The lanes are so narrow that I can touch the shanty walls on both sides without extending my arms. I watch my footing..litter and mud choke the path..and my head: low roofs made of rusty metal sheets overhang the path. One needs to walk carefully. The slum is a maze of tiny “streets” and hovels patched together from scraps of found material. A dense community of poverty, illiteracy and illness both physical and mental.

We “rescued” two small girls after their Mother drown herself in the nearby garbage-soaked river. Poverty often breeds desperation. Another little girl who is now at the hostel was recommended to us by someone in the community after her Mother began doing prostitution in their small room at night. Then I visit the home of a boy we put into boarding recently. It is a dirt floored shanty on the bank of that fetid river. Sujan’s Father died here last week of cancer.

Yet into this misery there has come a bright light: Strong Roots Montessori Preschool, a grassroots initiative started about four years ago by an amazing Nepali couple. Shanti Children’s Foundation has been helping to support and improve this small ray of hope that gives free, quality early learning to 60 slum children. Children who live in the shanties nearby. This extraordinary little school has had big challenges but soldiers on and gets better every year. This year I again spent an afternoon visiting, chatting with the founder and dedicated local teachers and observing the children. It’s truly top notch on a shoestring.

The kids first learn hygiene, like washing their hands and brushing their teeth. They learn toilet etiquette and are required to come to school neat and clean. They learn to be quiet when others are speaking, to wait their turn, to be orderly. These qualities seem basic but they do not get them at home. They are highly disadvantaged in their upbringing. Just think what that would mean for their lives without intervention like this little school. Here they learn things we take for granted and which parents in the U.S. easily teach their children at an early age.

They learn to tell time, to name colors and animals and parts of the body. They then learn the alphabet and numbers. ( and they do this through wonderful learning games that they can choose for themselves. I’ve watched them work independently, quietly and with incredible focus) They go home and share these things with their parents. Slowly the whole community has come to accept and value this little school. Mothers bring their children to school with pride..some sit and watch their children “study”, taking pride that their child is learning. Who could have imagined their child could get such an education?

We have sponsored a number of these children for their further education, especially those in dire circumstances. I can affirm that these kids do wonderfully in primary school despite having come from such a difficult background. They are excelling! And they will change the trajectory of their families utterly, from illiteracy, poverty and despair to education, success and well-earned pride.