Room to Read Blog

Girls' Education Program Alumna in Cambodia Finds Success After Graduation

The only girl child born to her parents, 21-year-old Sreymom Mat is the middle sibling in a family of five. Her parents are illiterate farmers who own a small plot of land, but their yield is often insufficient income, so her mother also makes akor (rice cakes) to sell in the village market.

Because of her family’s financial hardship, Sreymom’s mother suggested that she quit school after 6th grade in order to help provide additional income, but the young girl was persistent. Sreymom’s passion for education gave her courage to negotiate with her mother until a truce was found and a compromise worked out—she would help with house chores after school and study with friends at night. She joined Room to Read’s Girls’ Education program in 2004, and threw herself into her academics, recognizing the chance to stay in school as an opportunity to carve out a brighter future.

Sreymom started planning for that future while she was still in secondary school, undertaking a small business to help her save money for university. She began to raise cows as a source of income. As her cows grew so did her profits, allowing Sreymom to amass a small herd of what is now seven cows.

After graduating from secondary school and completing our Girls’ Education program in 2012, Sreymom was accepted to the Royal University of Agriculture in Phnom Penh. Now in her third year of study majoring in rural development, she lives in the city with family friends and couldn’t be happier.

In addition to caring for her cows, she also holds several part-time jobs and internships that provide her with hands-on experience in the development sector, including providing translation services to ActionAid Cambodia, performing community outreach on behalf of the Japanese International Volunteer Center and acting as a freelance research assistant.

In celebration of Sreymom’s many achievements and her steadfast dedication to education, she was invited to attend two Room to Read gala events in Hong Kong and Singapore as the guest of honor this March to share her story with packed houses of Room to Read supporters. “Without education I would never have gotten this far,” says Sreymom. “And, without Room to Read I may never have received an education.”

Read more stories in our Girls' Education Yearbook.

Join our Freedom to Dream campaign and help more girls across Asia and Africa pursue their dreams. All gifts through May 31 to our Girls’ Education program will be matched (up to US$850,000)!

Guest Blog in Honor of Khmer New Year: Looking Ahead

Borin Srey is Room to Read’s Communications Officer for Cambodia. In this guest blog he shares the traditions and office rituals surrounding the Khmer New Year.

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Today marks the first day of the Khmer New Year, a three-day celebration based on Buddhist legend, with each day having its own particular significance. In honor of the holiday and on behalf of the entire Room to Read Cambodia team, I will share a little bit about the holiday and how our team marks its occurrence every year.

The first day of this ritual ceremony is called Maha Sangkran. For this day, most Cambodians clean their houses and decorate them with lights, while preparing of offerings, such as flowers, garlands, fruits, candles, and incense to welcome the new goddess. As radio and television announce the arrival of the New Year, monastery drums sound, and people burn candles and incense to celebrate happiness, luck and prosperity. In the afternoon, many go to the local monastery to build sand or rice hills that symbolize Buddha’s stupa (where his relics were buried).

The second day is Virak Wanabat. For this celebration, people dress up in traditional costumes, prepare food to offer to monks at the monastery and offer their charity—such as money, clothes, or foods—to less fortunate individuals. They also burn candles and incense to ask for happiness and prosperity.  

The last day of the New Year celebration is Leang Saka. On this day, children shower their grandparents at home to show their gratitude and respect. At the monasteries, people do the same for Buddha statues. Young people love to splash in the perfumed water and play games, like scarf-throwing, tug of war or traditional dancing.

As with all national holidays in Cambodia, rural villagers finish their harvest early and relax a bit. Those who have migrated to urban areas often visit relatives these days as well. The ambiance in both the countryside and cities is lively, with illuminated decorations and music echoing in the streets.

Every year, just before the arrival of Khmer New Year, the Room to Read Cambodia team organizes a staff gathering, followed by recreational activities to celebrate the New Year and build team spirit.  Together, we reflect on the year’s achievements and look forward towards the future.

“Last year, we accomplished many great things. This year, we’ll continue to focus on building a positive work environment,” said Kall Kann, our country director, during this year’s reflection. Then, program staff voiced their plans for the future, building momentum and excitement among all of us.

