The History of TOIT

A Young Man’s Dream for the Future

Beginings

TOIT officially was founded in 2000 but it really began the day Indra Prasad KHAITU read a short, two-page biography of Albert Schweitzer. Inspired by the story of Dr. Schweitzer’s work with victims of leprosy in Africa, he thought of someday becoming a doctor and building a hospital for the poor people of his nation. “Reading about him helping so many people, made me want to help,” he says of that time. Over the years, his interest turned from medicine to humanities and his dream towards education and schools but his drive to devote himself to the betterment of the Nepalese people never changed.

In 1999, in Bhaktapur near by his residence, he met Eva Dieterman. Wishing to practice his English skills, he struck up a conversation with her. In the course of it, he told her of his idea to help the poor children of Nepal by starting a school. Indra says that they found they shared many of the same ideas for education in Nepal. She said that at 16 he was too young to start a school but might be able to help individual children through sponsorship. He thought about this and knew a child who needed financial help to attend a good school. Talking again with Ms. Dieterman, whom he today calls “my godmother,” he told her of the girl, Sabita Khaitu and to his surprise, she offered to sponsor her schooling for one year!

Growth

A series of serendipitous encounters brought Indra together via the Internet with Mr. Francis LONGAVESNE, one of the founders of 'La Maison des Himalayas' (an NGO already working for the education of Nepalese children) who immediately offered to sponsor 20 children. With the help of these and other people, like Mr. Birendra Singh KHADKA, Ganesh Prasad DACHHEPATI and the number of children began to grow. In 2000 TOIT became an officially recognized NGO (Non-Government Organization), opened an office, and began to furnish it.

With growth came challenges. Indra’s workload was getting to be heavy. Visits to schools to pay fees and tuition and check on student’s progress, telephone calls, and email to sponsors, organizations, and well-wishers. Parents and students with special needs, supervising volunteers, banking and accounting, all being done by one young man.

Indra made the painful decision to put off his own education and continue his work for children. He continued to devote all his time and energy, unpaid, to the children of Nepal over the next four years.

Today

TOIT has grown to sponsor 150 children. TOIT offers after-school programs teaching English and Mathematics and supplies other special help for disadvantaged children. We have computers used by students to practice their skills.

Indra and his supporters have decided that he should return to school and continue his studies in Sociology and English Literature, and so TOIT has recently hired two staff members to work with our children, families, and schools here in Nepal. We are using volunteers to assist with our current classes and special projects. We are developing a database of children, schools, and sponsors, to examine our efforts and look for ways to make our operations more efficient.

Our most ambitious plan is the building of Saraswati Pathshala, our own school! This has always been Indra’s dream and it is now a reality! We have already built a school building and 6 class rooms are used for the current school year. The school building lie 2 KM. far form the heart of the Bhaktapur City. We hope this school will help bridge the gap in education between rich and poor students and serve as an example to other schools, showing them what can be done with new directions in curriculum and teaching methods.

Tomorrow

The main efforts of TOIT will always be our connection between sponsor and child. We hope that through the utilization of technology, talent, and teamwork we can offer the best education for our children and the best use of your generous donations. Our database of children, families, schools, and sponsors will enable us to better monitor student’s progress, to see whether schools are actually teaching our students, track expenses, buy some supplies in bulk, bargain for discounts, and many other things. It also means our staff can spend more time doing home and school visits, to follow our students’ progress.

Our volunteer make family visit and make the report about the progress of the sponsored children on regular basis. Would like to increase this documentation, and are looking for space and Volunteers to fill this need.

We are building our library at the newly built school. We want to expand our library, especially in Nepali literature and include a study area.

We wish to nurture and deepen the personal connections between the various people and groups that are part of the TOIT family. See Partners and Sister organizations.

We believe that these plans for the modernization and extension of existing programs, and our expansion into new areas will enable TOIT to better serve its mission, “Educating Children to Build Nation!”