Htee Poe Wai (Community Self Supported School) is situated somewhere between Kyar Inn Seik Gyi and Bayar Thone Hsue (Three Pagodas). It is only accessible by boat in the raining season but in dryer season (winter and summer), it’s reachable by motorbike. During raining season, ADRA Myanmar staff travel by boat then walk for an hour and fifteen minutes to get to the school location.
Htee Poe Wai school has a head mistress and three other teachers from the community to serve a small 76 students. The school operates from Kindergarten to Grade 4.
When the project staff conducted Parent Teacher Association Advocacy Meeting, the village leader and most of the communities actively participated. School Management Committee members and some parents were also present during Textbook Distribution. In the Parent Teacher Association Advocacy Meeting, a village headman, School Management Committee President, Secretary, School Management Committee Member and 2 Parents attended and discussed about the school progress together. During PTA’s Meeting, the project staff introduces the Purpose of the PTA’s, explained how parents, teachers and students can work together to get a satisfactory result. After they heard about the responsibilities of the Parents, Teachers and the community, the ideas flowed from them to discuss together on school activities. They started to think how to develop and help their children to get access for better education. Some Parents started to visit their children during school time to see the progress of their learning.
It really was a happy event when the packages containing textbooks arrived to Shwe Poe Hat for the Basic Education Primary School in Htee Poe Wai. The village headman led the village head leaders with some community members came and received the packages of textbooks. Once the Textbook arrived in Htee Poe Wai village, the project staff stamped ADRA logo on the textbook. All this time, the village leaders, school administrator, parents and community members participated in the activity.
Before distribution, students from this school did not receive any textbook from any other organisation. Not being able to obtain textbooks for the students caused some difficulties for the teachers. Very often, the whole lessons were written on the black board for the students to copy, or read after them. The students did not have their own textbooks to do homework after school. In the classroom, the students were not able to follow what the teacher read to them for the lack of having their own textbooks. After the distribution of their own textbooks, the teachers save a lot of time, as they do not need to write everything down on the blackboard. They can also give assignment to the students as homework for they now have their own textbooks to refer to what they learn in the classroom. The school administrator, School Management Committee, Parents and Communities are very pleased and thank ADRA for those much needed textbooks for their children.
When they received the textbook, the children became quite motivated to attend and to come to the school on time. They worry that if they were absent from the school even for one day, they would miss out on the opportunity of getting other materials distributed to them. So, they decided to attend the school regularly.
The SEAQE ‘Strengthening Education Access, Quality and Equity in South East Myanmar’ project, funded and supported by ADRA Norway and NORAD, is ADRA Myanmar’s largest project working within the Kayin & Mon States and Tanintharyi Region.
Written By: Saw Loving and Naw Zin Mar Soe
Photo: © 2017 ADRA Myanmar
