Weekly meeting 26 July 2008

Date: 26 July, 2008


At the kindergarten, we have two children who are missing class for health issues. We're working with the families to get them treated and well enough for school again.

Another little one has moved with his family away from our community, so we are tracking them down to confirm he's alright.

We've had a group of grade schoolers acting up a lot during class at Steven House, but this week the teachers reported that the kids had settled down, except for one pair who are going again for counseling. They're bright little girls, but very disruptive!

The recent elections in Cambodia meant a lot of kids, especially older ones, missed school. Very happily, there were no riots or violent outbreaks during the election polls, although the ongoing Thai-Cambodia tensions are worrying.

Two children who had been enrolled in Riverkids then moved away for a long time are back in contact. Our social workers visited them and we're trying to find an NGO much closer to where they now live to help them get back into school.

Still having issues with domestic violence between several couples. Sometimes counseling seems to work, but sometimes we just have to "mop up the pieces" and protect the children.

We're taking in a few more children from a family where the dad has just deserted five kids and one child has already dropped out of school to work and is at high risk where she's working. We also have two migratory Cham children joining our program. The Cham minority in Cambodia are a very interesting culture - a long indigenous muslim history, recently much marginalised - and we've been discussing how to integrate them, respecting their religious customs as well. So far, all's well!

Two truant grade schoolers are promising to come back to class, we hope. The tactic now is to get their parents behind them, but we'll have a couple more visits probably!