Kolkata: In this hour of global calamity, the children, young people and their communities need the ability to cope with this crisis. For ov...
Kolkata: In this hour of global calamity, the children, young people and their communities need the ability to cope with this crisis. For over two decades, Magic Bus through its life skills education, has been building resilience among its children to help them face struggles and hardship at every stage of life. 82% of children reported that our life skills sessions had helped them to cope with the uncertainties of the pandemic, as reported in a Magic Bus Covid-19 Impact Survey in 2020. Now more than ever, resilience is what is needed to help deal with the crisis and Magic Bus’s emergency Covid-19 second wave responses are attempting to tackle the more immediate and urgent fallouts of the pandemic. So that the children are safe, Magic Bus will reach out to families with awareness on Covid-19 prevention, vaccination, and create linkages to government entitlements that ensure food security, and also distribute ration to the most marginalised, where needed. The response strategy is purposed towards saving lives and building resilience among communities, families and children.
In Kolkata during the lockdown, the West Bengal Government
announced a supply of rice and potatoes to students from Classes V to VIII of
all government schools. Magic Bus took the opportunity to support children on
the programme, by informing them about the Mid-day Meal distribution. Due to
movement and transport restrictions, it became increasingly difficult for families
to feed their children. Magic Bus informed families about the Mid-day Meal
distribution through Whatsapp/ Tele-calling and subsequently school authorities
followed up with them regarding the collection. In some cases, the Magic Bus
Youth Mentors even visited the homes of some of the children who were
unreachable through phones. For over a year, Magic Bus has been able to
connect more than 4,000 children with the Mid-day Meal scheme. They were given
the meal in the form of dry ration along with weekly Iron, Folic acid
supplements.
Sandhya Srinivasan,
Regional Director - East, Magic Bus said “Resilience
is not just a post-Covid-19 response, rather a vision that created Magic Bus.
For over two decades we have been enabling children and their families become
self-sufficient through our initiatives. Through our Covid-19 second wave responses, food security,
awareness on the infection, community engagement and welfare and learning
engagement with children continue to be paramount to helping families cope. In
Kolkata particularly, we aimed to inform and reach out to maximum number of
children who are eligible to get the Mid-day Meal and will continue to link as
many children as possible in the event of school closures.”
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