“We are looking forward to collaborating with the Reading & Writing Instruction team on producing decodable books to help teachers nurture young readers,” shared Rattana, manager of Book Publishing. “We will be introducing Life Skills Assessment to track the progress of our Girls’ Education program participants,” added program manager Soseihaknead. Sok Ieng, manager of School Libraries was next to chime in. “We are focusing on capacity building for our field staff to improve the training they provide to schools,” he said proudly.

With so much to look forward to, it’s certain to be a very good New Year.

Learn more about our work in Cambodia.

Hoeurn Him's Story: Paying it Forward in Cambodia

“When I got my first salary check, I went and placed the entire amount in my mother’s hand and said to her, ‘This is the power of education.’”

At 24 years old, Hoeurn Him is a natural leader with a warm smile and bright eyes. As a social mobilizer for Room to Read’s Girls’ Education program in Cambodia, she is currently responsible for monitoring the progress and development of 63 girls throughout the rural province of Kampong Cham. In this role, Hoeurn visits each girl’s home on a regular basis, helps facilitate life skills sessions and keeps a close eye on the academic performance of all her young students—providing support and encouragement along the way.

As the first person ever to graduate from secondary school in her village of 300 families, Hoeurn is particularly adept at understanding and navigating the challenges girls face in her community. “During my school days my parents were not at all concerned with my education,” she says frankly. “I finished school only because I wanted to have a better life and to not have to struggle for food.”

Her status as the village’s first-ever graduate has earned young Hoeurn a great deal of respect within her community and made her parents very proud. She says she will never forget that moment when she was able to share the fruits of her labor with them.

"When my first paycheck arrived, my father and mother were quiet for a long time and had tears in their eyes," she recalls. "Now they insist that my kid sister and brother stay in school, too.”

These days, Hoeurn is the primary breadwinner for her entire family, and plans to attend University within a few years. “I hope to receive a full scholarship, but my parents would still need a little bit of money to run the house,” she says. “Because of this, I set aside half of my salary each month to prepare for when I will be studying full-time and unable to earn for them.”

After university, Hoeurn has her sights set on becoming a teacher and returning to Kampong Cham to bring technology to the schools in her area. “I know from my own experience how much education can be empowering, so I must support all girls to see that as well,” she says.

Learn more about Room to Read’s Girls’ Education program.

Guest Blog from Cambodia: Two Photographers Share their Experience on Location with Room to Read

Last November, photographers Kristin Harrison and Jeremy Ginsberg (teamjk.com) met up with our team in Cambodia to photograph Lisang's story for our 2011 Girls' Education Yearbook. Below are their reflections (and photos) from the shoot.

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Smart, funny and quietly confident, Girls' Education program student Lisang instantly charmed us. We met her in the middle of a rice field in Kampong Cham province, a two-hour drive from Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. She was busily harvesting rice with women three times her age.

To help support her ailing parents and two younger siblings, 13-year-old Lisang works in the rice fields from 6 am – 12 pm before going to class in the afternoon. On weekends, she performs this back-breaking work full-time. After school, she cooks and cleans at home. Somehow, she manages to squeeze in time for homework, too.

She good-naturedly let us photograph her life for the 2011 Girls' Education Yearbook, and invited us into her world. We tagged along as she worked in the rice fields, prepared lunch at home over an open fire and attended classes at school. At the end of the day, we offered to teach her how to use one of our cameras, and she took to it instantly, smiling and laughing as she photographed students in her school's Room to Read library.

Throughout the day, Lisang inspired us with her passion for education, cheerful spirit and incredible dedication to family. Since then, we’ve thought of her often.

It’s clear that Lisang could achieve anything she wanted if given the opportunity, but she and her family are trapped in the heartbreaking quicksand of poverty, and it poses a major roadblock to her future. With the help of Room to Read, she has found an escape route through education and with it the chance to achieve her dreams. It was an honor to work with her.

