News

Class of 2012 - 120 girls from a Bangladesh slum community enter another year of education

Girls in the Duaripara community in Dhaka, Bangladesh, are more likely to be sent to work for 12 hours a day in garments factories than go to school but Oasis is raising aspirations and opportunities by helping vulnerable girls access formal education. This January which is the start of the new academic year, 33 girls who have so far missed out on education have started to attend ‘catch-up’ education classes at our project centre to prepare them for entry into formal schools; 49 girls are attending primary school; 35 are attending secondary school and 3 are studying vocational training or working part time whilst continuing their higher studies.

 Education is just one aspect of this integrated programme of education, health, life-skills, economic empowerment and family and community advocacy – all seeking to decrease the vulnerability of women and girls to commercial and sexual exploitation and make families and the wider community safer, healthier and with access to greater opportunities.

Here is what one of the girls who attends the Oasis project centre says:

“If I didn’t join Oasis my life would be different and maybe now I would be working in the garments factory. But joining this centre I have hope to reach a better position, have freedom, family members are now valuing me, my confidence has increased and I able to speak publicly in situations. I want to be a nurse and want to serve people and my family. I also want the other girls of the project to get support and go far as I am on the way to reach my dream.” - Mukta, one of the senior Duaripara girls.

27-Jan-2012