend classes either because of the need to travel to fetch water, or because they had become ill due to dehydration and being unable to wash.
Under Education for Life, we worked with the local community to install water at the school, meaning young people and adults have water for drinking, washing and bathing, enabling them to attend school and improve their health.
Adults
Education for Life also provides resources to parents and other members of the communities of which the children we work with are part.
At Ambohibary Primary School, where Education for Life has carried out activities including improving literacy, providing water and food (including by planting fruit trees and making vegetable gardens), teacher training, building a library and delivering school kits for youngsters, we also ensured facilities and programmes were open to parents and other community members.
One parent, Angelique Soloniaina, took part in our ‘literacy at school level’ course for ten months. In this course, she learnt to read and write, skills which she used to learn more about agricultural and livestock farming techniques from books at the school’s library. Using these books, she applied new techniques to her work, and has managed to more than double her income.
Another parent of one of the school’s children, Ando Randrianasolo, used the school’s library to learn needlework, and now earns a weekly wage from her work. This includes creating uniforms for the school’s children.
Digital Learning
One other element of Education for Life is working to provide children – and their teachers – with the equipment they need to get the most out of their schooling, and make the most of the potential they have.
Earlier this year, we donated 10 tablets, one Raspberry, one pico projector, one speaker and one hardware user guide to Ambohibary Primary School, and seven tablets, one Raspberry, one pico projector, one speaker, one hardware user guide, 56 Onetab and 56 headsets to Amboasarikely Primary School, as well as one tablet, one Raspberry and one Onetab to the region’s directorate of national education so the authority can provide support and assistance to the schools’ pupils and teachers where necessary.
The equipment is already providing teachers with assistance in preparing and explaining lessons to students, and helping students play a more active part in their lessons, paying more attention and engaging more.
Onjaniaina Rova, Ambohibary Primary School’s principal, said: ‘Before when we explained the lessons to the students we only made examples in their heads. Now, thanks to these tools we can use images, videos and audio, to help them engage better.’
Education for Life is are turning a situation into which four in ten Malagasy children never even finish primary school due to poverty, hunger, ill-health and death, into one in which all youngsters receive the access to quality education that every child deserves.
This work – your donation – is already helping children and the adults in their communities, and is laying the groundwork for ever better education, health, achievements and welfare in those communities in years to come.
The saying goes that ‘it takes a village to raise a child’, and we’d love you to join our village by getting involved and making a donation through Big Give from NOW to 12pm on Tuesday 10th December.
Please like and share this page, and donate from 12pm, Tuesday 3rd December to 12pm, Tuesday 10th December!
