2-25-10

2-25-10 As for my educational enrichment project for children victims of UXO’s, I’ve encountered a couple obstacles. First, my efforts to contact various NGO’s who work with UXO victims has so far proven futile. I’m beginning to wonder if the reason for the lack in response is because my goal is a bit too lofty.

In other words, there seems to be a much greater second obstacle: Poverty. I gained this insight through my conversation with Nahm. Poverty keeps even relatively healthy kids out of school for two reasons. One, there just are not enough schools in rural Laos. Two, when there’s no food on the table, everyone in the family, including children, has to work. To make matters worse, scrap metal provides the greatest source of income in rural Laos. Large corporations actually come into these areas and pay cash for scrap metal. So even though they risk their lives in handling UXO’s, people still think the risk worthwhile because they can maybe get away with it and put food on the table for their family. Therefore, the greatest problem lies with just getting children to school, or so it seems.

So if there is little or no access to education, how can there be any educational enrichment? In other words, how can I enhance education for a specific population (i.e., UXO victims) when even a basic education is not accessible for the general population of rural school children? These questions compound the problem of how to find children who are UXO victims and set up a special program for them. I hope the answers will be clearer in the morning! Feel free to email me your input too!!