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Wednesday 23 April 2008

The Sponsored Children

I was a bit kelam-kabut when the Education Sponsorship for Children first started. Unlike the Children Education Fund where I could lump up all payments under one account, for Education Sponsorship, I need to make sure there’s a separate account prepared for each particular child/sponsor so that by the end of the year we can send an individual report to each individual sponsor.

I guess that was why when the chairmanship of the NGO was handed over to me, and I handed over the treasurer’s job to a new treasurer, the committee members insisted that I still take care of the Education Sponsorship as it is still in its early stages. (In other words, they don’t want me to pass the headache to them!! Very clever lah these people!)

Well, I have finally managed to draw up a proper system/format for the sponsorship accounts, so now I can easily tell the fund balances for each individual sponsor, and the total sponsorship balances just by a click of the mouse. But I’d better remember to do a backup… all the info are now in my thumb drive, if I lose that, adoii… nangis!!!

Anyway, for the moment we now have 9 sponsored children – and 7 of the sponsors are readers of this blog. Another colleague of mine also managed to find a few other people interested to sponsor a child, and we are now in the process of assessing more children to be sponsored. By next year there will be a few more children under my charge who will be of school-going age, so I may need more sponsors next year.

Who are the 9 children sponsored so far?

3 of them are Fuzi’s children who can now go to school by bus instead of cycling along the lonely road every day. Fuzi can now use the monthly welfare aid for her household needs without having to worry about her children’s educational needs.

2 more children are Hana’s. Her elder daughter now need not worry about her monthly tuition fee as it is covered by the sponsorship money. But we are still unable to get a school bus/van for the younger daughter despite having the funds because so far none of the bus/van drivers approached wants to go to their area! So the little girl still has to walk to school every day. I am not too worried about the distance as she is used to it, but I am more worried about her safety, especially when her mother is at work and the girl walks alone to school. Just thinking about it gives me the creeps!!

Another 2 covered by sponsorship are Valli’s 2 boys. A whole load of burden is off Valli’s shoulders now that she doesn't have to worry about her sons’ bus fares and pocket money.

Shila’s daughter Laila is another child sponsored. Shila has told me that whatever amount of pocket money not used up by Laila in school will be kept in the girl’s savings account so she can use it for her future needs, when the sponsorship period is over (sponsorship is until she finishes school – it does not cover further education).

The 9th child sponsored is Pushpa the orphan. Her grandmother does not have any fixed monthly income… while her uncle has his own children to support. With the child’s schooling needs covered, her grandmother and uncle need not worry about her educational needs anymore.

To all the sponsors, if you’re reading this, YOU have made a whole lot of difference in the lives of these children.

On behalf of all the children and their families…

THANK YOU!!

3 comments:

Salt N Turmeric said...

salute to all the sponsors!

Pi, dont rely too much on thumb drive. they get corrupted pretty easily too. why dont u use googledoc? all ur files will be saved at theirs rather than ur pc so the risk of losing files is close to zero. unless google goes kaput but i dont see tht happening anytime soon. ;) u can also share the files with other users.

Nightwing said...

Helo Kak,

Ya..salute to all the sponsors..

And also to you for highlighting it in ur blog..otherwise they would not have known about the children.

Kudos to you kak.

Pi Bani said...

Farina:
Memang nak buat backup, cuma belum lagi. Thumb drive tu still perlu, because sometimes I need to use the files at places yang tak ada internet access. Anyway, thumb drive tu after I use on other computers, balik mesti I scan balik on my PC for viruses - my PC punya virus definition memang updated regularly.

Nightwing:
Yes I am so glad I highlighted the stories on my blog. Should have done that earlier actually... but better late than never, right?