Since last January this year, Cinta Baca in Aceh has begun to work again on the scholarship program for a new semester. For the first semester we selected and registered 54 students from poor families. Most of them live in villages. The process of selecting families, distributing the funds and visiting with the families several time a month is a time consuming effort but well worth it. The visits by the staff and our partners is mainly to monitor the students’ learning activities and develop good relationships in the community which is critical for any future expansion such as opening new posts, or developing partnerships with schools.
The scholarship program brings more benefit to the families than just the financial help. The money that we send them encourages the parents to provide the remaining need for their children with the school expenses. Some of the students would have quit school had they not received the scholarship. Besides the financial support, the students also get educational support through this program because as all students registered in the scholarship program are obliged to maintain good grades at school. If they fail on one subject they will not be allowed to register for the program in the following semester. The students are also encouraged to read more books and to write the story about their families or their schools. This writing lesson really helps them with their writing ability since their schools usually do not teach them how to write stories.
