Support the midday meal of an underprivileged child

Impact

Sandeep lives in a village in Telangana. His father is a mason and his mother works as a roller in a beedi (tobacco) factory.He went to the local government school till Class 4. **Sandeep was a bright kid and very good at sports.** His parents were unhappy with the quality of education in his school. The school also had no facilities to nurture his talent in sports. **There was neither a playground nor a Physical Education Teacher to guide him.**They heard about Matendla School through some elders and decided to enroll him. Once he joined the school Sandeep began to pursue his sporting interests.**The RDF school had a school playground and a qualified Physical Education Teacher. **There was also emphasis on sports to develop body and mind. With this, he started to develop an interest in martial arts. **He was provided rigorous training and was encouraged to participate in District and State level competitions.****Sandeep was put on a modified meal plan that included an egg a day and 2 glasses of milk to cater to the extra nutrition that he needed to pursue sports.** This allowed him to build stamina, endurance and expertise in martial arts.Sandeep worked hard and performed very well in the State competitions. He qualified for the National Level Karate Championship in Jammu & Kashmir.**He was part of the 20 member team that represented the Telangana state.** This was the first time he traveled out of his village and the first time he took a train.**He has brought immense pride to his family, his school and his village by becoming a State Champion!**Sandeep wants to develop a sports culture in schools. He feels that sports has taught him important lessons like discipline and punctuality. **You can help talented children like Sandeep be the future of our country in various fields. You can donate so that they can get proper training and support which can change their lives. You can give with confidence because every program listed is [GIVEASSURED](https://www.giveindia.org/giveassured).**

About The Program

Rural Development Foundation provides underprivileged children with a healthy meal every school day. This provides nutritious food to poor children and helps them concentrate on studies. It has also been noticed that when a midday meal is provided at school the number of children that discontinue education drops considerably.One unit of Donation to this program covers the cost of a midday meal for a child for a month.The RDF's Midday Meal program runs on all working days in the school year, which is close to 220 days. The meal is served to all the student and staff member in all the RDF schools. The midday meal program caters to close to 1023 students across 3 schools in Matendla, Redlawada and Rolakkal in TelanganaA mess-in-charge maintains the purchase and utilization register which is reviewed every week by the accountant. Every month the actual expense as against budgeted cost is reported along with the budget for next month to the Head office.Groceries such as rice, dal, oil, spices etc are purchased monthly and perishables such as vegetables are purchased weekly.The food is cooked in a designated kitchen using firewood stoves within the school. The kitchen staff is hired from within the community. This serves as a source of employment for the community. The team is trained in cooking and basic hygiene. The raw material such as grains, vegetables, and spices are sourced locally. Some seasonal produce is also grown in the kitchen garden maintained by each school. The meals consist of rice, a dal or sambhar and a vegetable curry which addresses the basic nutrition requirements of the students.A student committee maintains a calendar which allocates the senior school students as serving staff based on their class timetable. All schools follow a code system using hand signs to request for additional servings of rice, dal, vegetables etc, so that the meal is eaten in silence with minimal interruption to service. Plates are rinsed and washed by students and teachers themselves and then placed in the stock room.Many children who attend the RDF schools come from families with very meager incomes. Due to the absence of any vegetables, fruit or proteins, the nutritional content of their food is very poor. This severely impedes the physical and mental growth of the children. By providing at least one tasty and nutritious meal to these kids, two issues are addressed; the health of the children and incentivizing the parent to send their child to school.When you donate to this program, you help in providing poor school going children with one good meal a day.

About The NGO

The Rural Development Foundation (RDF), is an Indian nonprofit organization with the mission of providing quality education for underprivileged rural children. They founded and continues to operate four schools and one junior college in Telangana State, taking a unique holistic approach to education through innovative programs and methodology. Rather than using the conventional method of rote memorization, they focus on cultivating critical thinking skills and encouraging students to understand and apply concepts. They do this through special programs such as Social Awareness, Youth Empowerment, Student Leadership, and Sports. They strive to develop students who will become empowered leaders of their communities, thus working towards the vision of a transformed and prosperous rural India. Their schools strive to create India's future leaders, people who not only respect their rich, cultural heritage but are also ready to lead their country into the future. Their constant endeavor includes their sincere attempts to inculcate into young minds a civic sense and social responsibility. Beginning with a humble enrollment of 80 students, the number of children attending RDF schools has increased to 1900, as more villagers enroll their sons and daughter in the schools.

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