Abstract

This report is about the work of the non-profit NGO called JAAGO, located in Rayer Bazar. Started mainly as an English Medium school for the poor under-privileged children, JAAGO is slowly expanding its horizons. Its work in the community is getting more and more known, and is providing benefits to families living under the poverty line. This report contains findings from an interview with two of the children enrolled in JAAGO. It also contains the organizations campaign on Universal Childrens day. And at the very end, a little light is shed on another nonprofit NGO called Rishilpi, which helps poor disabled children.

Introduction
Non profit NGOs are not a rare sight in Dhaka or Bangladesh as a whole. But there are very few such organizations who work for the betterment of the lives of street children. JAAGO is almost like a revelation in making the lives of the disadvantaged street children a little better. The organization is trying its very best to provide education, nutritious foods, etc. to the poor street children, who couldnt even dream of such things. It is also providing benefits to the Rayer Bazar community through different projects. They plan to increase their projects in the future and expand their programs throughout all the districts in Bangladesh.

Methodology
Our methodology was very simple. Since we were dealing with small children who have just began to get a taste of education, we did not proceed with any sort of questionnaire or survey questions. Instead, we interviewed the children in a heartily manner to get to know their opinions and feelings. We also talked with the volunteers there, who were nice enough to give us a tour of the whole school.
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What is an NGO?
A non-governmental organization (NGO) is a legally constituted organization created by natural or legal persons that operates independently from any government and a term usually used by governments to refer to entities that have no government status. In the cases in which NGOs are funded totally or partially by governments, the NGO maintains its non-governmental status by excluding government representatives from membership in the organization. The term is usually applied only to organizations that pursue some wider social aim that has political aspects, but that are not overtly political organizations such as political parties. Some NGOs in Bangladesh for children

Chinnamul Shishu Kishore Sangstha Gono Kallayan Parishad Bangladesh Shishu Adhikar Forum Destitute Development Foundation Shishu Tori Sangstha Bangladesh Child Fundamental Demand Foundation Manabik Shahajya Sangstha Bangladesh Imaging Training Theater & Arts for Less Fortunate

JAAGO Foundation
History
JAAGO Foundation was founded on April 2007 in Dhaka by Korvi Rakshand along with some of his University students and friends. He was supposed to take over his family business but chose to do something for the under-privileged children of Bangladesh instead.
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JAAGO focuses mainly on combating illiteracy and malnutrition in the poor children and on how to vitalize them to better environments and social conditions. It also focuses on activities that will provide these children, most of who live below the poverty line, with long term and continuing benefits. Besides this, JAAGO Foundation is also thinking about expanding on a large scale in the near future. It is on its way to opening two new branches in Banani and Tangi within a couple of months. Their Research and Development team is also working on more development programs. Its long term aim is to found a school in each and every district in Bangladesh with supporting projects to help the entire communities there. They want to see every disadvantaged child in Bangladesh receive quality education so that they can have a secure and prosperous future.

Mission and Vision

Mission JAAGO aims to bring about substantial improvement in the lives of disadvantaged people with special emphasis on their literacy and nourishment

JAAGO is providing international standard education to the poor children from families that are below the International poverty line, i.e., who have an income below $2 per day. It provides the education to these children through a Free-of-Cost English Medium school. And not only that, but JAAGO has also established various other programs to enhance the growth of the community, such as, Healthy Living, First Aid Center, Call for Hygiene, etc.

Vision JAAGO looks to create a better society for the next generation, which is free of exploitation, discrimination and violence, and supports the achievement of its highest potential
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Like any other organization, JAAGO Foundation is also concerned not only on its present but also on the future. In keeping with that, JAAGO is increasing a class each year. In the foreseeable future, the foundation intends to have a fully operational branch in every district of Bangladesh. It wishes to give the opportunity to break free of the cycle of poverty and do something constructive to as many children as possible.

Projects
JAAGO Foundation was mainly started as an English Medium school for the under-privileged children in the Rayer Bazar community. But as time went by, it started augmenting its operation with new projects, which were run correspondingly with the school. These projects were set up to better the lives of these poor children with other things besides studies. To this date, JAAGO has five projects and it is continuing to add more projects. These projects are funded by the donors.

These projects are:

The Healthy Living Program It comes as no surprise that many students come to JAAGO each day with hungry stomachs. This project takes care of the childrens nutrition and nourishment issues by providing them with healthy nutritious foods like milk, bread, butter, eggs, fruits, etc. The students are provided these foods once every week. This makes the students healthy and ready to learn. This also helps JAAGO in retaining these students. Since these students come here to learn by forsaking the extra earnings for their poor family, the parents are often unwilling to send these children to study here. But knowing their children are getting food here on a regular basis, they are encouraged to send their kids here.

