The Santi School

If we are to teach real peace in this world, and if we are to carry on a real war against war, we shall have to begin with the children. 

Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.

It's a school with only 54 staff members, and yet it's serving more than 800 students ranging from nursery to high school. The Janasewa Higher Secondary School has been strained for both resources and space because of its swelling student population. To accommodate its kids, the school began constructing four additional classrooms in the hopes of providing Nepali students with a space to learn comfortably and easily. If you're one out of 800 students at a school in Kirtipur, Kathmandu district, new and immaculate resources provide a major incentive to come to school and take it seriously. It could be the difference between a child staying home or showing up to learn. 

Unfortunately, due to a lack of funds, the school was unable to complete its construction. Doors, windows, and whiteboards could not be fixed. Electrical fixtures remain in disrepair, and wires poke out of the walls. Not only is the incomplete construction an eyesore, but it's a sorely missed opportunity and a reminder of the school's resource strain. 

Leaking roofs, cracked walls and missing doors - these small signs of decay litter many of the primary schools in Nepal. Even more discouraging, however, are the budget limitations that these institutions face, crippling the ability to provide key resources like textbooks, paper, and art supplies. WIth school infrastructure quickly crumbling, it is easy for teachers and students alike to slump into an attitude of apathy and pessimism. Education loses its importance - and its value. 

While the Santi School works to fix these problems, we also recognize that our mission cannot solely revolve around school infrastructure  To truly make a sustainable difference, we must focus on interacting with the country's education culture itself. In villages, where work often trumps school, attendance rates are rarely enforced. On some harvest days, children work in the fields, and schools see their numbers dwindle to a trickle of two to three students per class. 

Teachers rarely receive training. Schools are still subjected to out-of-date curricula and ineffective educational techniques. Language classes consist of rote memorization - having students copy what is written on the board - instead of teaching methods like call and response, which have been proven to be much more productive many years ago. 

The Santi School works to counteract this. We train teachers, educate villagers on the full importance of, well, education, and introduce classroom techniques that make learning fun. By integrating our volunteers with village life, we spark change from the inside. While we do build school infrastructure, we also mold attitudes and change minds.

It is our hope to see school become important in the eyes of Nepali children, so that they continue to seek knowledge even after our volunteers leave. 

Registered as a 501(c)(3) organization in the US, the Santi School understakes several initiatives to better improve the quality of education in Nepal. We connect volunteers to Nepal, where they teach English in classrooms, immerse themselves in traditional Nepali culture, and provide resources to schools. All our donations go directly to Nepal - no middleman, no inside profit. And except for a handful of paid employees within the States, the Santi School is run entirely by volunteers. 

Top United Nations officials called today for more funding and advocacy to improve literacy rates among the world’s women, who comprise two out of every three adults who cannot read or write.