The gift of breakfast
640
Children and teachers
The gift of sight
600+
Eye tests
200+
Glasses
The gift of healthy teeth
600+
Dental check ups
200+
Dental treatments
The gift of shoes
600+
Shoes
The gift of transport
30+
School bikes
What We Do
All donations go to the children
100% of all donations (except for bank charges) go directly to the children. Everybody works on a voluntary basis with the sole aim of improving the lives of the children.
Our mission
Our mission is to provide assistance with health and wellbeing for all the 600 plus children at the school.
Gift of Breakfast
No child should have to start the day hungry.
India continues to have one of the highest child malnutrition rates impacting the child's health and development, performance in school and productivity in adult life. Nearly 47 million or 4 out of 10 children in India are not meeting their full human potential because of chronic malnutrition. The consequences are diminished learning capacity, poor school performance and increased risk of chronic diseases.
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For these reasons we decided to start a Breakfast project. Also as this school has some of the poorest children we are dealing with a higher risk of malnutrition.
Gift of Shoes
The roads are dirty with much rubbish and even animal excrement. Yet many children walk bear foot oblivious to the dangers of having nothing to protect them between the ground and their feet. One year a child lost his life to a cobra bite because he had no shoes on while playing football in the bushes. Children can also be bitten by scorpions when they have no shoes to protect their feet. Even many sharp stones on the road can cut their feet and cause infections.
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So for hygiene, health, protection and even to save their lives we are on a mission to give the gift of shoes to children each year.
Gift of Sight
In India generally 20% of school children need glasses. However, if their parents can't afford to buy glasses, these children struggle to see the blackboard or read a book. For this very reason we started the gift of sight. This involves two opticians from an eye hospital in Central India travelling 24 hours to the school in Southern India. They work non-stop and test over 600 children and all the teachers. Everybody needing glasses gets a prescription and tries on different frames to ensure they get the right size. Then a week later the lenses are mounted on the frames and everybody gets a new pair of glasses.
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Currently over 30% of the children at the school need glasses. We aim to provide the Gift of sight every year, ensuring no child has difficulties at school due to their eyesight.
Gift of Healthy Teeth
No child should suffer from toothache or develop tooth cavities or decay just because their parents can't afford treatment. It is for this reason that we developed the Gift of Healthy Teeth. This involves local dentists carrying out dental check-ups on each child directly at the school. Any child needing treatment is then treated at a local dental surgery.
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Currently over 25% of children at the school have needed dental treatment.
Gift of Transportation
Many children live far from the school and have to carry very heavy backpacks with their school books. Some children are fortunate enough to get to school with some form of transport. However, many don't have that luxury and have to walk for miles carrying their backpacks. Worried about the impact of these heavy bags to their backs we decided to start the Gift of Transport. This involves providing school bikes for children that live 2 miles or more from the school. Each bike belongs to the school and is allocated to a child during their time at school. A local bike repair shop takes care of the maintenance of the bikes so that they are always in good and safe condition for the children to ride them to and from school.
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One of the children told us that his mother could not believe it when she saw him come home on a bike. She cried with joy as this family could not afford a bike nor had the means for him to get to school with some other form of transportation.
