According to Myanmar’s Educational system, the school children can receive a high school diploma after passing the 10th standard matriculation examination. Without the completion of the high school curriculum, the students will be faced with little or no prospects for higher education and hence, the future career advancement will be bleak for these children. Many of them will be isolated, unwanted, and possibly ignored by the larger community.
There was a recent article from the Myanmar Times titled, “The Missing Million: Fewer than one in five graduate high school”, authored by Stuart Alan Becker, published on 18, May 2015 shared some perplexing statistics about the quality of the education in Myanmar based on the inputs and data analysis derived from the Comprehensive Education Sector Review (CESR).
Some of the findings from the CESR studies revealed the following highlights:
△ 1.1 mil Myanmar students enter primary schools each year in Myanmar
△ 300,000 Myanmar students make it to (10th standard) in public high schools
△ 100,000 pass the high school matriculation examinations
△ >50% failed on the first matriculation exam, 170K retake every year
△ 1 out of 9 youth age 16-19 were enrolled in higher education
△ 5 out of 6 Myanmar school children complete primary schooling
△ 25% who complete primary school fail to transition into middle school
△ 50% of middle school children could not complete
As a result of the early exits from the existing school system as described in the Myanmar Times’s article, the shocking truth can be told about the missing “one million” of youths each year. From the pool of 700,000 children, one could not possibly imagine the number of disadvantaged children who did not make it to the 10th standard because of they were simply labeled as orphans.
At the Mary K. Yap Foundation (www.marykyapfoundation.org), our burning mission is to transform the lives of the orphaned children into becoming productive and independent members in the community that they represent. We do this willing and unconditionally by reaching out to privately managed orphaned houses in Myanmar with our network of dedicated volunteers. We provide financial support and aid to orphan community that needs our attention. Obviously these children who come from the orphan community have far more disadvantages and greater challenges than normal children who can still rely on their parents.
In order to fulfill the requirements of our mission, the Mary K. Yap Foundation will deliver innovative opportunities to every orphaned student from 8 Standard (age 14) to 10 Standard (age 16). The “High School Diploma” program under the guidance of the Mary K. Yap Foundation will commit financial assistance to highly inspired orphaned children. The aim of the program is to bring the best attention to those talented orphans who are going through their last 3 years of high school curriculum studies. These teenage children will be equipped with proper guidance, coaching, and after-school tuition class. They are given the opportunity to advance academically during the last 3 high school years (8 to 10 Standard) in Myanmar. The aim of the “High School Diploma” program is to provide concrete opportunities to those who have the will, determination, and ambitions to succeed beyond the high school matriculation examinations in the pursuit of higher education.
To learn more about the Mary K. Yap Foundation’s “High School Diploma” and how to enroll your orphanage school in one of our enriching programs, please visit us at the www.marykyapfoundation.org/diploma-for-orphans
For more info about the CESR, please refer to the www.cesrmm.org
