Tim the Terrible (Tea Picker)
Tim Pare is raising money for Tea Leaf Trust
Story
Tim and Yas Go Head-to-Head!
In our first sponsored event since climbing Scarfell Pike dressed as a pirate and a cricketer, we will be competing to see who can pick the most tea, in conditions similar to those local tea pickers experience.
On August 12th 2012 we will don our tea-picking basket and spend 4 hours seeing who can best overcome the elements (leeches, snakes and possible monsoon) and reach the highest amount of kgs of leaf tea.
The teapick-off or the comp-tea-ti
tion (perhaps?) is happening for three reasons:
1. To raise awareness of the difficulty that tea pickers face on a daily basis in achieving the basic target to achieve the (meagre) highest possible salary
2. To raise money for our Community English Programme (CEP) where our 160 main diploma students teach nearly 1,700 children in their communities free of charge
3. To give bragging rights to Yas or me as we finally put an end to the long-raging argument that always starts with the same statement “I bet I could pick more tea than you!”… you know the one.
It is for you to place these in order of importance!
The serious bit:
Tea Leaf Vision serves young people from over 30 different tea estates 79% of whom are currently living off less than $1 a day (one kilo of rice costs $0.50). Just in case this level of poverty was not convincing enough in isolation, focus groups tell us that there is an estimated 85% of the male tea-picking community who are alcoholics and 83% of women from these communities suffer from repeated domestic violence.
Without English there is no escape from this cycle of poverty and abuse and yet the standard of English teachers in this area is particularly poor, coupled with an atmosphere of discontent and lethargy amongst many staff. The CEP works with local government schools to provide weekly, free English classes for children in primary schools. These classes are taught by our main diploma students and managed by our Interns through a ‘Training of the Trainer’ approach.
The CEP has been described by an experienced development professional as “… the best example of a win-win programme I have ever seen…” and benefits all involved for the following reasons:
• The children get good quality English lessons that they would otherwise not be able to access due to money and the remote nature of their communities
• The Student-teachers gain confidence and employability skills as well as status within their communities where they are traditionally seen as being the bottom of the pile
• Tea Leaf Trust enhances its reach and reputation as well as upskilling our teaching staff to train the students to teach
I realise that the economy is struggling, but these communities are faced with decisions about how to balance feeding their children and sending their children to school.
Yas and I have been living in amongst these communities for the past 3 ½ years but now comes the time to hand the project over to our brilliant, local staff team who will continue to run the project to the highest standards. We really want to leave on a high and enable this CEP to continue to make a difference to so many children’s lives.
Please consider making a donation and help me win my argument with Yas by picking the most and raising the most money!
1. To raise awareness of the difficulty that tea pickers face on a daily basis in achieving the basic target to achieve the (meagre) highest possible salary
2. To raise money for our Community English Programme (CEP) where our 160 main diploma students teach nearly 1,700 children in their communities free of charge
3. To give bragging rights to Yas or me as we finally put an end to the long-raging argument that always starts with the same statement “I bet I could pick more tea than you!”… you know the one.
It is for you to place these in order of importance!
The serious bit:
Tea Leaf Vision serves young people from over 30 different tea estates 79% of whom are currently living off less than $1 a day (one kilo of rice costs $0.50). Just in case this level of poverty was not convincing enough in isolation, focus groups tell us that there is an estimated 85% of the male tea-picking community who are alcoholics and 83% of women from these communities suffer from repeated domestic violence.
Without English there is no escape from this cycle of poverty and abuse and yet the standard of English teachers in this area is particularly poor, coupled with an atmosphere of discontent and lethargy amongst many staff. The CEP works with local government schools to provide weekly, free English classes for children in primary schools. These classes are taught by our main diploma students and managed by our Interns through a ‘Training of the Trainer’ approach.
The CEP has been described by an experienced development professional as “… the best example of a win-win programme I have ever seen…” and benefits all involved for the following reasons:
• The children get good quality English lessons that they would otherwise not be able to access due to money and the remote nature of their communities
• The Student-teachers gain confidence and employability skills as well as status within their communities where they are traditionally seen as being the bottom of the pile
• Tea Leaf Trust enhances its reach and reputation as well as upskilling our teaching staff to train the students to teach
I realise that the economy is struggling, but these communities are faced with decisions about how to balance feeding their children and sending their children to school.
Yas and I have been living in amongst these communities for the past 3 ½ years but now comes the time to hand the project over to our brilliant, local staff team who will continue to run the project to the highest standards. We really want to leave on a high and enable this CEP to continue to make a difference to so many children’s lives.
Please consider making a donation and help me win my argument with Yas by picking the most and raising the most money!