My family and friends are heavily involved in various fundraising activities to raise money to purchase 10 refurbished Windows laptop computers for a school in Rithepani (near Pokhara, Nepal). The purpose of this page is to kindly ask for any donation, no matter how small to help purchase these laptops. These laptops will provide children within this rural community access to Information Technology training to help gain 21st century skills for employment.

I would appreciate just a couple of minutes of your time to read the report below written by my partner’s dad, John Proud. John highlights the amazing work that he and members of the Northallerton Rotary Club have completed in recent years.

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Report by John Proud, Rotarian, Northallerton Rotary Club

I am a Rotarian and past president of Northallerton Rotary Club and an honorary member of the Rotary Club of the Himalayan Gurkha’s in Kathmandu.

In 2011 two teams of four Rotarians visited Nepal to supply two rural schools with solar panels, a computer room, 10 netbook computers, one PC laptop for the teacher, to run on a local network.

Our contact with the school in Rithepani (near Pokhara, Nepal) is provided through Rotarians from the Rotary Club of the Himalayan Gurkhas in Kathmandu, with whom we continue to work closely.

Rithepani is a poor remote rural community where children walk to school, often barefoot and having to take younger siblings in order for them to be able to access any form of education.

The ability to become involved in Information Technology training opens up enormous opportunities for these children allowing them to gain computer skills that, so far, have not been available to them. This will enhance their future opportunities particularly when seeking employments which, to date, have been limited mostly to rural farming or cheap labour overseas.

2017 was my 6th visit to the country and on each previous occasion after 2011 we have delivered updates and support for the IT systems and power infrastructure.

In 2016, following the two major earthquakes and the devastation that followed, our club arranged immediate support and also raised funds to build and stock a ‘goat bank’ as a community project. This allowed the remote rural villagers who had lost everything in the earthquake to start over again. Goats were loaned from the ‘goat bank’ allowing these farmers to start over, to breed their own goats and become self-sufficient again. In due course the goats loaned were repaid back to the goat bank, thus allowing the project to continue to help other farmers and remain sustainable. To date this has been a major success with not one default on repayment.

In the early part of 2019 we will provide Internet to the school thanks to the support of the HIRE ASSOCIATION EUROPE who have agreed to finance, this initially for the first 4 years.

Our aim for 2019 is to update current systems by providing 10 refurbished Windows laptop computers which will allow 30 children at any one time to access the Internet during computer training (Three students per PC).

Our ultimate goal is to employ a full-time IT teacher which is outside the financial capability of the school and also of this particular part of the development.

The Nepalese people are a gentle and humble nation who are incredibly respectful. They are fiercely loyal and extremely proud of their 200+ year Ghurka history links with the UK.

The ability to change young lives in Nepal is an amazing opportunity to give back something that will be sustainable for many years to come.

Your support, no matter how small will be appreciated by us all.

Kind Regards

John Proud, Rotarian , Northallerton Rotary Club

If anyone wants any more information or would like more DVDs showing what we do please contact us.