Honouring Teachers

“The purpose of education is to make good human beings with skills and expertise. Enlightened human beings can be created by teachers.”- Dr APJ Abdul Kalam

Teachers are pillars of society and they inspire us to bring out the best in ourselves and serve the country. Don Bosco Bidar under the Child Rights Education and Action Movement (CREAM) programme meaningfully celebrated Teacher’s Day by honouring teachers for their great dedication to building the nation.

At an event organised at Government High School, Rekulgi village, Bidar taluka in Bidar district in Karnataka, Mr Abudulla Saheb Allas, the Kannada teacher at the school was honoured with the Makkala Hakkugala Snehi Shikshakaru (Child Rights-Friendly Teacher) award for his contributions towards child rights education.

On 4 January 2022, the CREAM team had organised a Child Rights Education training in the school, orienting about 110 children. On 28 May 2022, the Child Rights Club (CRC) was formed in the school with 18 students as its members. Mr Abudulla was entrusted with the responsibility of guiding and directing the CRC which was named Mother Theresa Child Rights Club.

With the introduction of child rights education in the school, Mr Abudulla was passionate and dedicated about teaching children more about their rights and child rights violations. In consultation with Mrs Shaila Kumari, Head Mistress GHS Rekulgi, Mr Abudulla made it a point to provide one-hour classes on child rights on every Saturday for the students in the school, using the child rights manual created by CREAM for the purpose. This course on child rights benefitted about 110 students in the school. The child rights club members conducted monthly meetings under the guidance of Mr. Abudulla and discussed child rights violations in the village. He assisted the CRC children in difficult circumstances.

In June 2022, the club members and Mr Abudulla actively took part in the CREAM campaign Santoshadindha Shalege (Happily to school) on the occasion of World Day Against Child Labour (WDACL), combined with the government school re-enrollment programme Shale Kade Nanna Nade (My walk towards school). Through their efforts, the CRC re-enrolled 6 children (5 boys, 1 girl) to mainstream education, of whom, two children were enrolled to class 10 and four children were enrolled to class 9.

On receiving the Child Rights-Friendly Teacher Award, Mr. Abudulla assured the gathering that the school child rights club will initiate more actions to provide care and protection to vulnerable children. Fr. Aloysius Santiago sdb, District Director, CREAM presented the award to Mr. Abudulla. As part of the Teacher’s Day celebrations, the CREAM programme in Bidar will be honouring ten teachers who have been prominent in promoting child rights education in schools.