Project Title: Budimas Education Charity Fund
Duration: 2014 to 2019
Location: Orang Asli and rural villages in Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, Kelantan, Pahang
The Budimas Charitable Foundation works in aid of the underprivileged children in Malaysia. The Budimas Education Charity Fund (BECF) is one of the core programmes under the foundation’s umbrella. The main goal of the fund is to provide quality education as well as to cultivate interest towards education by exposing these children to the importance of education, and currently by establishing educational facilities in rural and poor villages in the country.
Up to today, we has built 5 libraries and operated in 5 different Orang Asli settlements. The libraries are managed by a librarian, hired by the foundation where they not only run the daily operations of a library but also assist the children in their daily school work, revision as well as conduct educational activities. The foundation also provides hard skill classes like “robotic programme” where the children are exposed to the “how-to” of designing and building programmable robots using high quality technical components.
How did this project create impact to the employees/ volunteers?
They got to see first-hand how education can play a huge role in a child’s life or in this case the Budimas Children’s Library; by witnessing a dynamic shift in the villages; how before this, the children were seen hanging around with not a book at sight. A great sense of accomplishment for them and has given them the encouragement to work towards building and furnishing more libraries.
What impact has this project created in the community / nation?
The Budimas Education Charity Fund will make a significant change in the Orang Asli Community where they will be exposed to a more diverse career opportunities and improve their community’s living standards. It has also shown that a nation could work together to make a significant change for the betterment the country.
Who were the partners in this project and what their roles?
JAKOA-advise on working with the Orang Asli community
Shell- fundraising
HPE- Book Donation
Big Bad Wolf-Book Donation
P&G-Monetary and Book Donation
OCBC-Book Donation
Pelangi Distributors-Book Donation
GinHua industry- Book Donation
Recurring Donors- Monetary Donation
Direct Mailing Appeal-Monetary and Book Donation
Public-Book Donations
How was this project help to advance the chosen SDG?
Huge progress has been made towards increasing access to education for children of all ages and has increased the school enrollment rates in these Orang Asli children. Their basic literacy skills have also improved tremendously.