Child Impact International
is an organization giving hope.
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Previously called Asian Aid,
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Child Impact International
is an organization fostering
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permanent positive change
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in the lives of
disadvantaged children
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and their communities.
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Child Impact is
committed to making a difference
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in the lives of children
and those who are in need.
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Serving communities in India,
Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka,
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Myanmar, and will soon
expand to other countries.
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For the last 50 years,
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Child Impact has invested
in the futures of people
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and their investment is
proving infinite returns,
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driven by the dedication
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to helping those
who have the least.
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Child Impact is an organization
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focused on the
welfare of children,
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implementing
diverse development projects
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and sponsoring
thousands of children.
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Their outreach expands
from child rescue operations,
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to providing an
education for orphans,
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deaf, and the blind children
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giving them a sense of place,
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a home, but above all,
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Child Impact is an
organization giving hope,
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giving hope to children,
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giving hope to communities,
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giving hope to the
ones who needed the most.
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This is Hope in Motion.
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Imagine if
Florida suddenly contained
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half the population
of the United States.
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A situation like
that exists in Bangladesh,
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a country roughly
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the same size as
the Sunshine State,
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but with a
population of 165 million.
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Situated between
India and Myanmar,
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the South Asian country
was formally a British colony
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and later part of Pakistan,
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but won its
freedom in a bloody war
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of independence.
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In the years that followed,
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Bangladesh suffered
from chronic poverty,
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catastrophic cyclones
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and despite
being largely agrarian,
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food insecurity.
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Bangladesh culture is centered
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around the practices
of the Bengal region,
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which crosses
several national borders,
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but it is
centered on Bangladesh.
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Today, Bangladesh is changing.
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Each year more and more people
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move to urban centers to work
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in new industries like textiles,
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which account for 77%
of the country's exports.
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But there are
still persistent issues
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which plague the country.
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A majority of
women are placed into
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forced marriages
under the age of 18,
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many under 15.
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And 40% of Bangladeshi citizens
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are categorized as
being in a state of hunger,
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with some facing starvation.
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Education while improving
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also presents
challenges to the country,
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which has one of the
lowest literacy rates in Asia
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and presents unequal
educational opportunities
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for girls.
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Around 80% of the
population is Muslim,
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with a further 15 to
20% practicing Hinduism,
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Christianity
accounts for a fraction
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of a percent of adherence.
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And of the 165
million people in Bangladesh,
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a mere 30,000 are Adventists.
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That's 0.0002%.
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It is in this setting that
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we chronicled the
successes and struggles
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of Kellogg
Mookerjee Memorial Seminary,
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an Adventist boarding
school in South Bangladesh.
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The trip took eight
hours passing through the river
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and taking inner roads
to make our way to KMMS.
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The school is only 80 miles
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from Dhaka, the
capital, but road conditions
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and the immense
width of the Padma River
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make the journey something
for visitors to remember.
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We went to Bangladesh
to show how Child Impact
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has been making a
difference in their country,
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and just why they are
in need of a lot of help.
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Like many countries
that are leaving poverty,
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Bangladesh has a
rise in education
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and improvements
with their poverty,
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which has dropped
20% in the last 20 years.
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The country still has
extreme poverty plaguing
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more than half the population.
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Education is one
way to help change that.
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Education is rare in Bangladesh,
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and even if
children go to school,
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it doesn't mean
they will have a chance
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of getting a good
education that can help them.
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Jim Rennie,
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the CEO of Child
Impact International joined us
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on that journey and discovered
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the many ways
Child Impact sponsorship
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is changing
children's lives in Bangladesh.
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So, this morning,
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the reality of
life here in Bangladesh
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and I guess what we experience
really sort of hits your heart.
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You suddenly are faced
with the struggles in life,
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you're faced with the poverty,
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and I think it's things
we fully don't understand.
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Bangladesh
families have long adapted
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to a different way of living,
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one where children
have to quickly learn
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manual labor in order
to help the family survive.
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Around 4 million children
work from the ages of 5 to 14.
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Their lives begin
harsh and they usually
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have no way of
making time for school
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due to the cost of education
or simply just surviving.
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This is where
major help has come in.
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Kellogg
Mookerjee Memorial Seminary
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or KMMS as it is known to locals
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was founded in 1920 as
Gopalgonj Boys' School,
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and was the first
Adventist mission in Bangladesh,
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which was called
East Pakistan at the time.
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Nine years later,
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the school became co-educational
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and now cares for
over 400 students.
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These students come
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from all
districts of Bangladesh,
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and in Bangladesh
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we have around 64 districts,
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and many students are
coming from Hill Tracts.
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Many are coming from
north, south, east and west,
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and we have more
than 10 ethnic groups,
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the school, and the
school is open for all people.
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Even we have students
from all castes, Catholic,
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Baptist, Oxford,
Methodist, Adventist,
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we have also students
from many Hindu backgrounds,
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and we have very few students
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from Muslim background.
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At KMMS students are housed,
fed, given a broad education
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that includes English
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and protected
from many of the issues
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that plague children
growing up in rural poverty.
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And at the center
of the mission KMMS
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provides children access
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to the Adventist
message in a region
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where even the concept of
Christianity is little known
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or understood.
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We have, we do group
meeting, Tuesday, 7 o'clock,
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and we have also
vesper meeting Friday, 6:30,
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and we have a
Sabbath school at 9 o'clock.
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We have a divine
service, 11 o'clock,
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and we have AY
Youth program, 5 o'clock.
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The large campus
contains a variety of facilities
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that help the school to operate.
