Support 2000 Students in Cambodia

15October 2022 - This Life in Schools (TLIS) Report

School Exchange Visit

During this reporting period, This Life in Schools program conducted two exchange visited for School Support Support Committee (SSC) and Student Council (SC) members from 12 schools. There were 181 participants (100 women) included 51 SCs (15 girls) visited Chansor and Puok schools. There was also 65 (35 women) SSCs, SCs, and teachers from the host schools including 56 SCs members (34 girls). The aims of these visit is to provide opportunity to the participants to learn from outstanding schools to improve student learning and school performance.      

At the events, the participants shared their knowledge and experiences through visible visits, achievements, challenges, and solutions with questions and answers. These events are very attractive from all participants because they have learned a lot from each other. At the end of the school visit agenda, each school set up their activities plan and express their high commitment to improve their school development plan and children learning outcomes.

From the program team observation, after the school exchange visit, the SSCs, SCs, and teachers worked hard together to improve their school garden and school garbage incinerator, to repair the toilet blocks, to construct the school huts, to construct a bicycle shelter, improve their leadership, and to learn club activities to support their team members and student learning outcomes with assisted by labour community members and supported by community funds.      

Learning by doing

A girl name Theary is 15 years old, studying in grade 9, and is a chairperson of the student council at Thlok lower secondary school, Srei Snam district, and in Siem Reap Province. She lives in a poor family with her parents and one sister.

Theary said “The exchange visit is one of the important activities because it makes to change the mindset, for myself, it is very attractive and I have learned a lot from this event such as running student council work, morality, good manners, courage, teamwork, and learning of the good experiences in leading and encouraging the student council members as well as other students in more to engage in school development and student learning. Afterward, the Student Council members and I shared what we had learned from our exchange visit with all students and encouraged them to be more active participation to improve school and student learning performance”.

She said, “ After the exchange visit, I work with the team members to take lead in the building of a new school hut, preparing a new school garden with a waterfall spreading in the middle, preparing the trash place and library, decorating the friendly classroom, and planting tree infront of the school”.  

Theary Added “In the future, I want to see my school more improvements such as a clean and beautiful garden (environment) and reduce dropout rates in my school and more human resources in the community. I am committed to studying hard and becoming a valuable resource, a good role model in my school, and helping my community”.

Education and Gender Equality Awareness Campaigns 

During the last few months, the This Life In Schools team worked closely with the District Office of Education staff, School Support Committees, and schools to conduct Education and Gender Equality Awareness Campaigns at the end of April, 2022. The  purpose of this campaign was to promote gender equality in education and the importance of education. Overall, 2,598 participants (1,516 women) including 2,212 students (1,225 girls) took part. Attendees included parents, DoE staff, the District Governor, commune chiefs, village chiefs, School Support Committee members, Student Council members, teachers, monks, students, and community members. Disseminating messages about importance of education as well as ender-equitable education contributes to reductions in: i) school-related gender-based violence, ii) students dropping out of school, and iii) harmful practices including child marriage and early marriage, migration, and child labour. The events and the presentations of speakers produced a range of emotions among community participants because of the controversial nature of issues such as domestic violence, but they concluded in a good, positive spirit and with much knowledge gained. Certain parts of the events really touched the audiences, most notably when guest speakers shared their negative experiences and stories and this caused them or audience members to cry and express sadness at the difficult lives some of the speakers had had. The participants, however, also laughed and found joy when the students performed role plays. The events were ultimately uplifting because most of the guest speakers sharing these experiences had endured hardship to become leaders today. Guest speakers, parents, and student representatives, shared their success stories, reciting poems about the value of women and education, performing role plays, and taking part in question and answer sessions. Lots of questions were raised by the participants to the guest speakers related to these issues and concerns around education, gender equality and reducing violence in communities. 

More engagement leads to more improvement for Student Councils

Nita (name changed to protect identity) is a 15-year-old girl in grade 9, and is a Student Council Chairperson at her school. She lives with her parents in a family that has been identified in  the third rank of the Cambodian ‘ID poor’ classification system. There are four persons in her family; her father is a construction worker in Siem Reap town, and she has one sister who studies in grade 7 in the same school.   

Nita said, “In school, I am a student council chairperson and I have been leading this group for three years. In the first year, I had a hard time cooperating with the group because they were less involved and the school didn’t have good discipline and strong morals. The school environment was not clean, and - most notably - the students and parents did not understand the value of education. These things, therefore, have caused many students to drop out of school”.

She added, “After collaborating with teachers and having the support of This Life to organize the education campaign to disseminate the value of education, I see that my team has improved a lot. They have built a very good relationship, are more courageous, and also have great cooperation among themselves. This resulted in the school getting more disciplined, the environment getting cleaner, and children and parents understanding the value of education better. Active participation from the local authorities in school-related activities also followed”.

She said, “Finally, I would like to thank This Life very much for supporting so many activities, especially the valuable education campaign. In the future I will be determined to strengthen myself and the team even more, as well as to actively participate in school, to keep my team stronger, and make the school as much of a child-friendly school as we can”.