RSVP Now! The Rose International Fund for Children Dinner & Fundraiser - September 15, 2011

SLC Results are in and it has nothing to do with Salt Lake City!

So you must be wondering, what's SLC? Does it have something to do with Salt Lake City? No. Does it have some talent show (sorry, I'm watching America's Got Talent right now)? Uhh, No. Okay, let's get serious now, what is it then? In Nepal, SLC stands for School Leaving Certificate. The SLC examination is usually administered in the spring (March/April) to all students completing Grade 10. Passing of this exam is of utmost importance to students because it determines whether they can continue on to higher secondary education also known as "Plus 2" or "college", then ultimately, should they decide to and are able to afford it, go on to university. This year, about 500,000 students had planned to sit for the exam in over 1000 exam centers across the country. The exam has been plagued with past reports of cheating, however, this year, it was reported that the government had planned to adopt a 'tough policy' in order to ensure that exams were conducted fairly.

On a more personal level, yesterday, I received an email from one of the children who I met back in 2006. He happily reported that he had passed the SLC and received a passing score of 83% with Distinction. Only 55% of those who took the exam passed it this year, and a much smaller number who pass with distinction! So this is quite an achievement for him and he is so grateful to his sponsors. It is a testament to the dedication of former staff/advisors for DRC, specifically Amrit and Rose Falconer, for ensuring his enrollment in a private school by finding donors to sponsor this young man's education. 

In Nepal, both public and private school have tuition fees. Despite passing the SLC, some cannot afford to continue on pass Grade 10. And likewise, even after completing 'Plus 2', some may not be able to go on to university. It is always a challenge to ensure that children even obtain basic education. This young man is one of the fortunate ones, but it did not come easy, and when dependent on donors, there are no guarantees. Fortunately, there are organizations in Nepal and here in the US that see the value in education and are willing to go the extra mile to help those in need.

Thank-you for visiting and if you want to learn more about the various organizations that do great work on behalf of Nepali children and young women, visit the organizations' websites included in Links.

Namaste,

Jackie

Click here to read an interesting Op-Ed piece about the SLC exam.

And another interesting read: http://neltachoutari.wordpress.com/2011/04/30/1645/

Nepal is Landmine Free! Totally, I hope!!!

Great news today for Nepal! The BBC reported today that Nepal is landmine free! This comes five years after the end of a 10 year long civil war that have cost many their lives and have left many people disabled. However, it was unclear to me from the BBC article if Nepal is free of landmines placed by the army as well as those placed by the rebel forces. So I did a little digging. According to the Landmine & Cluster Munition Monitor's Mine Ban Policy for Nepal, it states that the country's "November 2006 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) committed the government and the Unified Communist Party of Nepal/Maoist rebels to halt the use of landmines, and required the parties to assist each other to mark and clear mines and booby-traps." So that being said, I'm hoping that indeed most if not all the landmines have been located and detonated. And although Nepal has not yet signed the Mine Ban (Ottawa) Treaty (neither has the U.S.), I also learned that in 2009 the Monitor removed Nepal from their list of mine producers.


The human costs associated with wars is felt for many years even with cease-fires or peace agreements. Landmines continue to injure and kill many civilians, but the work that the International Campaign to Ban Landmines has been doing over the years has made a difference in bringing this issue to the forefront. What they've done in Nepal helps us get one step closer to a landmine-free world.


Namaste,
Jackie

Update from DHC New Life Center - June 5, 2011

Namaste Friends - this is the latest update from DHC NewLife Center. This is one of the organizations that we are helping in Nepal. A big shout out to those of you who donated recently to help the kids there - Gordon, Rose, Doug, Erin, Rob & Gina!! 


-Jackie
======================================
June 5, 2011
Update from DHC New Life Center


Dear supporter,
Namaste

This is a brief email just to keep you up to date with how things are
going in our Care House.  The children are all well and have settled
into the new school year.  Thanks to generous donations from people in
Australia, America , New Zealand,France,Switzerland, Hongkong etc we
have been able to pay all the school fees for the whole year and buy
the children the required new school uniforms and text books.  The
children did very well in their school results last year with Mahesh
coming first in his class!  They are very studious.

Our very exciting news is that we have moved house.  The old house did
not have any outdoor area for the children in which they could play or
where we could have a garden but in the new house we have good outside
areas.  I have attached photos so that you can see the new house and
the outdoor areas.  Kindness in Action USA has paid the rent for the
new house which is wonderful.  We have a 5 year agreement (lease) on
this house and while it is much much better than our previous house we
still need to fix some things in it like making the toilet more
accessible, especially for those children whose disability affects
their legs, put in an underground water storage system as we only get
access to government water twice a week and work on the garden so that
we can grow some of our own vegetables.

The other good news is that again thanks to Rose Stevens, who is Vice
chairperson in Kindness in Action and who visited DHC New Life Centre
in February 2011 with Robert Rose, we have an inverter so that we can
have electricity.
In Nepal we have 12 hour loadshedding every day/night (that means no
electricity for 12 hours out of every 24 hours) which makes it really
difficult for the children at night to go to toilet and study, but
because we now have an inverter we have back up electricity which
makes a big difference for the children – we will be use it to power
the lights while the children study and do their homework.

We have 5 years agreement this house, comparatively more comfortable
and has ground , garden but still we need to fixed some infrastructure
for disabled children as well as we need to fixed toilet, we need to
take out underground water because government supply water come only 2
time in a week, it is not sufficient for drinking. In new house we
have space for garden and play ground but need to fixed it and
plantation in garden.

We have also had a number of volunteers come and spend time with us
and that has been really good – the children love to have volunteers
come!

So we are going well and most importantly the children are well and
happy.  Please if you are coming to Nepal come and visit us and please
also keep in touch with us through email.  We value our contact with
our supporters and thank you very much for all the help you are giving
us to help make the lives of the children better.

Gordon Reiter has paid the health expanses which is really great! and
children getting regular health check up 3 times in a year and
Prosthetics like Crutches Caliper  wheelchairs etc.

With many thanks and best wishes

Amrit and everyone at DHC New Life Centre


(Please visit their website for photos and more details about them: http://dhcnlc.org/news.php)