CEF mum supporting herself and her daughter by making and selling soy milk and tofu

Each morning one of our CEF mums makes fresh soy milk and tofu. Then she goes off on her bike selling her home-made products door to door to people in her local community. 

This is how this single mum has supported herself and her daughter since she was born. Mum still produces and sells and CEF started helping with her daughter's education once it became too expensive for her to afford 6 years ago.

Sometimes it is not easy to see what is the most appropriate care for a child

I wish to share a challenging subject and those of you who work in care, in orphanages, with orphans, or with very poor families, you are most welcome to share your experience as it would be helpful. My email address is at the end.

Here in Vietnam children who have been orphaned often move in with a living relative if the relative thinks they can afford to look after them. Sometimes they think they can, but they can't, and then they ask for help elsewhere; from local pagodas, the local community groups, neighbors and sometimes the media get involved and ask for help for them.

There are twins we are helping with their education and the media helped raise some money for them and their care. Their uncle cares for them and is a sincerely humble and kind man. He was an orphan and their mother helped care for him when he was young and so he wants to help care for them. He loves them and cares for them like his own children. But he is poor, so the initial help he received through the media has helped with initial costs such as their mothers funeral, but most of it has gone into the bank into accounts set up for the twins for their future.

Sometimes the children are a means to obtain money and the minimal care is given to them, and sometimes they suffer abuse. These carers can end up receiving regular funds from various sources, as everyone feels so sorry for the children. This is true of some orphanages here and carers of orphaned children.

We have a little girl whose parents died from AIDS, but she is unaffected. Granny who is a little 'unstable' is 'caring' for her. Granny is also not completely honest and we do not trust her. She lives in a one room house she had built, which is always dirty, messy and has all the garbage around it that she collects and recycles. The little girl is usually dirty and in filthy clothes. Granny also hits her as we have seen red welts on her. We felt although it is a horrible situation it was better than an orphanage and she is with family, but sometimes after we visit we wonder......

One of the pagodas that refers local families to us has said they would take her and look after her, after they heard this story, but they could only afford to do that if CEF paid for her education. A Vietnamese friend said she would also be happy to bring her up if CEF could pay for her education.

This is a granny who is benefiting from having this child in her care. But is the child benefiting? Should she stay with a granny who uses her and abuses her or should she go some where, where she will be cared for, and not used or abused? We work to keep families together and we have never contemplated taking a child away from their family, so we are torn.

Even if we decide she should be with someone, or people who care for her, respect her and nourish her, granny is unlikely to let go of her as she would lose her benefits.

Linda: c.e.f.vietnam@gmail.com

Today on International Women's Day we are looking for sponsors so that these girls can become women with choices

Today on International Women's Day we at CEF are please to know we are helping many girls to have an education; to have a future with more choices than their parents. We also know they are safe if they are in school, as it is a known fact that children in school are trafficked less.

These are three of the girls in need of sponsors, but we also have more girls who need sponsors. Some girls can be visited as they are within an hour or so from the office, but some the sponsors wouldn't be able to visit as the girls are too far from the CEF office; some even a flight and a long drive away.

Please consider sponsoring and let us know if you wish to sponsor a primary school child, secondary, high school girl or a young lady in tertiary education. Do you need to see her or are you happy to support a girl you won't meet?

All sponsors receive an annual update, photos, school results and a letter or two, or a drawing, depending on the age of the child.

Please sponsor a child, a child who really needs help to stay in school, so she is safe and will have a future with choices.

Linda:  c.e.f.vietnam@gmail.com

International Day of the Girl Child and Why an Education is Important for Girls

It is wonderful to see that worldwide many organizations are making a stand to make the life of girls better.

Children's Education Foundation is passionate about educating girls here in Vietnam. All of us at CEF want to help impoverished and marginalized girls stay in school and complete their education to support their hopes and dreams of being educated as well as having the tools to reach their full potential.

There are many vital reasons to support females to be educated as the impact of giving a girl in a developing country a quality education can be felt in families, communities and in future generations. Below are a few:

Reducing Fertility Rates
The World Bank's research shows that when girls receive an education, they’ll have “fewer and healthier” babies.  One year of formal education can result in a 10% decrease in fertility due to being better informed about family planning, and are also more likely to marry later.

Lower Maternal and Child Mortality Rates
Girls who receive an education are less likely to contract HIV & AIDS, and thus, less likely to pass it onto their children.  The Comparative & International Education Society writes that their children are more likely to be vaccinated, and that educated mothers will be better informed about proper nutrition and health practices.

Future Educated Generations
By sending a girl to school, she is far more likely to ensure that her children also receive an education. As many claim, investing in a girl’s education is investing in a nation.

Higher Wages
The Girl Effect states that if a girl attends an additional year of primary school she’ll see her wages increase up to 20%.
Furthermore if she attends an additional year of secondary school, her wages could increase by 25%!

Investing in the Family
With these additional wages research shows that women are more likely to invest in their family.  In fact the Basic Education Coalition claims that women will reserve 90% of their income to better their families.  This economic savings will result in the betterment of not only individual families, but entire communities.

And
Thousands of girls, some as young as 7, will become a child bride.

Only 30% of girls in the world are enrolled in secondary school.       

One in seven girls in developing countries is married off before age 15.                                         

Women only hold 15.7% of top leadership positions in Fortune 500 companies.

Good news to share with Australians: CEF has GDR status!

Good news to share with Australians! Children's Education Foundation has been given GDR status. This means that from September 24, 2015, financial donations made in Australia over $2 can be claimed against tax you have paid. 