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The First Aid Center This project is supported by Novartis Bangladesh Ltd, and was established on February 1, 2010. It provides the children, who are enrolled in the school, with a regular health check-up. It is operated by an experienced doctor and well-qualified nurse. The medical check-ups are absolutely free of cost. Most medication and medicines are also free to the children. The services now are also being offered to the parents. The parents of the children enrolled in JAAGO may collect one Monthly Health Card per family for Tk. 30 per month to enjoy the services of the First Aid Centre. They can then advantage of the check-up facilities as many times as they like, and the medicines will be provided to them at a very low cost. This allows the families access to much-needed medical care and also helps the First Aid Centre to sustain itself.

The Sewing Centre This project, nicknamed Ghuri, is mainly a women empowerment project. It trains the local women, who are mothers of the school children, to be self-employed. It provides the women free-of-cost sewing training. It also provides innovative clothing designs and works with concepts provided by Bachara, a partner of JAAGO Foundation. The aim of this centre is to help the women with an opportunity to be self-employed as personal tailors. It also allows employment to parents of the children who are unemployed.

The Call for Hygiene Most students enrolled in JAAGO has never used a toothbrush and dont own soap or shampoo of their own. So this project emphasizes on the need for proper hygiene for the students by providing them with toothbrushes, toothpastes, soaps, shampoos, detergents, anti-septic lotion, etc. These hygiene items are provided to these children on a monthly basis. But it doesnt stop here. Many of these children and their parents have never been exposed to these hygienic products and so they dont know how to properly use them. Thats why, every year, JAAGO holds hygienic sessions where the children are taught how to brush their teeth, wash their hair, etc.

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The Lets Clean Bangladesh Project This project addresses the filthy, polluted surrounding area of JAAGO. It raises awareness for the need to keep the surroundings of the community clean and fresh. The 200 children of JAAGO School along with other volunteers and staff of JAAGO Foundation clean the surroundings of the JAAGO School premises of the solid wastes and dusts on a monthly basis. The local community also helps in this event. The students and volunteers are provided with gloves and other instruments. The state of the cleanliness of the nearby area of JAAGO has seen a major improvement after the initiation of this project.

JAAGO the school

According to the founders The ultimate goal of this project is to provide free of cost education of international standards to the underprivileged children of Bangladesh. JAAGO Foundation has chosen an English-medium curriculum to broaden the opportunities and bring about a sustainable improvement in the lives of its students by helping them learn an international medium of communication.

The school started with only 17 children in a single small room with just a whiteboard and a piece of carpet. Gradually, more and more students enrolled in the school, which now amounts to 280 slum children. The age of the students ranges from 4 to 15 years. Most of them come from the slums of Rayer Bazar, where the school is situated. And most of the families from which these children belong to earn below $2. JAAGO is making sure these children get the education which they would have never had the opportunity to receive.

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The basic subjects that the students are taught here consist of:

Mathematics English Bengali History Science Culture Environment Moral Studies

The children learn both English and Bangla alphabets and nursery rhymes in both languages. The classes are held from 4 pm to 7pm in the evening six days a week. And once a week, the volunteers and the children try to do something together, like playing games together, eating together, etc.

Besides these subjects, there are also some extra-curricular activities in which the children engage themselves. These activity clubs are designed to make the children creative and intelligent. These activities are:

Arts and Crafts Dance Sports Drama Music Photography

Currently, the school consists of classes starting from Reception (nursery) to Class 1. Each year, the school adds an extra class. So it is expected that in 2011, the school will start Class 2.

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The school is a two storied building with many rooms. These rooms consist of the class rooms, teachers room, kitchen, etc. There is also a computer lab for the students where they learn the basics of how to use a computer. There is also a field where the students play football, cricket, badminton, etc. after their classes are over. This field is located right beside the school.

Many foreigners from different countries visit JAAGO and spend time with the children for a week or so. In this time, they teach the students, eat with them, play games and have fun with them. They even celebrate special occasions with these children. For example, the day we visited JAAGO, we found out that some German people visited the school and brought along with them a big cake for the children in celebration of Christmas, which was early in Germany, according to the volunteers.

Interview with the children

I carried out an interview with two Class 1 children from the school. Their names were Md. Tarak Rabbi and Siam Shimul. Below is what I got to know from the interview. Parents Occupation Rabbis father is a CNG driver and his mother is a housewife. Siams father is the owner of a house (shack) beside the school, and his mother is a housewife.

Enrolled since Both these kids were enrolled in the school since the Reception class. They are now studying in Class 1.

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How they got to know about JAAGO Rabbi says that he got to know about the school through one of his cousins who also happens to attend Class 1 with him. His cousin and cousins parents convinced his family to send Rabbi to the school. Siam says he learnt about the school when it was being established since he and his family lives in the neighborhood.

