In the afternoon, we headed out to visit several families supported by Thien Chi.
First family
This family has six members: the parents and four children (grades 9, 6, 4, and kindergarten).
They live in the grandparents’ house because they do not have a home of their own. The grandfather passed away, and the grandmother now lives with another son.
They also have no agricultural land.
The father works tapping rubber trees for others, and the mother takes care of the children and sometimes joins her husband in the fields, though the work is unstable.
Two of their children currently receive educational support: one annual scholarship and one monthly scholarship, which began three months ago. The family was identified through poverty survey conducted to find children most in need of financial support to continue their education.
The mother would like to send her daughter to extra math classes, after a score of 4.5/10, she feels her child needs help, but she simply cannot afford it.
On the wall, photos of the children hang next to certificates confirming that the father worked as a rubber tapper. One certificate even shows that one company once provided a scholarship to the oldest child. He left that job because the salary was too low to support the family.
Second family
The second family also has six members: the parents, two children, the grandmother, and the wife’s brother.
Her brother, aged 39, has Down syndrome, and the grandmother suffers from poor health, requiring regular hospital visits.
They own 2 000 m² of rice fields, just enough for their own consumption.
The father works six months a year in a rubber factory; the rest of the year he takes whatever work he can find.
The mother wakes up early every day to sell rice cakes at the market and spends her afternoons preparing the cakes for the next morning.
Their daughter used to receive a monthly scholarship when she was in school. Now she is attending university far from home, supported by a Thien Chi education loan of 15 million VND per year. She studies to become a teacher and will have to work for the government for eight years after graduating (common for students in education or policing programs). She returns home only twice a year because of the distance and cost.
The family also receives a 5 million VND loan from Thien Chi to support their rice production and small cake business.
Every month, the government provides 750 000 VND (about 24€) to support the brother with Down syndrome.
Third family
The third family includes six members: the parents and four children.
One of the sons, who was in grade 7, dropped out of school because of learning difficulties; he struggled to remember lessons. He now works with his father tapping rubber trees.
The other children are in grade 1, kindergarten, and the last one is a baby.
The family rents their home and farms 2 000 m² of rice.
The mother takes care of the children and runs a small shop where she sells water and beer.
The father works tapping rubber trees for others, but only for six months a year. The rest of the time, he takes temporary jobs in construction, rice fields, or wherever work is available.
Thien Chi has supported them since 2020 with a monthly educational scholarship for their daughter in grade 1 and a 5 million VND loan for their small shop.
During our visit, we handed over the monthly 300 000 VND scholarship, and the mother signed the receipt.
Leticia