Sponsor A Child

Life, love, and laughter - what priceless gifts to give our children
Phyllis Dryden

The objective of Sponsor A Child program is to fund and sponsor the education of children in India who are at risk of discontinuing their schooling due to very impoverished circumstances. The goal of this program is to prevent the dropouts by orphans or financially backward children. In addition to getting financial assistance (worth of Rs 250 per month), in this program children are benefited from more individual attention by our project directors and project committees that have been established at each project location.

Information For Donors

It takes $11 (USD) or Rs.350 (INR) or equivalent amount to sponsor the education of one child per month. One donor can sponsor any number of students. Donations can be paid quarterly, half yearly or annually. Bighelp sponsors eligible students on donor name within 4 to 6 months from receiving the first donation. For new donations received after the month of December, students may be sponsored with effect from the month of June/July in next year (beginning of next academic year). Student mailing address and their school address is published in this website. Donors can communicate to students through mail or directly visiting project sites.

Project director at each project location monitors the progress of children, provide guidance and closely work with the children to ensure the quality of education. Our project committee members also volunteer to teach in government schools where there are not enough teachers to cover the existing or new students that have been sponsored and admitted by Bighelp.

Child Selection Criteria

Following is the child selection criteria for enrolling students into 'Sponsor A Child' program.

• Child must belongs to a remote village or a town
• Child must be studying between 5th and 10th standard.
• Child must be studying either in government school or government aided school.
• Bighelp does not sponsor children studying in private schools or religious schools.
• Child must not be getting more than Rs.500/year scholarships or aid from government or any other private agencies.
• Child and his/her parents must be financially backward (less that Rs 36,000 total family annual income).
• Children living in government facilitated social welfare hostel where free food and accommodation is provided are NOT eligible.
• Children who live and study in private hostel where they need to pay fees for lodging and boarding are NOT eligible.
• Girl students, merit students, disabled and orphans are given preference.
• Child gets preference when all her/his siblings (brothers & sisters) under the age of 18 go to school.
• Children who are ready to educate their parents, neighborhood adults and volunteer to empower their community will get preference.
• Children must show the performance improvement to be able to continue the scholarship form Bighelp. Evaluation is done on continuous basis and decision to continue/discontinue the student will be made on half yearly basis.

Benefits for the Sponsoring child

Following is the list of items provided to each sponsoring child.

• 2 uniforms per year
• 1 pair of shoes or sandals per year.
• Sufficient Note books & Stationary (Including but not limited to drawing sheets, coloring pencils, pens, plain papers, geometric box, school bag, geographic maps, science books etc.).
• School fee & Exam fee.
• Tuition Fee (Bighelp provides special private tuition to all sponsoring students to bring them up to the speed with their peers).
• 5kg rice each month.
• 1kg dal each month.
• 2 soaps each month.
• 100gm coconut oil bi-monthly.
• 100gm tooth powder bi-monthly.
• Prizes for winning students in the competitions organized by Bighelp.

Please click here to see the list of all children currently being sponsored under this program.