The teachers According to these kids, the teachers who teach here are students just like you. That means most of the teachers here are University students. Some of them are also finished with their undergraduate education. They usually remain very busy, but find time despite that to teach the children here.

Activity Clubs The students said they were very much benefitted from taking part in the extra-curricular activities. They are getting to learn about dancing, singing, etc. They are also very happy about the computer classes since they are getting to know about technology.

Benefits to the parents The children said that their parents were benefitted from the project to a good extent. As mentioned earlier, the parents were provided with hygienic items such as toothpastes, shampoos, etc. The unemployed parents were also given sewing training at the Sewing Centre. Due to these benefits, the parents, besides the students, are very happy and upbeat about the school and the project as a whole.

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Universal Childrens Day 2010

On Universal Childrens Day this year, JAAGO organized a daylong campaign, on 18th November, to create awareness of the day. Traditionally, this day is never celebrated in Bangladesh. But the founder of JAAGO, Korvi Rakshand, thought otherwise. He said, We celebrate Valentine's Day, Christmas, New Year but we never celebrate Children's Day. He added, This day was formed internationally to inform people of child's rights and to focus on the childhood that they deserve, especially in the developing countries. According to him, the primary aim of the campaign was to let the street children, who sold flowers and goods at the traffic signals, take a break from their daily routine of trying to sell something. The street children were given a leave that day and their work selling items in the streets were done by the volunteers in yellow JAAGO shirts. These volunteers consisted of young people from solvent families who were in high school or universities. The children were taken to Wonderland in Gulshan to enjoy the whole day. They were fed there. After breakfast, they started enjoying the rides. The Wonderland authorities allowed the rides for free to these children for three hours. The children had the time of their lives. They were really happy. They never thought they would one day get such an opportunity, that they couldnt even dream of. The event was supported by The Daily Star, Mojo, KFC, Pizza Hut, Adcomm, Radio Today and the Alliance Group. Many celebrities and well known personalities also took part in the item selling in the streets. At the end of the day, the volunteers earned around 3 lakhs takas from the campaign, which was then divided among the children.

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A little about another non-profit NGO

Rishilpi is a local NGO run by two Italians Enzo Falcone and Laura Melano, in Satkhira. This NGO, under its Health Program, has opened up a special education unit to provide treatment and rehabilitation for the disabled children. Rishilpi launched its initiative in 1997 with 7 disabled children, two teachers and a single classroom. It first assesses the IQ of the disabled children and categorizes them under five segments. These five segments are children facing problems regarding:

Visual Hearing Manual Stimulation Speech and communication

The children are taught various colorful elements such as toys, balls, candles, etc. The program stats with physiotherapy in the morning and then followed by Bengali, English, Mathematics and communicational classes. They are mainly taught through instruments. They also take part in arts, recitation, sports and cultural competitions in order to improve intelligence disability.

Rishilpi trains the disabled who become fit in special education program in sewing, handicrafts making, etc. and assigns them to different trades in the NGO. As of now, four disabled are working in the vocational trades and earning their livelihoods. According to the director, at least 82 children are reading in different schools in the district, having taken special education from Rishilpi.

He says that the primary aim of the project is to create confidence among the disabled, remove superstitions and wrong ideas about disability, create awareness about their rights in the society and to make them self-reliant by providing training on various vocations.

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Hypotheses
H0 = JAAGO is succeeding to teach the basic subjects and materials to the street children H1 = JAAGO is failing to teach the basic subjects and materials to the street children

H0 = JAAGO is providing these children with necessity products besides teaching them H1 = JAAGO is not providing these children with anything besides teaching them

H0 = JAAGO is helping the family of these children H1 = JAAGO is not helping the family with these children

Scope and Limitations

Scope
Most of us never get to talk with poor street children, and frankly, most of us dont even care. This was a chance for us to get to know the lives of street children in Rayer Bazar. We got to know about their family, their lives, their happiness and ambitions. We were very satisfied with the interviews and the findings.

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Limitations
Obviously there were some limitations such as:

Limited time Low sample size Inexperience in conducting interviews

Conclusion
In conclusion, we can say that JAAGO is indeed making a positive contribution to the society. Their work reflects the success that they aim to incorporate amongst the disadvantaged children of Rayer Bazar. And although they are still sort of a small and unknown entity, their future plans seem very feasible and positive. They are indeed making a difference!

Reference
NGOs in Bangladesh http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGOs_in_Bangladesh Celebrating children in YELLOW! http://www.thedailystar.net/magazine/2009/12/01/making_difference.htm Awakening the Community http://www.thedailystar.net/magazine/2009/01/03/making_defference.htm Disability is not the real problem http://www.thedailystar.net/starinsight/2007/09/01/journey.htm JAAGO Official Website http://www.jaago.com.bd/

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