Future Hope School Rowland Road Kolkata Water Project

FUTURE HOPE INDIA

 

PROJECT TITLE: School Water Project and Resurfacing of Playing Area

DONOR AGENCY: ROTARY CLUB INTERNATIONAL – THE NETHERLANDS

LEGAL PROJECT HOLDER: Mr. Tim Grandage

Founder & Managing Trustee

Future Hope India

PROJECT EXECUTOR: Mr. Mike Thomson

CEO-Principal

Future Hope India and Future Hope School

Email: michael.thomson@futurehope.net

Tel: +91 9674007643

Historical background of Future Hope

In 1987, while working for HSBC bank in Kolkata, Tim Grandage befriended a group of street children who looked after his car. Through meeting and talking with them he became aware of their numerous problems and needs, and realized he could not turn a blind eye to their plight. Tim’s involvement with the Nabu Jeeban centre run by Mother Theresa’s brothers also brought him into close contact with street kids who eked out an existence at Howrah Station.  

Tim soon moved a group of children into his own flat and looked after their most pressing medical and other needs. Within a couple of years he had left HSBC and enlisted the bank’s support for his new found charity. Having learnt that many street children in Kolkata gravitated to the main stations of Howrah and Sealdah Tim often visited these places at night to try to persuade the most vulnerable to join those boys already at Future Hope. The original children lived in cramped accommodation sleeping on the floor but they are now spread between a number of homes, including two for girls, where they can enjoy their own space, study in peace and reap the benefits of a stable life. 

Along the way many have volunteered their time and skills to assist Tim in establishing Future Hope: he found doctors willing to treat the sick children and teachers to educate them, while others provided crucial financial and administrative support.

Mission statement

Our Mission

To rescue children from the streets and to provide them with a secure and loving home, an education, medical aid and opportunity. Through our homes and school we will strive to offer an education that unfolds opportunities for social, intellectual, physical and emotional growth. We will always work as a big family with a big heart, to which we will add the regular support and skills of international volunteers who come from all walks of life. And while our homes are a ‘safe haven’, we will not lose sight of the fact that our children are being educated to stand on their own two feet, ultimately finding employment or reaching their potential through colleges and universities, or starting and supporting their own families through personal and financial responsibility.

Vision

Future Hope has a 5 year Strategic Plan to extend its assistance to more underprivileged children in Kolkata and surrounding areas by way of establishing:

·	a 24 acre residential school and sporting campus at Rajarhat for 500 children and support staff

·	a Skills Centre at its Barrackpore campus, offering training to students in trades such as plumbing, electricity, carpentry and mechanics

·	a dedicated Vocational Training Centre at Rowland Road campus for hospitality and service industries

·	broader support for remote underprivileged children in the State of West Bengal, providing assistance for learning programmes, medical care, shelter and future employment

·	to introduce Information technology as a

Aims and objectives

Through our homes and school, Future Hope aims to provide Kolkata's street children with the fundamental aspects of a normal family life:

·	a sense of belonging in a secure, loving home

·	to be amongst people they can trust and on whom they can depend

·	to be healthy and well fed

·	to enjoy the freedom to laugh and play

·	to discover their individual talents and explore their creativity

·	and to receive an education that challenges their minds and gives them an opportunity to reach their full potential

COURSES OFFERED AND EXAMINATIONS TAKEN:

The School's professionally qualified teachers follow the curricula of the CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) and the NIOS (National Institute of Open Schooling), both Indian Government Boards of Education that administer public exams at secondary level.

The standard of tuition our school provides now compares favourably with that of many top Kolkata schools, and every year Future Hope children are accepted into universities, colleges and vocational training courses.

The School’s System of Operation

Future Hope’s six homes accommodate street children and operate seven days a week, 365 days a year and 24 hours a day. Each home has two house parents. Most meals are consumed in the homes, except for school time lunches from Monday to Friday that are taken at Rowland Road in the Hall alongside day scholars and staff. The day school operates from 8am to 4pm, Monday to Friday. Sporting and cultural activities are enjoyed throughout most of the school week, but especially on weekends. On Tuesdays and Thursdays the School visits the Maidan for recreation and sport.

Teaching and learning is governed by a time table which is followed as strictly as possible. Teachers are assigned subjects to teach in Middle and Senior Schools, while Junior School classes are managed by class teachers at grade levels. There are eight lessons per day and a period or lesson lasts 45 minutes. We offer a good balance of subjects across the Arts, Humanities, Maths and Sciences. Drama, Music and Singing also feature prominently, as do health activities such as Yoga and Meditation. Home students and all Class 10 and 12 (pre examinations) attend teacher supervised Prep or Homework sessions on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 2.30 to 4pm.

