ICA Bangladesh

Kids in a Dhaka slum get basic education and life-skills training            click pictures to enlarge


The Bengali word “phulki” means spark. It is also the name of ICA Bangladesh’s educational and life skills project for street children in Dhaka City. Phulki was initiated in 2009, and is now in its fourth year. This year ICA Bangladesh introduced the rickshaw and the sewing machine in this project. Among extracurricular activities, it organized visits to different sites of educational and recreational interests.

Under this project, the children are provided access to non-formal basic education and

 
 
Students being introduced to computer training.

basic life skills training. Basic education includes learning the alphabet, numerical counting, and functional literacy, while life skills include child rights, health and hygiene, disability, sanitation, HIV/AIDS, STDs, drugs, the environment etc. The children are taught facilitation skills, healing techniques, citizenship, love, respect, herbal medicine, natural agriculture, social justice, environmental restoration, micro-credit, responsible internet access, leadership skills and basic computer knowledge.

They are offered learning materials including books, notes, monthly scholarship, school bag, school dress, snacks, and stipend. Sport facilities, cultural and extra-curricular activities like dance and drama, and water and electricity are also ensured under this project. The guardians, community, local government and local voluntary clubs/non-profits/business are partners in the project. The children are offered participatory and active learning environment along with facilitative leadership and life skills training.

The project was inaugurated by a Member of Parliament and has held its first year celebration. Educational and urgent materials distribution day was witnessed by the City Councilor. Parents and local partners took part in a workshop using ToP followed by the formal inauguration, cultural day, sports day and concluding ceremony.

Before starting the academic year, ICA staff visit every home in this community to tell them about the project and collect their opinions about it. We arrange community meetings at the commissioner’s house or the learning centre where the guardians of the children attend and share their views about this project. We use the ORID method and the workshop method for planning. These meetings encourage us to continue the project as the community realizes they are poor but poverty is not the main issue of their life. The main problem is they do not know how they can overcome poverty. Their dream is to make their children successful but they have no way to make it happen. If their children are involved in income generation they can minimize hunger in the family. But if they take the responsibility to make their children educated and skilled, they can develop their children’s future as self-confident, dignified and self-reliant citizens.

 

The students love the school and the ICA mission. They feel the school is their own

 
 
Students in the classroom.

organization. They say that the education system is different here. Teachers are friendly and helpful. The children are learning new things here unlike in other schools. Leadership training is exciting for them. They also love to learn life skills. They also share what they have learnt during awareness raising sessions on social issues like patriotism, love, respect, birth registration, voting, traffic laws, health, rights etc. with their parents and neighbors. In return, they are appreciated and honored. When they think of themselves as the future leader of their community, they feel empowered and dignified. The children want to change their society.

They were asked to write something about the project, the people funding it and the ICA. We have picked the following two stories written in Bengali by two children.

Md. Rabin Miah, 11, is a student at the Phulki school, mainly funded by TUC Japan. He lives in a slum with his mother. He is her only son. Last year, he lost his father. At that time, he was in class four of the primary school. His father was the only earning member of the family. After his father’s death, he had to stop his education and to work in a bread-making factory to support his family. His mother also began working as a maidservant. Rabin is a meritorious student and very interested in studies. But his working hours clashed with school and he had to drop out. When his mother learnt about the ICA education project, she wanted to get her son admitted. Now he is a regular student. He has good leadership skills and was selected as class captain. For life skill training, he has chosen computer training. He dreams of working in a computer shop while continuing his studies.

Lucky Akter, 12, lives in the slum of Khilgaon with her parents. Her father Abdul

 
 
Students performing extra-curricular activities

Gafur is a rickshaw-puller and her mother Sharifa Begum is a housewife. They were not keen to admit her to the school due to prevailing social values and norms regarding girls and education. But Lucky was very interested. When the ICA team visited their slum, she asked to be admitted. The ICA team spoke to her parents. When they understood that their daughter could learn some life skills which would be helpful for income generation and would also get a monthly stipend, they agreed to send her to Phulki. Now she gets basic education and life skills training. She is interested in dressmaking and wants to learn how to use sewing machines, which the ICA introduced this year.

 



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