Education

For the villagers who live below the poverty line in many of the hill villages in the Kalimpong region, education cannot be a top priority as children are expected to work to help their family's survival. 

Schools are few and far between and, where there are educational facilities, they have usually become run down and are poorly-equipped.

The Glenn Family Foundation believes strongly  in the power of education to improve people's lives. Its local GFF Committee has therefore put a high priority on restoring educational facilities and raising educational standards in its Model Village Programme.  

Repairs have been carried out on many school buildings over the past eight years: leaky roofs have been fixed, amenities restored, sanitation improved, school sports fields brought up to scratch and classrooms re-equipped.  

One such programme is the Cluny Women's College established in 1998 and run by the Cluny Sisters. It offers higher education for girls in the Kalimpong area. A donation from the GFF enabled the College to buy 15 new beds, computers, printers and a generator. Before this there had been no computer room in the College. The College offers a degree for Bachelor of Computer Applications, teaching computer skills to the girls to give them an edge in the job market.

 In the past year five new villages have been added to the Model Village Programme  - in line with the Programme's aim of steadily expanding to include as many of the hill villages as possible.

The schools in these new villages have benefitted as the other 10 communities have done before them. Each has received two new computers, sports equipment such as badminton and cricket sets, footballs, volleyballs and nets, skipping ropes, and sets of Chinese Checkers and Ludo.  As well, 300 new library books and a secure cupboard for these have been provided for each school, along with over 30 vital new teaching materials to support the teaching staff.

Workshops have also been held for the teachers of these schools to ensure that they understand the GFF's vision of the place of education in their communities and that the staff are using the new equipment and materials to the maximum, as well as taking care of them. The Committee works with the schools to arrange competitions and events among the schools and encourages them to work together in other ways, for the benefit of all the children attending from the hill villages.  

Through the education aspect of the Model Village Programme the GFF is contributing significantly to increasing the quality of life of the people living in these villages.