ANSWER students are sponsored at cost by Western families and individual – usually around $250-$280 per year, which covers tuition, fees, books and supplies, uniforms, shoes, book bags, etc…everything a student needs. The student’s family is required to spend something they can afford on the child, too…like a second pair of shoes, so that they, too, are invested in the program.

We enroll them in private English-medium schools because they need English for a decent career. We are 53 for 53 in sending our high school students on to college and 3/3 in graduating our students into good careers. In 2009, we graduated 10 more students from high school; four in distinction (A+) and six with 1st division marks (A’s & B’s). Rohan has won a full ride engineering scholarship at an Indian university. He also placed 3rd out of 134 entrants at the science and technology fair in Mexico City this summer. We have three students in the best nursing school in Nepal – Saraswoti is first in her class. Manisha is first in her class in lab medicine at the best private medical school in Nepal.

Most of our college students are in business, nursing, and health sciences where jobs are much more plentiful. We give our students career counseling, guiding them away from careers that have little employment value or lead into the brain drain. Our graduates and students are on our board and we will soon be hiring them to take over the administration and selecting the next generation of students from the disadvantaged. We have instituted a Social Welfare Club on Saturdays that make our children aware of the need to address community needs rather than just building dynasties of wealth centered on just family needs.

ANSWER pays for its own administration through separate donations and fundraisers. Our overhead for three FTEs, an office, equipment and other overhead is well under $10,000 as we are spending our “own hard-earned money.”