Center for Children’s Happiness PHNOM PENH , CAMBODIA
CCH Enters Its Fifth Year
CCH Anniversary November 30, 2006 marked the anniversary of the founding of Center for Children's Happiness in 2002. The event was celebrated at the CCH I facility with many children from CCH II and CCH/CDCC also in attendance. Teens and older pre-teens gathered together with staff and volunteers to sing, dance, and enjoy refreshments. Also, the older children shared stories with the younger ones about their struggles, mistakes, successes, and dreams for the future---an important moment of children teaching children. The lives and hopes of the approximately 115 children continue to grow into the future.
Education News Cambodian public education continues to struggle. Now, children are often divided into three sessions per day, with some upper and intermediate grades beginning school at 6:30 A.M., others at 10:00 A.M., and still others at 2:00 P.M. This presents great challenges for the three cooks at CCH I, CCH II, and CCH/CDCC, trying to feed children according to this hectic school schedule. Despite all this, the consistent emphasis at CCH on supplemental education programs appears to be paying off dramatically. Class size in a typical Cambodian school is about 50, and numerous children at CCH/CDCC and CCH I & II have scored #1 in their classes, including Lon Sambo and Say Raksmey (grade 5), Chea Srey Pao and Kong Chinda (grade 4), Kry Reach (grade 3), and Pheng Thai (grade 1). All children are studying very hard, and many more children are placing in the top 10% in academic performance at public school.
Lon Sambo, #1 in her class Un Narun continues to study at United World College in Singapore. Narun is now completely immersed in an English speaking environment, and is trying hard to bring his English proficiency up to the standards of native speakers. Narun has completed a long field trip with 45 fellow students on a tour through several Southeast Asian countries, and acted as the tour guide as the group passed through Cambodia (including a visit to CCH). Youth Leadership A truly exciting development at CCH is the evolution of the Mobile Library. Last summer, many children at CCH I participated in reading, drama and library training with a visiting American elementary school teacher, Halimah Van Tuyl. During the summer, CCH librarians began to visit children at CDCC to read to them, act out stories, and help the younger children with reading skills. Since July, the experience and the confidence of the youth librarians has grown, CCH has received the gift of 2 tuk tuks, funding has become available for purchase of additional Khmer language children's books, and now plans are afoot to use all these resources to create a mobile library. The intention is for the CCH librarians to visit the Steung Meanchey Municipal Garbage Dump (where many CCH children once lived and worked), to teach children still there a little about reading, and to spread some of the CCH cheer. Eventually the mobile library may grow to service nearby public schools, and if funding eventually becomes available, a large library van may be purchased. Three cheers and congratulations to the student librarians, whose infectious enthusiasm and love of reading is making this dream become a reality!
Pisey Drives Librarians to CDCC in CCH Mobile Library Tuk Tuk
.....Naran reads to CDCC kids...........................Narath and Manin share a new book
....................Sophorn at work........................Manin, Sinath, and Sophorn in the Tuk Tuk Special Events
CCH continues to provide its many children with special activities. This month included the 3 day Water Festival/Boat Race extravaganza celebrated on the full moon of late October or early November in Phnom Penh. Thousands of people from all over the country flock to the banks of the Mekong and Tonle Sap Rivers to watch hundreds of traditional boats race, listen to local celebrities perform, pray and sing to the moon for strength and good luck, and generally have a good time. CCH children were there to take it all in.
In addition, thanks to a generous sponsor, all of the children at CDCC got a trip to the Phnom Ta Mao Zoo (Ta Mao mountain zoo), a very special treat indeed. The group packed a fried chicken lunch, and everybody had a good time. For many children, this was their first trip to a zoo.
Kids take in animals and plants at the zoo
Other generous sponsors provided a road trip to the seashore in Kep (Kampot province) for CCH I & II students, and the iCAN International School provided some CCH kids with a day of swimming. Volunteers, NGO Partners, and Visitors Volunteers continue to help children at CCH, supplementing their public school educations, and visitors continue to add variety to the lives of the children, and give glimpes of the great variety of human experience beyond Phnom Penh. A touring bicycle group from Europe came through, traveling east to Vietnam, and promised to ship back some of their equipment to CCH at the end of their tour. English volunteers from a group called Star Cambodia spent 2 weeks at CCH teaching some children drawing and how to read musical chords, and a Canadian volunteer brought toys and educational materials to CCH/CDCC. Regular weekly Australian volunteers, Jared and Amy Sharp, brought their parents for a visit, and two separate groups of visitors from Japan spent a few hours with the children, leaving behind pencils and origami materials, and purchasing hand bags and ornaments made by CCH staff and children.
Sokha has also secured the services of two part time Cambodian volunteers to teach children mathematics and Khmer. These volunteers are themselves from poor families in the countryside, but have earned scholarships to a university in Phnom Penh due to their strong academic efforts. They are currently staying at a Buddhist temple, but may come to live at CCH II, to help with the 24 hour supervision of the older boys living there. The new program being carried out by Charity Factory Foundation (CFF), of the Netherlands, continues to work well, giving valuable retail shop experience to three young women from CCH---Chetra, a student, and Sopheak and Srey Tom, two young staff members of CCH, that need to make money to further their university studies. Sokha attended a one day meeting of 42 Cambodian and 4 International NGOs. In this meeting, a recommendation was drafted and delivered to the government, urging enforcement of rules against teachers charging students for publicly supplied educational materials. Another recommendation was made that the government prevent the practice of corporal punishment exercised by some teachers.
Special Projects Thanks to a generous grant from Wild Geese Foundation in the Netherlands, further construction of pig cages and clearing of grass in a fish pond has been undertaken at the "CCH Farm," a short distance outside of Phnom Penh. This 50M X 80M plot of land will provide some income for CCH through raising or pigs and fish, and will also help provide extra protein sources for the diets of children at CCH. Thanks to a generous targeted donation, a protective firewall and extra water taps are now being built at the CCH/CDCC facility along the south boundary of the property. The intent is to protect the wooden structure at CCH/CDCC in the event of a fire at the adjacent property. At CCH I, concrete tables are being built to help in preparation of meals, and also to provide table space for children at meal times.
Want to make a donation to CCH? Click here to find out how.
Contributors to this report: Content: Mech Sokha English Editing and Layout: Elia Van Tuyl Special Thanks to Keo Manin and Keo Chanchesda for their valuable assistance with all the photos.
|
