Saving children from traffickers
Nepal
Child Rescue Nepal has developed and refined teacher training, to create a child-friendly approach to boost academic standards and attendance.
Their new two-year project aimed to scale up learning from this approach, and specifically aimed to reduce the risk of children dropping out of school and falling prey to traffickers. BFSS gave the charity £59,904 over two years for teacher training and to establish a strong partnership with parents.
Recent data suggests that 10,000 to 12,000 children are trafficked annually from Nepal to India and that 75% of trafficking victims in Nepal have had limited or no access to education. This emphasizes the critical importance of providing children with schooling to protect them from traffickers and increase their awareness about human trafficking and its potential dangers.
Since 2016 Child Rescue Nepal (CRN) has developed and refined teacher training in the the Makwanpur district of Nepal. Recognizing the need to support children at risk of trafficking, they developed the Keeping Children Safe in School project, to train teachers to create a child-friendly learning environment. As teachers play a pivotal role in inspiring children to come to school Child Rescue Nepal believe this project will not only improve academic performance but also boost attendance, to keep children out of the hands of traffickers.
The two-year project began in January 2023 and aims to support more than 9,000 children in 40 schools to attend school more regularly and so decrease the incidence of child trafficking reported. The charity aims to train 200 teachers and 40 head teachers to deliver child-friendly, interactive lessons; improve the educational standard and experience for teachers and pupils; organise awareness raising programs targeted to 3,600 parents and forge a strong partnership between parents and schools.
Already in the first six months they have:
- Trained headteachers from 20 schools, along with two young people from each school
- Run two residential training sessions for 55 teachers in child-centred methodologies
- Held nine awareness-raising sessions with parents.
- Collected baseline data and two schools were selected to be educational learning centres.
The initial training allowed Child Rescue Nepal to refine their teacher training in the light of feedback.
“When my students didn’t finish their assignment by the deadline, I used to scold and punish them. Now I realise I was completely wrong. I regret it now! Today, I commit to stop my way of punishment and make my classroom child friendly.” – Nepalese teacher, after CRN training.