Youth Together for Human Rights Education
- Making Undreamt Futures a Reality!
- When Love Is Just Not Enough!
- What Is The Essence Of Living?
- Shared Goals and Talking to the CEO
When Love is just not enough
Beyond a momentary glance of passers-by, unschooled kids roaming the streets receive no attention. Unless one can benefit from children, unschooled kids are no one’s responsibility.
Parents of these street-kids do not consider they or their families have any rights in life. They settle for what they have and what they have lacks human dignity. Their love for their kids has no bounds. Yet unbeknownst they shut off dreams for their children’s future and they destine them to a life of illiteracy and low income.
The truth is that parents of these children do not see themselves responsible for changing conditions but accept the current circumstances as the will of God. To bring about higher expectations for their children, we know that something more is needed as parents love is just not enough!
On interviewing parents at our centre we found they believe that through beating their children they can make them well mannered and responsible. When asked why your children have not then become responsible, they responded that children probably then need more beating from us.
What parents think and how they react, directly impacts on their children’s behaviour and actions. If parents find it completely acceptable to complain about other ethnicities and religions and bad-mouth others in the street, why should their children do any different?
Parents also thought that children are like moving objects – when given an order then they should immediately comply. As far as they are concerned the child’s views, thoughts, questions have simply no value – a good kid means an obedient kid and nothing more.
Through our parents’ workshops, we are making parents realise that they can play a constructive role in raising their child. Our training classes are directed towards parents making a better home environment, so the child can reach their full potential.
Making undreamt futures a reality!
Unschooled street kids coming to our centre for the Fast-Track Educational Program have limited facilities at home.
70% of these children live in mud huts/tents with issues of running water and electricity. 56% of the mothers of these children work as maids in houses, while 78% of the fathers work as labourers to support the family.
Many of these children in the age bracket of 11 to 18 have never been to any school in their life. A few moved to the area, but could not continue education due to the unavailability of government schools in the local area. In some places schools were present but due to shortcomings of teachers, children dropped out of schooling. Financial problems caused some children to leave school with elder’s putting pressure to earn a living.
All the children studying with us had lost hope of ever going to school. They were passing time, wandering the streets, and at risk of extremist groups who could involve them in wrong/illegal activities. For nearly all the children studying with us, this centre is their last ray of hope. They came and visited our space in October last year. They met with our senior management and teaching staff. Parents and children were interviewed and realised they had an opportunity to change their future by committing to getting an education.
Those who qualified at Greenhouse Education Centre (GEC) felt lucky and are persistent to learn, gain an education and put into use what they learn daily and are making good progress.
some successes
Sania, 14 years, Korangi area: I never thought I would be able to read English and told myself I did not really need to, as it was not our national language. However, when I saw things written on notice boards, in shops and on road signs, I wondered what was written and if it was important for me or not. I am very happy today as through the phonics method. I can identify letters and sound them out right. I can join sounds and say the words right. Sometimes I know the meaning of the word but most of the time I do not. I sometimes use a dictionary to look up the meaning of words and it gives me pictures so I can understand the meaning of the word.
I am now saving up my money to buy an English to Urdu dictionary too. Soon I will be able to read stories too and I look forward every day to my English Class at GEC.
Junaid, age 14 years, Korangi area: My family members and even few people at work are measuring things by the span (width) of the foot and span of the hand. I also used to measure things like that but measurement always resulted in conflict and disagreement. I saw a person come to our school for taking our measurement for uniforms. I was surprised and amazed that how will he make uniforms by noting some numbers through measurement tape. I was for the first time introduced with the concept of measurement tape here at GEC. With the help of a measuring tape, I can now see how things vary in size, height, width. I can now see how one thing is taller,
thinner, or thicker than another. I am happy to see myself able to measure things with the use of measurement tape. I did practical work in the class and enjoyed measuring many things. It was fun learning with other students.
Sajjad, Age 12 years, Tayyab Goth area: Before joining the school I use to take pleasure in beating my siblings and talk rudely and badly with my mother too. Many times I fought with neighbours and they complained to my mother and then my mother would beat me. Once just for fun, I broke the lightbulb of neighbours. At my Greenhouse Education centre, my life has changed. I have learnt about good manners. I have learnt how these affect my life and how people, my family, friends, neighbours treat me if I have good or bad manners. I have decided to change. I am happy as I see the change has made a difference.
essence of living - do you have it?
We believe that social responsibility is the essence of a life well lived.
Being socially responsible means that people and organisations must behave and contribute ethically and with sensitivity toward social, cultural, economic and environmental issues, giving due regard to all people who form our society. Our projects with students of secondary schools, colleges and universities are aimed at inculcating the value of social responsibility.
After our recent project on “Youth Leadership” training held at St. Patrick School – Karachi, the Cambridge students volunteered to serve at our centre and work to improve the lives of these children who have missed out on education. They taught the children how to introduce themselves, how to express their like o dislike for something. Volunteers also donated notebooks for students to use for academic studies.
We are thankful for the Care and Share Society and School Principal, Sister Margret for facilitating students in doing community work and taking social responsibility. We hope these students will continue to have a place in their heart for these children, who hold them in high regard.
“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” — Winston Churchill.
why i do what i do!
“My life is mine to live and my time is mine to give. Each of us chooses a profession, a way of spending our time and the people to serve and work with. My dream is that every person in our society must hold human life in high esteem. I believe that by mutual cooperating, we can reestablish to man his legitimate nobility and regard; an existence of pride and duty. I have confidence that by joining hands in our endeavours, we can restore to individuals their trust in others and freedom from ongoing cynicism. I am devoted to not only learning and teaching myself but others too. I am especially motivated to assist children who are deprived of their basic right to education. I strongly believe that this is the only way forward towards making our society get on the track of becoming peaceful, prosperous and giving us a sense of pride in making our lives meaningful.”
Muhammad Sajjad Pirzada
Head of Administration
Youth Together for Human Rights Education (YTHRE)
Shared goals and talking to the CEO
If you share our goals and wish to work towards bettering the lives of children and improving the quality of education please call us and connect with our CEO Madam Fareeda Abbasi. She will be in Karachi in the coming weeks. Please book your time in advance by calling or texting at: 0312 -1037938. Our general meetings to inform you about our goals, results and how you can help is on 30th March, 6th of April and 13th of April. Please come to attend the presentation from 3 to 4:30 pm.
In Pakistan, we have 22,500,000 children out of school who should be getting an education."
Dawn Newspaper – 9th March 2018
Every child has a basic right to education. How can we help these children? You could say I can’t.
However, that would not be true. Together we can help improve the situation.
You can be a part of something great.
We provide fast-track schooling to students who have missed primary education and on whom the doors of schooling are now shut. We enable them to graduate from school so they can gain admission to colleges. You may think of your ways of helping. Here are some suggestions from us:
- Provide funds monthly and take ownership of one or many children’s education. Help them to graduate from school on our fast-track system.
- Offering health check-up services if you are a dentist, doctor, eye specialist or nurse.
- Provide Stationery and Materials to run the school (including providing toothbrush and paste etc).
- Providing short story books to help kids build their reading habit and increase their vocabulary.
- Help secure a school building to enable higher enrolments of street-kids.
- Volunteer your time during Reading Time and help children to read and learn.
- Donate amounts in your will or as a legacy to lift communities out of illiteracy.
If you wish to help please call us at 0311-8124226 or write to us at info@ythre.org
Everyone has a part to play and everyone can find a way to help. Knock on our door!
human rights
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books that build a strong foundation
(Click on a book to go to www.ilovewords.org)
