Thanks Letter from NCLP

Helping Minds donated 23 Fans, out of them 7 went for Coimbatore National Child Labor Project (NCLP) schools and 16 for Tirupur NCLP schools.

Thanks letter from the project co-ordinator of National Child Labour Project (NCLP) to Helping Minds Trust for the support provided for 23 fans to NCLP schools in Coimbatore and Tirupur.

  Thanks letter from NCLP by sankarsuresh

NCLP Schools

Remember the MasterCard advert that adds a price to everything and in the end claims that happiness seen on loved one's face is priceless? At Helping Minds, we experienced it through Mr. Muppi when he distributed uniforms to the kids of two of the NCLP schools.

Back in June 2011, we decided to help the NCLP schools as much as we can. There are around 21 NCLP schools in Coimbatore district itself, and they all need support from the society in one way or other. They have not received uniforms from the government yet and had seeked help from Helping Minds. 2 weeks back, Muppi went to Coimbatore along with the NCLP Coordinator and Field Officer, purchased uniforms and chocolates and distributed them to the school kids.



While the visit and the deed of distributing the uniforms is insignificant in itself, but what we experienced there was more than encouraging. This is what Mr. Muppi has to say about the kids - "These kids were once toiling as labors in textile mills, workshops and what not. Today, there is an apparent enthusiasm for life in them. One can see hope for the future in their eyes when they come to school. Projects like NCLP are commendable efforts by the government to uplift the poor through education As a society, we need to support the government in projects like NCLP. We had planned to visit at least 3 schools today, but we could visit and distribute the uniforms to only 2. Had there been more volunteer support we would have been able to visit more schools and help the students in every small possible way that we can"

You can see some of the pictures taken at these schools here

If we were to borrow lines from MasterCard, we say this - "Uniforms to NCLP school students - Rs. 20,000. Opportunity to put a smile on their faces - Priceless"

Do you want to experience it first hand? Do let us know in comments, we are looking for volunteers to provide more support to NCLP schools.

National Child Labor Project Schools

Helping Minds team discussed about the National Child Labor Project (NCLP) Schools and decided to find out how Helping Minds can extend support to NCLP schools.

As a first step, Muppi from our team visited Coimbatore to meet Collector Umanath IAS to check on NCLP Schools. Umanath IAS provided the details about the schools.

NCLP schools are funded directly by Central Government, and the fund is managed by district collector. General data about these schools in Coimbatore
Total NCLP Schools in Coimbatore : 21
Total Teaching Staff : 69 (Approx 3 to each school)
Non teaching staff for each school (Helper) : 1 (Cooking, cleaning)
Ages of students in school : 9 to 14
Coordinator for all 21 schools : 1 (Mr Vijaya Kumar)

The salary paid for the teachers in NCLP schools is very less and so the collector has written to government saying the salary can be increased for the staff to have better management of these schools. 90% of the students are immigrants from other state (Manipur, Assam etc). Most of them come here as cheap labour, once the work is finished, they go back or move to some other jobs. Making the students continue in the school and advising parents about the importance of education are really challenging tasks for the officials here.

Here are few statistics about Child labor in India -

Of 12.6 million children in hazardous occupations in the world, India has the highest number of labourers in the world under 14 years of age.

According to the New Delhi-based National Sample Survey Organisation, nearly 16.4 million Indian children aged 5-14 years are engaged in economic activities and domestic or non-remunerative work. The World Bank puts that figure at 44 million.

National Child Labor Project is a Central Government program, with the help of UNICEF, which aims to provide education for the children who were employed. The NCLP schools are different from the normal schools since the education needs of the students are different. The education needs and the aptitude of the students are assessed and they are taught here till they are good enough to be brought to the mainstream regular schools. In the state of Tamil Nadu, NCLP has helped more than 3,600 child labourers leave their jobs and be mainstreamed into regular schools.

Muppi visited three NCLP schools in Karunya Nagar, Kaaramadai and Rangarajapuram. Some school buildings are government owned and some are rented. There is just one small building, very small in size, with asbestos on top and side. Actually it is very difficult for the kids to sit there during summer time. The students were singing songs, rhymes etc to reveal their talents. Muppi and friends had a look at notebooks of each kids and checked them how good they are at what they have written and were amazed to see the way they were responding. The students are making very good progress overall.

Link to Coimbatore NCLP Schools visit photos:

https://picasaweb.google.com/muppitathi/KovaiTrip?authkey=Gv1sRgCO7rnqWdg6-T6QE&feat=directlink&fgl=true&pli=1#

More information about the requirements of NCLP schools will be posted in our future blogs.