Kanchanpur: The student dropout rate is nil at the Baijanath Basic School, Pariphanta of Shuklaphanta municipality-8 in Kanchanpur district, thanks to the midday meal that the school provides its students.
Not only has the Midday Meal Programme helped retain students, it has also contributed to reducing the student absenteeism. Mostly children from economically poor families are enrolled in this school. Previously, the children’s studies were hampered as their parents took their children also along with them for daily wage labour. But this is not the case now.
“In the past, we had the problem of students repeating in the same class, dropping out and high absenteeism. The kids have started coming to school on regular basis after we enhanced the Midday Meal Programme,” said Dabal Bahadur Thagunna, a teacher at the school who has been looking after the Programme.
According to him, the Municipality’s Education Section has been releasing money to the school at the rate of Rs 15 per student to manage the midday meal for the students from the ECD level to Class 5 only, but the school has been providing the meal to students up to Class 8 from this money.
The school has prepared a ‘menu’ of the midday meal, specifying the different dishes containing nutritious food to the children. The food is prepared from locally-available sources, Thagunna said.
Comment