“Education is not a way to escape poverty – It is a way of fighting it.” Julius Nyerere
Education can empower children, heightening their awareness of their rights and responsibilities, their abilities and self-confidence enabling them to improve their lives.
According to a report by UNESCO, Poor children have numerous disadvantages in relation to their better off counterparts. They are usually less healthy, their language skills less developed (a factor that has a negative influence on school performance) and they are generally less well equipped – socially and physically to undertake school programs.
According to research,
- 900,000 newborn children die in India every year.
- In India half of women aged 20-24 are married before the age of 18 years old.
- Stunting affects more than 60 million children, reflecting chronic under-nutrition during the most critical growth periods and development in early life.
- Over 8 million children have never seen the inside of a classroom.
- 49% of those who do attend school, drop out before age 15.
Our Partner charity, The HOPE Foundation whom we work very closely with aims to restore basic children’s rights to vulnerable children living in extreme poverty in Kolkata and other areas of India. The organization provides protection, education, health care and development of livelihood skills to the children through over 60 projections.
HOPE has implemented some key projects including:
- A primary health improvement project reaching almost 16,000 people in 35 slums
- HOPE hospital
- Life skills training institute providing vocational training to 300 young people every year.
- A holistic education program reaching 2,190 children in 21 slums
- 13 residential protection homes
In the situation of extreme poverty, girls are particularly at risk as they are more likely to inherit the poverty of their mothers. They are prone to abuse of all forms and very often confined to households in which they are virtually slaves. This is very prominent in areas of India where I observed strong gender issues that are very much deep seated throughout their culture. This was something I also experienced first hand myself. This is something that can change though through education and I will be discussing this topic further in another blog post later on.
It was truly wonderful seeing first hand, how education is the solution to poverty. Sure sometimes we must give a helping hand first as we are with our shoes but the shoes are just a part of the solution. They show we care and as mentioned when one feels loved and supported they can rise above anything. Through our collaboration with Hope we are teaching this new generation of Indian children how to be sustainable themselves beginning with school.
With so much sadness and tragedy happening in India, there is also so much joy when you see these children and how their lives have and are being transformed by all of us wanting to make a difference. It is my wish through our Dream Crazy mission that Moeloco make an even bigger impact spreading the message of hope and light, empowering all to rise above with love and positivity.
If you would like to help us achieve our mission please visit and purchase shoes. We are currently running our #1000shoesforIndiacampaign, where we want to gift 1000 shoes to the children for this Christmas. We launched this campaign before leaving for India and so far 583 shoes have been raised. www.moeloco.com/shop or you can contact me at email@example.com if you have other ideas for support.
Until we meet again,