Golpata was born as a way to provide stable funding for the community work of our founders and friends.
Our profits go directly to serve the following so that such programs do not have to rely solely on donations or fundraising:
- Food, education, health and daily living costs for children in our shelter in Teknaf
- Employment opportunities for young adults and families in need, especially disadvantaged youth and women
- School in Dhaka for over 200 students from slum communities
We wouldn’t be who we are without an unwavering commitment to our cause, and we wouldn’t exist without your support.
Children's Shelter
Teknaf Family for Children
In Teknaf, a village about 56 km from Cox’s Bazar, there is a shelter responsible for 40 to 50 children in two dormitories split by gender. These children, ages 5 to 21, from all over Bangladesh, are either orphans or have parents who cannot provide for them. Their family circumstances are so bad that the parents had to send them away. Or often, we have children who have run away from home or were abandoned, left to fend for themselves.
At Teknaf, we provide them full board, access to primary and secondary education, and care for their health and wellbeing, including food, clothes, medicine, etc. Most of the students are with us full-time. A small handful stay in a boarding school for nursing or technical courses, and some are here for educational support, but live with parents unable to bear school fees. All religions reside together in peace, and special care is taken to ensure gender equality among our children and staff.
As adults, some move onwards to university, vocational training, or apprenticeships. Some may return home to take care of their family. Some may even join our team. We try our best to support our children even after they become adults, including higher education support, career training, life guidance and counseling, and our former students often return the favor by supporting the newer cohorts. Together, we hope to create a long-standing impact on village communities all over Bangladesh.
To run a children’s shelter properly, we need a significant amount of money just to cover daily expenses. Large organizations, more accustomed to donating for building houses, schools, or hospitals, simply do not have budget for this. Giving money to feed individuals is not something bigger NGO’s normally do, thus Golpata was created to serve this purpose.
Working at Teknaf Shelter or Golpata
Between our children’s shelter in Teknaf and Golpata’s Bed & Breakfast accomodation, we have used our operations as an outlet for hiring young adults from villages or direct from our shelter. This way, they can earn an income to financially support their parents, children, relatives, or marriages, or make ends meet when they are in between education, training, or jobs. Many of our staff come from these backgrounds and, as a result, are especially caring to Teknaf’s children and Golpata’s guests.
A Golpata Learning Experience
In addition, teenagers and older students from our shelter and neighboring schools love to spend time in Golpata as way to build internship experience, practice English, and meet people from other parts of the world. Using Golpata as an outlet, we aim to empower young adults wherever we can.
You are welcome to talk to our staff to hear their stories when you visit us in Dhaka.
Women Emancipation
Brief Background
Female emancipation is still a foreign concept in many parts of Bangladesh, especially in the countryside. Being the family caretaker, women traditionally cook, bear children, and wait on the husband. Women are rarely allowed to earn surplus income elsewhere. Polygamy (and divorce) are strictly the husband’s prerogative. Unfortunately, some men who lack the financial means to provide for one family will still have more than one wife, each with many children, leaving each wife essentially a single mother.
In many instances, parents are inclined to marry their daughters off to the first suitor so that there is one less mouth to feed. This practice means, however, that women left alone with children are an all too common occurrence. Because the erstwhile husband will soon prove to be disappointed with his bride, these single mothers are expected to provide for themselves and their children without any support. Such life is not so different for widows, who, shunned from society, can hardly remarry or find steady work. And if they do find a new husband, he likely won’t be interested to take care of any children from an earlier marriage.
In addition to the projects above that depend mainly on Golpata’s funding, we give as much as we can to friendship organizations making amazing strides in changing life in Bangladesh. By supporting Golpata, you are supporting them, too.