On May 1, 2013,
Dorje Gurung, a teacher, was
jailed under false accusation in Qatar. This happened at a time when he was thinking of finally going back home to Nepal and devoting himself fulltime to
educational charity work. During the 12 days in confinement, he was filled with many doubts but his dream to help change the
education system in Nepal remained undeterred.
All he needed now was to get his freedom back.
His
friends and
network that he had earned over his lifetime of learning and teaching came to his rescue. They along with thousands of strangers who believed in justice won him his
freedom through an online
petition,
social media campaigns and myriad of
other pressure tactics.
For Dorje, the time has never been better to start acting on his
dream.
Born into a family of low socio-economic status in a small town in Nepal, he attended local government schools. But a teacher recognized his potential, and as a result, he ended up in a high
quality school in the Nepali capital of Kathmandu where his studies were subsidized by the owners. That simple step changed his life. From there, through hard work and determination, he went on to educate himself in
schools and colleges abroad, all paid for by scholarships, and later became a
teacher himself.
Looking back on his childhood and the 12 days he spent in jail with 10 other Nepalese who didn’t have the same educational opportunities as he did, he realized education--both when pursuing
and providing it--had contributed to his freedom.
And it is this freedom he wants to give back to his community. As a start, he wants to help one of the many government schools he visited last summer.
(Fig. 1. A typical government school classroom.)
The school in Sindhupalchowk (a district three hours from Kathmandu), like most government schools in Nepal, has very poor infrastructure, lacks resources and trained teachers. The dropout rate
is
alarmingly high and the exam pass rate very low.
If you believe education can change lives of the children of Sindupalchowk for better, help him do that. Help provide high quality education to communities in the area. Help his quest to give
back to the community what he has received with the help of communities around the world - freedom. Freedom through education.
(Fig. 2. A typical government school Science resources and "lab".)
Follow the link below for supporting intructions through Paypal or Credit Card in languages other than English:
1.
German.
2.
Spanish.
3.
French.
