The experience of Building Schools in Myanmar during the Political Turmoil

Summary: Studer Trust focuses to fulfill its commitment to the children, the mission of the organization and the donors, still building schools in marginalized communities.

Details:

The tragedies in Myanmar since the coup started on 1st Feb 2021 is beyond unimaginable. And they are a very good reason many organizations recoil and hibernate. However, the Studer Trust wanted to make sure the commitment to the children, the organization and the donors are fulfilled in all possible ways.

This year, from January to June 2022, the Studer Trust has worked with 5 communities from different parts of Myanmar, all remote, and built the schools. The schools are located in Nagaland (the least developed part of Myanmar), the Kayan area where the battles between Karinni Army, PDF and the military heavily taking place, and Chin, the situation not short from the first two areas.

And we made things possible due to your kind support, of course. Not just in terms of monetary but also passion for our children in Myanmar and the huge understanding from you extended to us in 2020 and 2021, where things are almost impossible to do. We sincerely thank you and are really grateful for your partnership. We truly appreciate all of them.

Building schools in remote areas is not easy at all. The common challenges we faced due to remoteness plus all other challenges imposed by unstable political conditions and safety concerns for all of us including our crews made it difficult to find words to express our day-to-day challenge. Our phones rang more than 20times a day. Each call demands our attention to solve problems. We had to find innovative ways to connect with different local people and persuade them to do the right thing on behalf of us and be part of the school construction. We learn how to communicate clearly and firmly with different people if we need to. We can say we work most through the phone but some days our brains are hot like they are on fire as we have to think of alternatives when plan A, B and C seems not working. But that’s part of the new normal now.

We are really proud to say that we are very quick at learning, better at assessing situations, good at proactively taking action, and as flexible as the rope but our mind is as strong as what the

passionate people usually possess. We actually enjoy the process and are happy with the results. One day we are going to be able to say that we tried our best to do the right thing, even when we can avoid it.

We celebrate our achievements and invite you to celebrate it with us too. Following are some pre and post pictures. You and we did really make it, whatever the situation is. We do not shy away from the challenges and give reasons not to do the right thing. You and us are the real good combination to change the lives of children across the country. We hope we will continue doing more and better things.

Last but not the least, we thank from the bottom of our heart to our crews who are always hands in hands with us to make changes we should and must do for the children. Salute to you all!

And we all think its worth it. We finished 5 schools this year.