News from Nepal: An update

Yubaraj has been in school for nearly six months, now, and is truly enjoying this new life. He's been stopping in to the Mountain Fund office on most Fridays, to check in and just catch up with Sudhir, Kul, and other other staff there. Yubaraj was working with a tutor for the first month of classes, and we stopped the tutoring when it looked like he was ready to handle the schoolwork on his own. But just a couple of weeks ago Yubaraj got the results of his first set of exams, which are administered semi-annually at all public schools in Nepal. We found out that he didn't pass Science or Math (not what we were hoping for!) and Yubaraj immediately asked for tutoring help in those subjects. School has been closed for the past two weeks, and Yubaraj has been with his family in Bethan, for the Dashain holiday and as soon as he returns we'll start up tutoring sessions in those subjects. Our goal is to prepare Yubaraj to successfully transition in the spring a non-public school, one that would provide a better educational foundation for him and that ideally will include a shared living arrangement with other students. So we'll re-start tutoring in November and continue that as needed, and look for his exam results to improve through the second half of the school year so we're ready for the process of applying to other schools.

Over the past several months we've settled into a good system for passing monthly funds to Yubaraj and his family. We were initially reimbursing Yubaraj for actual expenses and now give him a monthly allowance to cover all expenses other than rent and school fees. This gives him more control and responsibility for his finances, and gives him the ability to save up special purchases, too. He receives funds to pass along to his mother as well (to replace the income lost when he stopped working) and we've confirmed that the money is reaching her as planned. As always, if you'd like to see a detailed accounting of the financial side of this project please don't hesitate to ask!