| Place: | NANMANGALAM (Madras) | |
| Program: | Education, health, food and nutrition | |
| School Year: | June 2010 to May 2011 | |
| Number of Participants: | 1’740 pupils from 3 to 19 | |
| NGO: | Society for the Upliftment of the Economically Backward | |
| Annual Cost: | INR 3'886'000 | CHF 97’150.- |
| Individual Annual Cost: | INR 2'233 | CHF 55.- |
The school has been chosen as “Model School” by the Tamil Nadu Primary Education Department.
Our school of Nanmangalam due to the good results obtained by the students has been upgraded to a high school.
That means that we will provide education fron standard 1 to standard 12.
School Directors from other states come to visit it to study its functioning and its results.
On April 27th a Special Day was organized by Heart for India to end the school year. Children, parents, teachers and governmental and local authorities were invited.
During this day children showed us sport and dances…The best children have received medals and books. Snacks and drinks were offered to all the participants (2000 to 3000 people).
Education
Nanmangalam Government School is a State school located a few kilometers from Chennai. It has 1’200 students on roll with classes from the Pre Nursery to Std VIII.
The fees and lunch are free for the families. 120 attend each class of the school.
In order to improve the educational standards, the Foundation decided:
- to divide all the classes in groups of 40 pupils and to hire the additional teachers
- To provide English courses by hiring teachers
- To implement tuition courses from 4 to 6 p.m. by hiring 3 teachers. 140 pupils attended those courses last year. This program is such a success -275 pupils this year-that we had to hire 2 extra teachers
- To provide yoga classes before the courses
- To provide Physical Education courses to all the pupils during their free time. The children can practice Kho-Kho game, badminton and handball with their P.E. teacher
It has such a success that the pupils want to represent their school in competition
- To provide uniforms, footwear, socks, textbooks, notebooks, stationery and school bags to all the pupils of the school
We are also helping the Kovilambakkam School, we provide there snacks for 100 students and several teachers from Nanmagalam have been transferred to Kovilambakkam.
Safety and hygiene
- Heart For India feels concerned about the health and hygiene of the children so 4 Indian toilets with flushes will be connected to 2 septic tanks and water by June 2009. Indeed, as for now the children have 6 toilets (not connected to water and a septic tank) at their disposal, they usually use the ground between the classes as toilets.
- The ground was leveled by adding ballast, sand and pebbles as it was a dangerous and liable to flooding place during the monsoon –it carried malaria and chikungunya.
- Heart For India hired two women, Mrs. RANI and DHANALAKSHMI to do the cleaning of the ground as it was covered with rubbish.
- In order to avoid the stealing of food, tools and materials, the Foundation hired Mr. FRANCIS as a security guard.
Health, food and nutrition
A nutrition program was implemented for the 1’000 pupils as the majority of them only had one meal a day. A second meal is given to all the pupils of the school during the 3 p.m. break. It allows them to concentrate in class in the afternoon and to go to tuition organized after school. Two women -Mrs. KALA and Mss ESTHER- who work and live in the village of Nanmangalam were hired to distribute those extra meals.