Return of the Jodi

Co-founder of SCOOP Australia – Jodi – recently spent 6 months living and working at The Jeevan School in Varanasi, India. Here’s what she had to say upon her return:
The kids at The Jeevan School are very close to my heart as I have spent just under a year living with them, almost 6 months each time I go. I was there last year and left just before Christmas.
The vast majority of the kids come from the slum in Samni Ghat (a ghat is like a quay along the rover Ganges) and we provide a safe place for them to be and fruit with chai/juice in the morning and lunch to everyone. There are currently about 150 – 160 kids every day from pre nursery to class 10. The kids learn at their own pace as most of them have developmental issues due to infant alcohol syndrome.
The hostel has room for about 40 kids, they are chosen by the four people who run the school and it has to be a majority vote on who gets to live there. They are chosen by who is most at risk for abuse and they think will benefit from being removed from the slum life. Believe it or not the kids don’t want to leave their parents and will often runaway back to the violence and abuse because that is what they know. I could speak for hours on this so if you are ever in Melbourne, let me know!

We have a huge amount of kids in the early years but once they start to get to class 3/4 they start to drop out more unless they are in the hostel. It is hard to study when you live in a slum and although they can come and study at the hostel they get into bad habits at home (gambling and drinking/drugs). This will not be a quick fix for any of these kids but with each generation we are getting closer to getting them off the street for good. We have land to build a bigger hostel but the money is slow at coming in and the exchange rates are killing us. The more kids we can house the longer they will stay at school.

The teachers are paid above what most teachers are paid in Varanasi, it is hard to get good teachers to work in slum schools as it is not seen as a very good career choice and it is very demanding work. We do get volunteers, however they need to sign up for a year as the kids are too traumatised when people keep coming and going. I was an exception because I will be going there many times for a few months at a time. The western teachers who live and work there don’t get wages, but they do fundraise before coming or while they are there.

-end-

To find out more about SCOOP Australia, please visit their website:

http://scoopfoundation.org.au/