TEACH A MOTHER CHANGE THE WORLD.
This is the Creed of the Amarok Society founded by our guest speaker for the evening Gem Munro and his wife Tanyss. When you look at the Rotary’s Creed. “Service above Self. This family lives it. They create schools in the slums of Bangladesh where they teach mothers who then in turn can teach their children. Being the poorest of the poor in the poorest country in the world. Normal schooling is not an option for these families.
The Munro’s through their Society fund these schools and actually live in the Slum amongst the mothers they teach. They have been doing this for 7 years and now 14 schools.
Gem detailed how they develop their program and showed us video of the students (mothers) and their progress from total illiteracy (some had never before even held a pencil) to being functional in basic English. They also teach them how to read and write in their local language, teach them English (necessary in South Asia for economic advancement) and teach them math. They also teach them life skills such as health, nutrition, childcare and conflict resolution.
Neighborhood houses (rooms) are used as schools. The mothers are then trained to become teachers of their own and their neighbors’ children. The small schoolrooms, when not being used for mothers’ classes, are used by the women to discuss issues of importance, as determined by them, and as a place for cottage industry work to increase family income.
Their operating costs are low (They opened their first school with an initial cost of $60!) It costs about $9500 per year for each school to operate. Their classrooms are Spartan the women sit on Grass mats on the dirt floors but they achieve results that improved the situation of the women and their families.
A truly moving presentation showing how the world can be changed one mother at a time. For more information.To donate and to order Gem's Book Log onto their website. http://amaroksociety.org
Photo's Gem telling us their story. PR Director Susan with Gem and Alistair Munro
