As a parent, you want to see your kids succeed. I mean, you wouldn’t want to see them fail and struggle, especially if you felt the setbacks were because of you. Sometimes, this is how Sharma felt as a mom. She has two daughters—Avantika, a second-grader, and Anamika, a first-grader—and they attend a state-run school a mile and a half from their home in Sowlore, India. Their school performance wasn’t great… their teachers would scold them because the girls didn’t do their homework correctly, but that was because they didn’t have anyone to help them with it. Sharma desperately wanted to be able to help, but her work schedule made it practically impossible for her to give her daughters the time and attention they needed. She works late into the evenings as a manual worker in the fields, and she has to if she wants to make ends meet for her family. She has a husband, but he’s a daily wage worker and he also has another wife with kids, so he splits his time between the two households. Even when he is around Sharma and the girls, he doesn’t really care for their needs. This basically leaves Sharma on her own to provide for herself and her daughters.
Sharma was feeling the weight of it all for quite some time, and she felt the weight of her daughters’ struggles in school. She was sad there was no one around for them after school—sad she wasn’t around. She felt helpless in helping them. What could she do? She couldn’t decrease her work hours because that would put them in an even worse financial situation, and they already were struggling to make ends meet. But she also couldn’t let things continue in the same way they were going—her inner mama bear wouldn’t stand for it.
So when Sharma heard about The Hope Venture’s tuition center, she quickly signed her daughters up. They could go to the Jack Norman Memorial Hope Center in Sowlore after school in the evenings, where they could get homework help—for free!
Their grades at school began to improve and they were no longer getting in trouble for poor performance on homework assignments. Sharma found comfort in knowing her daughters were being cared for after school in a safe place, and took joy in knowing this was setting them up for success in their education. She’s so thankful for caring people at the center that support her daughters, and herself, in a way. Gone are the days of Sharma feeling guilty for her daughters’ poor performance in school. Instead, she’s hopeful and excited for their futures. Her big mama bear heart cheers them on as they pursue their dreams.
