P-E-G: Students today, leaders tomorrow

Thanks to CSG supporters and KWVC, five keen young adults are studying at BELTEI (Business, English Language, Tourism, Economics, Integrated-technolgy) Institute.

Success In Life for Girls (SILG)

This lively photo shows the first "team" (Sreyneat, Solkim, Spohea, Davin, plus "Destiny's Child") in our new SILG partnership project with KWVC.  BELTEI tailors each students' course load to suit personal abilities, needs, and background.  With them is young man Vutim (see Destiny's Child).

The girls' life stories range from difficult to dire.  Two have supportive but very poor families.  One has an arthritis-crippled mother, elderly father, and three drug-addicted boys among her seven siblings.  the last girl's abusive father later abandoned his wife and four children.

In rural Cambodia, girls often must stop school to cook, clean, and tend home and family.  Even when parents care about schooling, poorest girls may have no choice but to work hard (at low wages) for family support.  They also face human trafficking perils.  These four stayed in school up to high grades, which shows their strong desire to study; but none had any hope for advanced education.

Enter the new SILG project!   

The girls now live together at KWVC office in a safe environment with healthy food, supervision, health counseling, emotional care and more.  The BELTEI school they attend is only a two-minute walk away.  CSG-linked sponsors share their schooling and living costs  

Superb planning, insight and care are given by KWVC.  They work together to help and encourage each other, and as a team have visited each girl’s family to learn more about varied problems and needs.  They all talk with passion about helping others in the future.  

Sreyneat and Soklim, the two with strongest backgrounds, rank fourth and sixth in their respective 30-student classes at BELTEI.  Sophea and Davin are ranked in the middle of their two classes. These successes are dramatic since BELTEI is a private school; many of their classmates come from privileged families and lifelong quality schooling.  

SILG is new and still being refined.  We invite your comments, questions - or offers to sponsor a student!  We know of others who are needy, deserving, and intensely eager to study.  This kind of support will change their lives and Cambodia ’s future.

P.S. - We did not realize while registering the students that (like countless good offer- ings in Cambodia) BELTEI has ‘Canadian content’- and that Ambassador Donica Pottie visited the new school site long before the girls and Vutim set foot there.