How do we find new students?

Every year, we make our rounds to visit poor families in Ebo Town and New Jeshwang. It’s important to reach out to the poorest families, but it’s not always easy. Many children want to attend Butterfly Friends’ schools, but we can only accept a few of them. We talk to the mother or father and ask if anyone in the family speaks English. When the answer is no, it usually means that this family hasn’t registered any children before.

We try to make it as fair as possible, but you have to be very firm about not taking the whole crowd with you. They are extremely poor, and the parents have never had the opportunity to go to school. We register a child at age 4, and at the family’s home, we take a photo of the child with the registration number. The mother is then given a document confirming that her child has been registered with a number, and she must bring this document with her when school starts. If she doesn’t have the paper with her, her daughter won’t be able to attend school. We have to be strict about this process, because there are hundreds of children who want to go to school but never get the chance.

Yes, it’s a challenging job to be as fair as possible when selecting the students we’ll provide free education to, but it’s very rewarding. Every September, we welcome 150 new students to all Butterfly Friends schools. Of these, 80% are girls—a deliberate choice we make, since girls are usually at the back of the line when it comes to getting an education.