CEF received funds from chocolate sales which are helping two girls near the border to complete high school

CEF is lucky to have a team of chocolate sellers in Australia who have many chocolate-loving friends. Some of the profits are now helping two girls from near the Vietnam-Laos border to complete their education. Without this help their families could not afford to support them through this last year of their education.

Some of the funds are also being used for Anti-Trafficking education materials for the authorities in this area, the schools and the families and children. Girls living near the border are more vulnerable to being trafficked.

When the chocolate lovers are enjoying their chocolates I hope they realize that their purchase is giving a pleasure to others too, one that will last a life time.

 Typical countryside in the area where the girls in the scholarship program live

A typical home of the scholarship girls we are helping

A kind and generous new sponsor for CEF

Our good news for the day is that this lovely grade 11 student has been sponsored! Her mother died when she was one year old and her grandparents helped bring her up, but now granddad has passed away and granny is very old and no longer able to look after herself.

Dad who is a garbage collector has been struggling to pay off mums medical bills since she passed away. Her new and very sweet and generous sponsor has offered to pay off the remainder of their loan! Sometimes our sponsor's kindness and generosity is overwhelming. We at CEF are very lucky to have such good caring people help girls to stay in school here in Vietnam.

 With her dad

 With her dad and sister

 Her granny who helped bring her up from when she was one year old. 

Unfortunately granny is frail now and can't even look after herself., 

Good hearts result in less suffering in the world

CEF is blessed to have many wonderful caring people involved; our board, donors, partner organizations, sponsors and staff all make our work possible.

Today the staff had been discussing one family they are very worried about as this family is already financially challenged and their situation has deteriorated. The father is semi-paralyzed, mum has poor health, one of their children has Down's Syndrome, and now one of the older girls in the family who worked and financially helped them scrape by, has now married and moved to live with her husband's family far away. The mum and dad of the sponsored child who were already very skinny, have become even more so.

The staff almost never ask for more help for a family, but the visit to this family distressed them. I don't like to ask sponsors for extra help either, as they are already sponsoring. But today they did ask me, and I did ask her sponsor who responded with such a big heart and care it was very touching.

I feel so blessed to have such caring staff and such caring sponsors. It makes it possible to provide the care our CEF families need and reduces their suffering.

International Literacy Day 2015

It's International Literacy Day; a day to acknowledge the importance of literacy!

We at CEF love choosing, buying and then preparing books for the children. We then share the books with the CEF children and other children in their communities. Parents can borrow them too.

In Da Nang we take books to our students homes when we visit them. In Quang Nam students come to the office and borrow books, or they and the other children in their communities can borrow from the boxes of books we leave in the local pagodas in areas where we work, or in the homes of some of the CEF children. One child takes responsibility in the community to educate the other children about book care, sign the books out, and make sure they are returned.

How much this program grows depends on the donations we receive that are specifically for literacy. We are very pleased that more and more children have access to good quality, educational books on a large range of subjects.

We were given many comics which we  then gave to the children at  Hoi An Children's Home 

 One of our tertiary students with some books she borrowed from the CEF office library

 Another tertiary student with books she borrowed from the library at our office

 Books from a recent book shopping trip

 Some of our CEF students reading books they borrowed

 One of our secondary students with books she borrowed

Another of our secondary school students with books she borrowed

CEF students write about their summer holiday

The following diverse snippets of letters are from CEF children to their sponsors talking about their summer holidays which have just come to an end. All letters were translated from Vietnamese to English by CEF staff.                                                                                                                          

A CEF primary school child wrote:     ...This summer besides joining in on math extra tuition classes I also joined in on many of the activities of my 'Community Youth Union' each Sunday afternoon. We did singing and dancing and played many traditional games. And something which made me so happy was that I received the 'Encouragement Award' of the singing and dancing competition in our community. I enjoyed this summer very much......

One of our secondary school students wrote:     ....During this summer my mother took me to the beach early every morning. We did exercises and swam there. The most exciting event for me this summer was CEF’s 'Water Safety and Beach Outing Day'. I not only was able to swim and play games at the beach, but also was able to go to the cinema with other CEF students. It was a great day!.......

Another secondary school student who lives with her grandmother and cousin wrote:   .....My grandmother’s legs are usually painful when the weather changes so I and my cousin often try to act the buffoon to make her happy and we give her massages. In this last school year, both I and my cousin got good results at school. I am very happy about this and I know that it makes my grandmother happy and proud of us. 
I and my cousin also love reading books, especially Fairy Tale story books. In this summer holiday, when my aunt-in-law had free time, she often took me to the CEF office to borrow many Fairy Tales story books to take home for reading. We really enjoy them very much.......

One of our university students wrote:    .....I had a delightful summer holiday, so let me tell you about it. I started my summer holiday with a month long part time job at a coffee shop near my college in Hue. I worked as a waitress and I only had to work in the morning. I was very happy that I could earn a little bit of money this vacation.                                                                               Then, I visited my brother and his family on Cham Island. This is the first time I went there and I really liked it, not only for the beautiful sightseeing but also because of the kind local people.      We heard that our first stepmother who lives in Ho Chi Minh city was seriously ill, therefore I went to visit her for about a half month. She suffered from spinal problems and she can’t move. Every day I talked with her, and played with and taught her grandchildren. My stepsister took me to visit several places in Ho Chi Minh city too. I did enjoy the visit with her very much. However, I don’t like Ho Chi Minh city much as it is a noisy city. I prefer to live in our peaceful homeland, Hoi An. My step sibling took care and looked after me very well. They made me so happy. After all, my sister in law took me to visit her home in Gia Lai province, a mountainous area in the center of Vietnam. There the atmosphere was so fresh, and the people were so friendly. It was really the most special summer holiday that I have ever had. It is also the last summer vacation in my school life because I will graduate at the end of this academic year........