Students are aided in their personal development by targeted counselling and pastoral programs from KG to Class 12. Students are allocated to tutorial groups of approximately seven per teacher-mentor for the year. Tutorials provide a small, friendly forum in which boys and girls learn to speak with confidence about themselves and school, discussing relevant topics or issues of the day or simply being guided by their tutor in good study habits and use of the School Diary. It is often through this mechanism that we make contact with the parents of day scholars.

Our medical program is a crucial arm of the operation that oversees general and specific health issues, including vaccinations, dental care and on-going treatment of long-term medical conditions. The School has a visiting doctor and a small health clinic operated by a medical administrator and nurse.

Throughout the course of the year, we are assisted by volunteers who join us from mainly the UK, Holland and Australia. Volunteers value-add to the programme by bringing with them a sense of internationalism with strong educational backgrounds. They help with our reading program, sport and dine with the Home students on a regular basis.

STUDENT POPULATION

Residential Boys and Girls

 

Day Scholars

 

 *Gender breakups are boy/girl above (b) and (g)

 

 

  Currently there 23 beneficiaries not resident at Future Hope.

Currently we have 9 working but still dependent on Future Hope.

Currently there are 8 students in vocational studies.

Currently there are 14 students in college/university courses receiving benefits.

Currently there are 34 teaching staff

Currently there are 42 non-teaching staff

Total of all staff is 76.

PROJECT BACKGROUND/JUSTIFICATION

Our Rowland Road campus is a small, confined space with its playing or recreational area limited to an uncovered back garden of approximately 15 metres by 8 metres. Weather permitting this area is used by our children to enjoy PE and play mini hockey, cricket, football, and gather for assemblies and social occasions such as our annual Mela. Kolkata’s wet season lasts for 6 months and during the Monsoon we experience severe flooding of this area and much of the School. This renders it unusable for 6 months and sometimes longer. If we were able to improve our drainage and cover the area with artificial grass it would enable us to enjoy this precious space all-year round. This would profoundly alter the potential of our campus.

1.	To provide and improve drainage from the back garden area into storm water drains that will absorb Monsoon rain.

2.	To provide a concrete base onto which can be laid synthetic grass for sport and group activities.

Our ‘backyard’ area at the start of the Monsoon.

Future Hope relies solely on donations to operate as a charity and cannot afford the cost of providing this vital facility alone without donor support. The support needed therefore is meant to cover the cost of solving our water drainage problems and providing a usable space all-year round, hence this project proposal.

PROJECT OBJECTIVES:

i.	To provide good drainage in the wet season to eliminate flooding.

ii.	To eliminate muddy surrounds.

iii.	To provide a safe and guaranteed playing space for children.

iv.	To provide a dry walking surface to the nearby Science laboratory and Assembly Hall.

BENEFITS TO DRIVE:

i.	Access to a dry playing space will increase our children’s play, health and enjoyment of school.

ii.	Students will be able to assemble for school without their shoes becoming water-logged in the wet season.

iii.	The school’s games and activities’ program can be expanded to include activities not previously possible during the wet season.

COST INVOLVED AND SUPPORT NEEDED:

We have received a written quotation from a reputable and experienced local company named SportScape that will complete the drainage works, concreting and laying of artificial grass for the cost of 12,310 Euros or 1,037,645 rupees). SportScape has completed a recent project for the BCCI at Eden Gardens, one of India’s main cricketing stadiums.

We include the company’s copy of quotation, cross-section of the plan to establish a sub base and drainage to storm outlet, and basic area plan with reference to surrounding blocking to avoid soil leak onto the synthetic surface. The total area to be covered excluding the surrounding blocking is 39’ x 34’ = 1,326 square feet. The surface will be slanted very marginally to assist the run-off of water. Once established the surface will require no maintenance, only sensible care and will have a life of 12 to 15 years. We also attach an example of the company’s work at a local school named Khalsa.

COST INVOLVED AND SUPPORT NEEDED:

TIME FRAME FOR PROJECT COMPLETION:

This will be done over a period of approximately one month (30 days). Projected start date November 2103.

TRANSFER OF GRANT:

To: Future Hope India: 1/8 Rowland Road, Ballygunge, Kolkata 700020

Name of Bank: HSBC

Branch: 31 BBD Bagh, Dalhousie Square, Kolkata 700001

Name of Account: Future Hope India

Accounts Number: 031110562006

IFSC Code: HSBC 0700004

Swift Code: HSBC INBB

Future Hope India CEO APPROVAL: Please see recommendation letter.