Children's education appeal

This appeal is now closed but you are welcome to Make a general donation to Oxfam's work around the world.

Natalie: All she wants for Christmas is more homework. Photo: Jane Ussher/Oxfam
Natalie: All she wants is more homework. Photo: Jane Ussher/Oxfam

Natalie wants to go to school, but can’t.

Natalie isn't naughty, and she’s definitely bright enough for school. However, she’s the child of parents who simply don’t have the money to pay school fees. And worse, she lives in a country where thousands of students – some as young as ten years old – are pushed out of education system each year.

For Natalie, this is very bad news. In the world’s poorest countries, like Vanuatu where she lives, children desperately want to go to school.

So when you tell a child like Natalie, “You can’t go to school anymore,” it’s like you’re condemning her to struggle for survival, for the rest of her life.

And as Kathy Solomon, Director of Oxfam’s partner the Vanuatu Rural Training Centres Association says,

“ When children cannot continue their schooling the parents weep because they feel that is all they can give their kids. After they drop out of school, the children are often just walking around…”

This is where the story gets more serious. Children without schooling might be able to do domestic chores or farm work. At worst, these children drift into Port Vila or other urban centres looking for work to help their families, falling victim to drugs, crime or early pregnancy.

It’s tragic to think of fresh-faced children like Natalie confronting these grim choices.

It doesn’t have to be this way. A gift of $42 today will send a child like Natalie to school for one term at an Oxfam-supported Rural Training Centre.

You can help

Oxfam supports the Vanuatu Rural Training Centres Association and the network has grown to comprise 49 community-owned and governed rural training centres across the most remote areas of Vanuatu’s far flung islands.

Students in each of these centres are learning practical vocational skills that will help them earn a living and contribute to their family and community. Natalie will be one of thousands of kids getting an opportunity to work their way out of poverty.

“Every parent is expecting something special from their kids,” says Kathy Solomon, “But when they don’t get it from the formal system, they see rural training centres as a second chance for their children.”

$42 is not much to send a student to school, and it means the world to that one child.

Give the Christmas gift of education. Photo: Jane Ussher/OxfamVRDTCA -- Vanuatu Rural Training Centres Association

Your gift will be giving children more than access to a classroom. After Cyclone Ivy devastated much of Vanuatu in 2004, Oxfam began building the Rural Training Centres out of materials that can shelter a whole village from a cyclone.

The recent Samoan tsunami reminds us how critical disaster preparedness is for vulnerable communities. So this simple life-changing classroom is also a life-saving resource, and with safe water and toilets, the children are learning valuable lessons in hygiene as well as their school subjects.

Oxfam New Zealand began its partnership with the association of Rural Training Centres in Vanuatu in 2003. The organisation provides a wide variety of services to support rural communities.

Please give the gift of education and hope for a lifetime. Thank you!