Evening to Support Literacy in Bangladesh Puts Rotary’s International Service Front and Centre
Posted by John Borst
on Apr 04, 2011
Created as a joint program of the Rotary Club of Dryden and the Dryden District of the Retired Teachers of Ontario “An Evening to Support Literacy in Bangladesh” was a fitting way to end Literacy month. Fifty six adults and four children attended the event. In addition another $725.00 was contributed by those who wanted to support the project but were unable to attend, an amount equivalent to another 29 attendees.
G.E.M. Munro combined storytelling with a short video clips to illustrate the work being done by the Amarok Society that they founded.
Their “Mothers of Intention” is a program where the Society trains teachers
to work in the slums of Dhaka and Khulan, Bangladesh to teach illiterate women who
in turn must then go out and teach 5 children. “Schools” are the same one room
shanties lived in by those in the particular slum.
Over the past 5 years, G.E.M. estimated that at
least 600 mothers...and thousands of children had been exposed to some form of
literacy.The Amarok Society currently operates twelve one
room “schools”. Between 20 and 25 Mothers often with children on their lap sit
on dirt floors for instruction. The Amarok
Society supplies the teacher, rents the school, and supplies the paper and
pencils. The children are educated in the mother’s home. This way for about $9,500.00
a year 25 mothers and often more than 200 children become literate.
Door prize winners
wereJulie Dzeoba a Riverview basket of Northwestern Ontario
delicacies; Mark Tinkess and Peter Keen both won a Boffo Bog with a bottle of
wine and a pair of Dryden Entertainment Series tickets while Mark Whittaker to
home a $50.00 gift certification from the host caterer, the Masala Restaurant.
READ A GREAT BOOK
G.E.M. Munro’s book “South Asian Adventures
with the Active Poor” a best-selling collection of true short stories about
these extraordinary mothers and families was available in the lobby where 16
copies were purchased at $20.00 a piece. Because 100% of profits go to Amarok
Society, buying a book directly helps a child to get an education.
For more information on the work that they are
doing in Bangladesh, go the their website at
Certainly by the end of the evening the Amarok
Society’s motto “Teach a Mother – Change
the World” was well understood by everyone in attendance.