All gifts matched through May 31! From now through the end of May, all donations will be matched up to $150,000 by our partners, Hilton Worldwide. Honor the influential women in your life with a gift that has the power to change a generation.www.roomtoread.org/MayMatch.

Pocket Libraries Teach Literacy and Leadership in Cambodia

Finding time read during school breaks is a universal challenge for students around the globe, but in Cambodia, where children’s books are an unaffordable luxury for most families, it can be nearly impossible.

Recognizing the value of continuous access to books for students’ reading habits, our team in Cambodia embarked on a problem-solving mission late last year. What we needed was a low-cost, high-impact ways of ensuring that even children in the most remote Cambodian communities had the reading material they needed to practing their budding literacy skills during school breaks. 

Constructed of sturdy material sewn to create folds as wide as storybooks, the pocket library seemed like a perfect solution. Large enough to contain a collection of 100 books, it can be hung nearly anywhere. During weekends and school breaks, the entire contraption is rolled up and transported from village to village, allowing children to check out the books one at a time.

“I used to wish for more books to read from at home besides my school textbook,” says Thavry, a fifth grade student from the Kampong Cham province. “Now, the books come to me!”

After piloting the pocket libraries in 2011, our team has now extended the program to several other districts. “Exposure to books at school alone is not enough,” says Chea Sum Vuthy, one of the field facilitators from our School Libraries program. “There must be other accessibility as well.”

In addition to promoting literacy, the pocket library initiative also teaches valuable leadership skills. Students take turns looking after the system and managing the check-out register with enthusiasm. For many, including Thavry, the visits from the pocket library provide the only exposure to reading material outside of school.

Learn more about our School Libraries.

Literacy by the Numbers: Guest Blog from Our Research, Monitoring & Evaluation Team

This is a guest post from Peter Cooper, Room to Read's Senior Officer for Research, Monitoring and Evaluation.

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As an organization, Room to Read has always been committed to the sustainability of our programs. We know that a library is only as good as the number of lives it enriches, so we design each and every one of our programs to ensure the greatest possible sustainability and sense of community ownership.

In an effort to learn more about the sustainability of our school libraries and to put our own theories to the test, we launched a multi-country study in 2011 that examined a statistically representative sample of our post-completion libraries (i.e., projects that have “graduated” from our program and are now run without support from Room to Read). Over a period of months, independent evaluators funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation visited 517 school libraries in three countries—Cambodia, Nepal and South Africa—to see how effectively each project was functioning on its own and where Room to Read might enhance our program to improve the odds of success for all school libraries.

Our team put together the infographic below, featuring highlights from the study, so that our supporters around the globe can catch a glimpse of what we found. Take a look (to view the image full-size, use this link):

Read more about Research, Monitoring and Evaluation on our website.

Aussie Students Sign up to Build a Library in Cambodia, Just in Time for the New Year

This weekend, Cambodia held its annual New Year’s celebration (Chaul Chnam Thmey), and for the students of Pradak Primary School in Siem Reap, the new year will be one filled with hundreds of brand new books.

Starting today, students from primary schools across Australia will come together in a nationwide campaign, the Stubbies Schoolwear World Change Challenge, raising money to build the first-ever library at Pradak Primary.

The campaign kicked off at Ocean Shores Public School, where students raised AU$575 in one day—enough to print 575 local language books to stock the shelves of the soon-to-be-constructed library. To earn the money, students participated in a number of activities, ranging from a mini read-a-thon to a book swap, and one teacher even sponsored a student to keep quiet for the whole day!

Children’s book author Tristan Bancks helped Ocean Shores make a video about the day they spent changing the world (below) to help inspire other schools to get involved. An writer-ambassador for Room to Read, Tristan has even volunteered his own time to the challenge—pledging to hold an exclusive reading and writing workshop with the classroom that raises the most money towards the $20,000 goal.

Good luck to all the schools participating and thanks for being a part of the global movement for education!

Watch the video:

  

Learn more about our work in Cambodia.

