Case Study - CWIN Holiday to Chitwan
Summary Proposal Photo diary Video
Background - CWIN is a pioneer organisation in Nepal for the rights of the child and against child labour exploitation. CWIN’s Balika Programme for Girls at Risk works for the empowerment and social reintegration of girls at risk at advocates for the inclusion of girls issues in all related programmes and policies. CWIN Balika runs a residential home for girls at risk where they are either supported through education or provided one of various skills trainings so that they can be self reliant.
The need - Coming from challeged backgrounds, the girls rarely, if ever have an opportunity to visit the spectacular places Nepal has to offer. There is both a lack of funding for this type of excursions and also a great responsibility on the part of the carers to ensure the children’s welfare, which is more challenging in a context outside Kathmandu. Yet, the educational, cultural, confidence boosting and enjoyment benefits that can be gained from such a holiday are enormous and will remain with the children forever.
Meeting the need - Following a personal visit to the Sapana Village Lodge in Chitwan, First Spark approached CWIN regarding the possibility of organising a trip to the Lodge for a group of children. First Spark offered to fully fund the programme and also for First Spark staff to accompany and support the trip, offering a further level of supervision if necessary.
CWIN were very positive about the proposed plan and selected 15 girls from their Balika residential home. In June 2008 First Spark took the girls plus 3 supervisors to Chitwan and the Sapana Village. The trip provided the girls with the unique opportunity to visit one of Nepal’s most spectacular national parks.
Activities included: Canoeing, Trip to the Elephant Breeding Centre, Elephant jungle ride, Jeep drive to a bird watching lake 20,000 lake, Tharu culture programme (dancing), Elephant bathing.
Finance - First Spark funded this project 100%.
Feedback - "First and foremost we would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to Toby and Lucy for organizing an excursion for girls of CWIN Balika Center to Chitwan National Park. I think the trip has met up with its objective which was to provide the girls with the opportunity to see and enjoy the natural beauty as well as give them educational insights into nature, culture and conservation. CWIN too has a recreation and entertainment program in which we organize a trip inside the valley so this trip was first of its type for the girls. To tell you the truth we didn't expect that the trip would become such an exciting and memorable one.
We all got an opportunity to learn and enjoy from all those program that had been scheduled for the trip such as; elephant ride, canoeing, visit to elephant breeding centre, jeep drive to the 20,000 lake, tharu cultural program and elephant bathing. We all got information on different species of birds, animals, about tharu village, national park and many more. Overall the trip was very exciting and we will always cherish it throughout our life. Once again on behalf of all the girls of Balika we would like to thank you for such a memorable trip."
