Help Dreams Rise in Remote Bali

After eleven weeks of “learning at home” since our government instructed schools to close on 16th of March to prevent risks of infection during the COVID-19 pandemic, our students have adapted well to ‘distance learning’, although they often tell us they miss direct teacher interaction in the classroom and meeting their friends. But, learning independently with limited resources has been challenging!

High School Graduation Exams: As we’ve no internet or computer labs in our village, our 9th grade junior high and 12 grade senior high students took their final exam at home, with hard copies of the exam sheets delivered to their homes by the teachers, from 16th 20th March. Congratulation! The result of this exam will become as guidance mark fill out on their graduation certificate.

Our distance learning program is divided into two parts: completing the learning module assignments delivered by the teachers to each student; and the second is submitted assignment for marking by the teacher. But when students get confused and struggle with their assignments, they patiently wait for their teacher’s visit for help/guidance. However, these problems don’t lessen our dedicated students’ spirit!

Our elementary students’ home learning is monitored by their local tutors from each school. Luckily, they are able to learn in small groups, always though applying strict social distance and health protocols with the comprehensive sanitation/hygiene kits and masks EBPP provided. This learning method works well, as students can ask their tutor for help/guidance with any lessons they don’t understand.

WhatsApp Learning Groups and smartphones: To complement their hard copy class assignments, our junior and senior high school students created a WhatsApp group to communicate with their teachers and classmates remotely to discuss problems, ask teachers for clarifications, etc. For students who couldn’t afford smartphones, EBPP was able to buy the 16 phones needed through a $1,000 GlobalGiving ‘hardship grant’ and provide, on loan to these students!! Now, all EBPP students have fair and equal access to communications and “online” learning!

Creative art at home: Thanks to a generous art materials donation from Graeme Howell’s Worldwide Action NGO, all our students can eliminate their boredom by developing their creative arts. Guided by our Art Teacher, Pak Wayan, they enthusiastically make personal masterpieces, high school students focusing on comic and caricature drawings, with stories about how Covid-19 affects their life. They stick their masterpieces on their wall outside their house, so people seeing them will laugh and forgot their sorrows for a moment.

Nutritious food Supplements: To prevent the transmission of Covid-19 virus, students and their families cannot leave their village and most struggle to provide adequate daily meals. But thanks to a generous donation in April from a dedicated Indonesian supporter, EBPP was able to provide nutritious food packages for all our students’ families to help for one month, distributed to the students and their parents at their respective schools in early May. This helps students to maintain energy for distance learning. But we need your help to provide monthly, as long as learning from home continues.

Semester exams for intermediate years: As we reached the end of the 2nd semester academic year 2019-2020, our students took their tests, on schedule, at home from 18th 22nd May, flexibly and without time limitations. We’ll provide their results and report books in early June. Keep your spirits up EBPP students. May this situation end soon!

Thanks again dear GlobalGiving donors for your continued support for education.

Your urgent assistance is needed now to continue feeding our children each month until the COVID-19 lockdown ends. Please contact us for further information: david.booth@eastbalipovertyproject,org