SIALKOT: A project to educate nomad and scavenger children has met with great success and opened doors of quality education to children who were scavenging, begging or have never been to school.

The Child and Social Development Organisation (CSDO), a social arm of the Sialkot Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SCCI), started this multi-phased education project in 2009 in collaboration with local philanthropists.

The CSDO has established 14 CSDO School System Schools out of which 10 have been established in Sialkot district under the supervision of Punjab Education Foundation (PEF) while two each in neighbouring Narowal and Gujranwala districts.

CSDO Project Director Ejaz Ahmed said 1,700 students, most of them nomads, drop-outs, beggars or scavengers were getting education from nursery to middle level under the project. There students included 100 special children also. He said the aim was to make these children useful citizens.

Acknowledging his good academic record, a local school chain has granted admission to a former CSDO student Chaand Khushi Muhammad to Class VIII and announced to bear all his educational expenses.

Chaand said: “I used to collect garbage and pieces of metal from trash heaps and sell them for Rs100 to Rs200 daily, as most children of my age did.”

Now, he also teaches children in his community at their cottages after attending school.

Majid Raza Bhutta, president of the CSDO, was optimistic that most of the students will complete their primary education and continue studying at secondary level.

“Many of our former students are now in various private schools. They have come into the mainstream,” he added.

Talking to Dawn by telephone, a private school’s Managing Director Faisal Manzur announced full support to nomad children studying in CSDO schools, saying they wanted to provide quality education to these “brilliant students” besides necessary training to teachers of CSDO schools.

Published in Dawn, May 24th, 2016