Tent Schools

So...Back after few busy days...I feel so glad.... All these days over my busy times, one matter used to keep clinging around my mind since the time I visited a TENT school in Bangalore, near the airport road... What is this TENT school? The same question popped up even to me when I heard about this for the first time from my friend.....

My dad always wished that I became a doctor and served the poor free of cost. But that never happened. Still my dad used to serve the needy as much as possible from his side. I always wished to be like my dad but never got into action really to do it........

1 month back when I was having a small chat with my friend I came to know about these tent schools and felt it's the right time to splurge in some action.... With my initial understanding that TENT Schools were something like orphanage I decided to donate something from my side. But I was always waiting for my dad's consent here.... I began to get into deeper chat with my friend regarding the same and was very particular in extending my support only after understanding if the organization/school was really lacking support.....
So thinking more about it and after discussing with my Dad..I contributed some amount to my friend... My Friend who was solely working for this bought a Book Rack for the TENT school and asked if I could join him while he hands it over.... I was elated and immediately joined him over a weekend.......

That was the day! I was so happy for really waking up early on a Saturday morning and visiting that school..... That was the first time I heard about TENT school from my friend....It took an hour for us to reach the school and I had a very nice chat with my friend when I came to know more about the TENT Schools.. So here I go with my understanding about the same.....

TENT Schools aim at supporting the children spread/brought up in Slums, mostly for the kids of the laborers involved in construction works. What happens here is the laborers keep shifting their place wherever they get to involve in building construction contracts that spread for a span of minimum 1 or 2 years. During that period they live in a small slum nearby the workplace. Once the construction gets over they shift to different place..In this way they do not have a consistent place to live and consequence the children are not assured of getting literate. What ever they earn is just enough to pass their daily living.... consequence of being illiterate the children will be ignored in the society, cheated by some frauds, their living becomes difficult....

Therefore the concept of TENT Schools surrounds around educating the slum kids to whatever extent possible with the limited period of time. So that at least the kids know how to read and write and thus can escape from ignorance, getting cheated/fooled.

Not only education, Tent schools also try to support with food/shelter based on the amount of support they get from the society..... All these are done free of cost...

This sounded very good to me and when I visited the school I was shocked to hear that the land for the new school was donated by a great person..I do not remember the name....

But the part of pity here is...due to less support there are just one or 2 teachers to manage a set of 30 to 50 kids...and due to lack of infrastructural support, few kids although eligible for higher studies still sit in a single class and read the same thing again and again..........

I was moved very much when I saw kid running towards my friend calling anna...with a very cute smile on its face...the single teacher there conveyed her thanks to me...and I got back to my office after that......

Red india foundation is one such support for TENT schools....and till date it has organized free dental camps, book donation camps etc for the slum kids....

I felt so good visiting that school and feel very responsible to support such kids.... We all party lot with our friends, I guess once in a while during our free time we can even definitely try to involve in such support activities.......

More information about Red India can be found here:
http://www.readindiafoundation.org/

If some way this post has instilled some thought in the mind of the readers to take out some time and involve themselves in such social activities, I feel very happy and satisfied here.

Cheers,
Akshatha