Arsiya studies in Junior Kindergarten at Vision Rescue’s Beacon Learning Centre. Her teachers appreciate her helping nature. Back when our face-to-face classes were open, Aarsiya loved distributing lunch boxes to her friends in class every day. But all that changed when the coronavirus hit India.
Let’s backtrack a little bit.
20 years ago, Arsiya’s father had migrated to Mumbai from the state of Uttar Pradesh. He had settled into a Mumbai slum community bordered by the city’s largest garbage dump. 9000 metric tonnes of trash reach here every day.
As an electrician, Arsiya’s father earns Rs.6000/- each month, out of which a majority goes towards their house rent, electricity bill, water charges, and daily expenses. Living in a one-room house with her parents, grandmother, and aunt, Arsiya could hardly find enough space to sleep every night.
Once Arsiya joined our classes in 2019, your gifts reached out to her with daily nutritious meals, health assessments, dental checkups, a school bag, lunch box, stationery, books, and much more. Aarsiya’s progress and enthusiasm towards studies even encouraged her mother to participate in our focus group meetings and she went on to complete our fabric-bag-making course that upskills parents for potential employment.
When the first lockdown hit India in March 2020, Arsiya’s progress in education came to a standstill. Her father lost his job and was left to grapple with this tough question – “How would my family survive without a penny’s income?” They fell several months overdue on their rent, and were struggling to survive.
It is your donations that answered Arsiya’s father’s question. Monthly grocery kits reached their home every month along with nutritious snacks for Arsiya.
The lockdown had completely stalled Arsiya’s education too. The family didn’t own a smartphone for Arsiya to study online on, and they thought she would lose the entire academic year.
Again, it’s your donations that enabled Vision Rescue to rope in education representatives who would go house to house to family’s like Arsiya’s, and ensure that children separated by the digital divide would not lose out on their education.
Arsiya jumped with joy when she got to know that an education representative would be coming home to teach her! She now dreams of becoming a teacher herself.
Aarsiya’s family is immensely grateful to you for standing with them in their toughest times.