Floating Library Boosts Literacy in Remote Cambodian Villages

 For the water-dwelling communities of the Tonle Sap Lake in central Cambodia, commuting to school can be quite a challenge. With houses that float on the river’s ever-fluctuating surface and a population that is sustained almost entirely by fishing in the surrounding waters, there are a lot of barriers to education. School is separated from the students’ homes by a two-kilometer boat ride, so each child must learn to swim before making the daily trip to Phat Sanday Primary School.

The school rests on floating docks, and serves 358 students from three villages. Due to its relative inaccessibility, the schools in this area have largely been ignored by development efforts, but in 2009, Room to Read established a library at Phat Sanday Primary—adding more than a thousand books to the shelves and committing three years of training for the school’s staff.

“The library is my world now,” beams ten-year-old So Kim Suo. “I always come here when I have free time.”

The school's staff has noted a marked change in the students since the library opened, as well. “The school grounds used to be very quiet,” says librarian Chhun Nhork. “Now, with the new library, the sound of students reading aloud is enough to compete with the boats that roar through this area.”

The school’s principal, Heng Peng Eang, agrees. “Before, it was hard to teach because we were completely dependent on only the one textbook from the ministry of education,” he recalls. “Now, we can use different books to guide the teaching and learning process.”

Before the addition of the library, he remembers many students in the upper grades who were still unable to read at the appropriate level—a fact only exacerbated by the half-day schedule the school uses to avoid overcrowding its facilities. “Now,” he says, “they can read confidently.” 

Learn more about our programs in Cambodia.

Dino's Story: Going the Extra Mile to Help Young Readers Succeed in Cambodia

“I work as teacher because I love children,” says Kea Dino, a bright 22-year-old from Kampong Thom, Cambodia.

Her enthusiasm for teaching is palpable immediately as is her dedication. In addition to working as a teacher and librarian at a local school, Dino is currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree in Accounting at nearby Kampong Thom University.

Given all of her existing commitments, Dino knows that her decision to join Room to Read earlier this year as a field facilitator for the School Library program might come as a surprise to some. “I want to share my experiences and knowledge with other librarians,” she says of her newest endeavor.

Born one of three children to an illiterate mother and a father who works as a soldier, Dino knows first-hand the power of a good education. Despite her full schedule, she remains optimistic about her work, calling each of her jobs in its own way an “agent of country development”.

In her new role as field facilitator, Dino’s primary responsibility is to follow up with completed libraries that are under Room to Read’s three year period of support—providing both technical assistance and training to ensure the project’s long-term success. As an added bonus, the site visits provide an opportunity to see up-close the impact each library is having on students’ reading habits. “I am happy when I hear them telling stories and singing songs, and especially to see them able to read,” she says.

Before starting as a facilitator Dino had her share of doubts. “I was really enthusiastic to start the job, but worried about failing—thinking I might be unable to do the work well,” she recalls. “I was also concerned about my personal security traveling long distances to visit many schools in the area.”

As time went on, though, encouragement from her parents and extensive training from Room to Read gave Dino the confidence she needed, and “my fondness for children,” she says, “gave me courage.” She is now an extremely successful facilitator and relishes the opportunity to use her personal experience as a librarian to help the communities she works with.

“This is my dream—to help young children develop a habit of reading,” says Dino confidently, and it seems she’s already on her way to making that dream come true.

Learn more about our School Library program and our work in Cambodia.

Why I'm Lucky: Guest Blog by Eight-Year-Old Jazmin Zage

Transcription: My name is Jazmin Annabelle Aiko Zage. I am 8 years old. I am American and live in Singapore. On November 3rd, 2011 I went to Cambodia with my family to visit schools and libraries that were built by Room to Read. When I visited a school I realized how lucky I was. I learned that most schools don't have libraries or many books. It made me think of my huge library at the Singapore American School. I thought I was very lucky that my mom and dad have enough money to send me to such a good school.

I noticed that the kids at the school were very happy even though they didn't have much. The children were very friendly. I got to go into a classroom and participate in their writing lesson. One of the students taught me how to write Cambodian words.

I think Room to Read has really helped these Cambodian children. But there are still so many children to help.

Learn more about our Students Helping Students program, or how you can visit our work in person.