PBF Safe accommodation for children of rural mountain farmers
Lalibela is surrounded by several mountains where rural farmers live without public amenities and infrastructure like clean water, schools, hospitals or even roads. The children from these villages have to walk more than 6 kilometers every morning to attend schools in the town.
Most of these children are forced to stay within the town for the school days and only return to their distant villages over the weekends. Some put up with relatives while other have to sleep in unsafe places and even go without food to attend classes.
Even though the primary school in Lalibela does not have boarding facilities, one of the teachers volunteered to host the very vulnerable children in the school hall where they can sleep safe.
The boarding program is to address the following:
- There are students who come from rural areas and spend two hours on the road each day.
- There are also students who come from rural areas and stay for one week but they have not enough food to survive the whole week.
- There are students who waste their spare time just playing games, doing some other activities not related to learning because of guidance and care.
- Farmer parents who live in far away villages have no chance or capacity to care or guide their children in the town. They also cannot provide for them in their weeklong absence.
These are the main factors that prevent the children from doing well in school. Most of them drop out and engage in several deviant activities.
PBF response covered the following:
- Beds, mattresses and beddings
- he hall is repaired , windows and doors which were falling apart are fixed.
- Food support for the weeklong boarding children.
Dan Amolo and Sisay Amare