THE BACKGROUND
In the village Katakhali in Hasnabad, families are mostly "beedi” workers. Labour in this industry is primarily made up of women and children, who have no access to a safe work environment or regulated minimum wages. More importantly, this livelihood steals a child's right to education and good health. The children in the islands of the north Sunderbans had never been to school beyond Class 5, until the establishment of the Swapnopuron Welfare Society in 2012, as most of the Anganwadi centres functioned merely as "Khichdi centres" providing midday meals. The original objective of the SWS was to address this.
THE SOLUTON: SWAPNO PURON SHIKSHA NIKETAN
Image: The school now
The Swapnopuran Welfare Society was established in 2012 with the first 25 children who started coming to the learning centre. Slowly children from other localities began to join and the number grew to 50. In 2015, some parents expressed a desire to have an English-medium school. The idea was worth pursuing and the ground for a complete English medium curriculum was being prepared. In 2018, 1.2 acres of land was leased.
Earlier, after finishing from Swapnopuran the children would join the local government school. Once again, the community proposed that the school be extended up to high school, till Class12 level. Unfortunately, schools in the Sunderbans do not teach subjects like Science and Mathematics at the +2 level due to a lack of infrastructure as well as qualified teachers. So most children are completely unaware of these subjects and of their potential and inclination for them. This was another reason why the local people wanted Swapnopuron to build capacity.
THE WAY FORWARD
Over the last eight years, nearly 1,000 children have been under the umbrella of Swapnopuron. All the teachers are trained and are locals. Capacity building workshops of teachers continues to be conducted quarterly. Since 2020, there have been teachers who travel in from Kolkata to teach. Even when the Covid-19 pandemic hit the world, our teaching-learning continued.
The plan is to have an English medium school from Nursery to class 12 for the local children who do not have any access to quality high school education. This will be affiliated with the CBSE. In 2020, the foundation of the new school building was laid and construction of the first floor was started. However, the first floor and other facilities are yet to be completed.
Image 2: Construction of the new block
IT COSTS INR 60L TO COMPLETE THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE NEW BLOCK.
COST SHEET
ABOUT ME & THIS CAMPAIGN
I am SHANKHA SUVRA.
I am running this crowdfunding campaign to improve the infrastructure of the Swapnopuron Shiksha Niketan. a school founded and run by Swapnopuron Welfare Society
This campaign aims to build a new block for Swapnopuron Shiksha Niketan school. The block will also meet all the prerequisites to obtain a CBSE affiliation, this will allow the students to write their 10th and 12th board exams.
At present, the school plays an important role in transforming and uplifting the lives of more than 300 students in that remote region of Sunderbans. I believe that by improving the infrastructure of the school, Swapnopuron will be able to carry the light of quality education to more than 2000 children, who could otherwise fall prey to child labour, trafficking or other evils of society.
PICTURES FROM THE SCHOOL
MAP
TAX BENEFITS
Funding for this campaign is eligible for tax breaks as SWAPNOPURON is a registered NGO and you can avail of benefits under section 80G of the IT act. Foreign funding is not accepted.
FEEDBACK FORMAT THAT YOU GET
To ensure that there is complete transparency I shall get a report from the NGO (this takes between 2 to 3 months usually after the funds are raised & transferred to them) telling me who benefitted from the funding. The details will then be posted on the UPDATES section of my campaign. As soon as an update is posted, the platform will send an EMAIL alert to all the funders - i.e. to you. Click on the link on the email and you can read about which person has benefitted. That's transparent right.
FAQs
Will we get to know the details of who benefitted?
Yes. After the money has been collected it will be transferred by Fueladream to SWAPNOPURON. It will take from 2 to 3 months after that to get details of fund use. Once I get this information from them I shall upload this on the UPDATES section of this campaign. You will then get an alert & can read details about the beneficiaries.
When do I get the receipts?
It takes up to 2-weeks after the campaign is closed for the monies to be transferred to NGO. The receipts will start getting processed about 4 to 6 weeks AFTER the campaign is closed and will be sent to you directly.
How does crowdfunding work?
Crowdfunding in India is a relatively new concept & is growing very quickly.
It’s a concept that allows a large number of funders (like you) to fund an idea or a cause or event by giving small amounts of money online. Fueladream.com is a crowdfunding platform in India that allows for such pooling of funds. You can fund innovations & ideas on FuelADream and be the first to get these products or make them come true. You can also do a good turn by funding charities and causes through crowdfunding. When you fund a charity it’s more like a donation & you get small innovative rewards like a shout-out on an FB page or a thank you email from the beneficiaries.
