Providing Education & Training to Women in India

Donations to this project have recently funded scholarships for students at the Auxillium school in Kerala, India. The beneficiaries of these scholarships are students who have been identified as coming from poorer backgrounds, struggling to meet the demands of paying for an education and as such within risk of not completing school. Average income for families of the beneficiaries will be below 5000 Rps / £70 a month, security for their children's education will bring huge relief and we hope increased prospects for the future. As GVI Project Manager Ridhi explains, 'Having their kid’s school fees taken care of for a year is such a huge weight off their shoulders.

One of the main long term goals of the project in Kerala is to ensure that kids do not drop out of school as this is a huge problem in the state of Kerala.  By donations we are able to keep the project going but more importantly help poor children and the community we are working with financially. As many of the parents are daily wage earners (i.e. fishermen, coolies, or auto rikshaw drivers), the families often have to borrow money from loan sharks to pay for school fees and end up in a cycle where they are in debt always. Some of the parents also have terminal injuries or illnesses that do not allow them to work and hence there might be no income coming in. In India there is also the tradition of joint family system and those earning money have to support all those living in the house. At times this includes their grandparents, aunties’ and uncles and other children as well.  The pressure is huge on these children to perform as their families feel they are working hard towards paying their school fees and expect their kids to work equally hard in school and get very high grades. The donations thus reduce the burden from both the families who having a hard time paying fees and also the kids who are expected to get top grades all the time by their families.'

Donations to this project are helping to make a real difference to students and their families in India, many thanks to everyone who has supported us.