PROVIDENCE SCHOOL

Originally Providence was an after-school group where the Class 10 (Leaving Cert) of Br Steve gave some of their time in instructing these children in their a,b,c, and 1,2,3. Originally, the aim was to bring children who had never started school (because the family was well below the poverty line or children needed to work for family income etc) up to a sufficient standard to enter mainstream local schools. Many have done so.

Now the focus is on finishing their education in Providence, entering apprenticeships, acquiring employment and possibly setting up their own enterprises in Shillong or back in the villages.

The teachers in Providence have discerned from experience that for many of the children, mainstreaming is out. It would entail entering local schools with a much younger age group ...... not conducive to self-esteem and self-image.

Children can now stay on in Providence, follow a set syllabus and enter for state exams (NIOS) there. This work occupies the afternoons.

In 2008, the Abbey group taught spoken English to small groups of the children.

Providence also provides a hot meal each day for the children, discreetly supplies clothing when necessary and organises attention to their health.

Providence has also developed a morning vocational programme in renovated buildings on St Edmund's campus, funded to a great extent by previous Abbey India Projects. In this programme the children receive instruction from locally qualified people in skills such as commercial cookery, confectionary, screen printing, gardening, candlemaking,hairdressing, tailoring, rexine work etc. these will be the basis of the livlihoods of many of the children. In the mornings the Abbey students are on the receiving end...being taught in these activities by the same children they teach in the afternoon.

The school was named PROVIDENCE in accord with the thinking of Edmund Rice. The Lord will provide..... If the Lord wants it (the school) to run, it will run.

Blessed Edmund Rice.