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These facilities
could be leveraged
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to help the school
reach greater independence
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in the future.
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Income generating
project like our fish farm.
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We have patty field.
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We have the garden.
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So even all the students,
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even teachers, they
do not take weekend.
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So teachers, they
work with the students.
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So that support
comes from garden farm,
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and that actually really
helped to run our school.
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But for now, many students
at KMMS face a great need.
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Out of the 400
children enrolled,
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more than half rely
on sponsorship to attend,
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and 200 are either
orphans or lacking a parent.
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This is the
reality in Bangladesh.
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The country is full of
people looking for work,
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but not enough is found,
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and the need to improve
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an education
doesn't make it easy.
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Parents have to
make hard decisions
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that most in well-off
countries could not understand.
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The reality of
how to let your child
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have a future.
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Many people are
begging and asking for help
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to give their children a future.
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And sometimes
having to make them work
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is the only alternative.
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The fact that KMMS exists
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and give children a chance
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to not only have a childhood,
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but also be
sponsored to have a good future
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is huge in a
country like Bangladesh.
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One of the great
aspects of my job is getting
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to the field to see
what Child Impact does.
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And as you go through the day,
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just
occasionally something happens
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that has a big impact on you.
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And just yesterday, it happened.
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I was standing here at the gate,
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near the gate of the
school and a lady came in.
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You can see she was distressed.
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She was crying.
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She wanted to speak
to one of the teachers.
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And when she did,
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tears were
rolling down her face.
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I could see that
something was wrong.
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And she's a solo mom.
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Her husband has left her,
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run off with
another woman to India,
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and she is struggling
to bring up two girls.
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And to be honest,
she has to get out
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and earn some money,
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because she can't feed
them and look after them.
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She's also worried that
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they're going to be trafficked
or taken away from her.
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So she wanted them
enrolled in the school.
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She wanted them sponsored,
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and I could see that it
wasn't just an education,
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it was giving her hope.
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It was giving her hope
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that her children could
be fed and have an education.
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Sponsorship's
making a big difference.
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And if you
could sponsor a child,
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or you could help
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with the unsponsored child fund,
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it will make a difference.
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In Bangladesh,
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KMMS is a focus
school for Child Impact,
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which sponsors hundreds
of children in the country
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and allows them to continue
receiving a quality education,
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food security
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and an
opportunity to know Jesus.
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On this filming
trip to Bangladesh,
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we've got two new perspectives.
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One, the perspective of poverty
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and the other perspective
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of the impact of
our sponsorship program.
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In rural Bangladesh,
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35% of the population
live below the poverty line.
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And amongst
woman, it's even higher.
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There are statistics like
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the people only earn $1.98 a day
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and the absolute poor
are 32% of the population,
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and the extreme poor are 19%,
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and both those
categories are above poor.
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We've heard from
the children the stories
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of struggle of their
parents, of their solo moms.
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And we've heard
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how they've been
struggling to feed them.
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And so we see that sponsorship
is much greater than education.
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Sponsorship is
supporting the family.
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It's giving the parents hope,
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and there's a huge
benefit to the community.
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Sponsorship is effective,
00:12:26.61\00:12:28.78
and sponsorship is
making a difference
00:12:28.81\00:12:30.85
on a wider scale here
00:12:30.88\00:12:32.68
in our program in Bangladesh.
00:12:32.71\00:12:37.09
Child Impact International
sponsors over 3,500 children
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living in poverty at
100 different schools.
00:12:40.92\00:12:43.69
At KMMS alone,
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Child Impact
sponsors 75 students.
00:12:48.13\00:12:50.00
Though they may live
thousands of miles away,
00:12:53.80\00:12:56.04
going through a life
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wholly
unfamiliar to a foreigner,
00:12:57.44\00:12:59.04
every child here
at KMMS has a story.
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What is life like for a
child in rural Bangladesh?
00:13:07.25\00:13:10.39
What have they gained
from an Adventist education?
00:13:10.42\00:13:13.25
And how has Child Impact
sponsorship affected them?
00:13:13.29\00:13:16.49
Join Jim Rennie
00:13:16.52\00:13:17.86
as he explores these things
00:13:17.89\00:13:19.23
at KMMS and several
other schools in Bangladesh
00:13:19.26\00:13:22.63
to see how a
glimmer of hope is possible,
00:13:22.66\00:13:25.23
and how you can have a
direct impact in this world
00:13:25.27\00:13:28.14
that God has given us.
00:13:28.17\00:13:29.50
Each year Child
Impact has its rice appeal
00:13:33.31\00:13:36.61
for needy schools and
countries like Bangladesh.
00:13:36.64\00:13:39.98
And I'm here now in Bangladesh.
00:13:40.02\00:13:42.22
And you can see
that at KMMS School,
00:13:42.25\00:13:44.95
these girls are
enjoying their rice meal.
00:13:44.99\00:13:47.86
Now they eat a
little differently to us,
00:13:47.89\00:13:50.03
but at least they're
enjoying a healthy lunch meal.
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Not only does it
ensure that they have rice,
00:13:54.40\00:13:57.23
but it is also a big benefit
00:13:57.27\00:13:59.10
to the school for their finances
00:13:59.13\00:14:01.30
because food prices have
just escalated beyond control.
00:14:01.34\00:14:06.41
So thanks for supporting
the rice appeal in the past
00:14:06.44\00:14:09.61
and as we face it again in 2020,
00:14:09.64\00:14:12.71
we know that
you will support us.
00:14:12.75\00:14:14.58