A former German teacher who revamped kerala anganwadis through an NGO- Positive Power for children eV
aria Kasselmann, a former German primary teacher turned traveler cum photographer, visited Kerala to learn yoga as part of her treatment for her hip issue, on the suggestion of her guide. For this purpose when she landed in Kovalam city in 2008 , she encountered the dilapidated anganwadi at Thrissur.
Though the intention of the anganwadis operated by the government is to provide quality education, food and other basic amenities for children under six years of age, Maria on contrary found this particular anganwadi to be in its worst form and phase with broken benches, leaky roof, withered wall paint and lack of key facilities such as clean drinking water,hygeinic toilets,electricity,ventilation,toys and other stationery.
This made her to initiate a small donation campaign in Germany, with the help of which she equipped the ruined anganwadi with all the amenities such as electricity, toilets, wall paints, benches, black boards, study material and other requiremnts needed to the full extent. The small donation campaign later turned into a full fledged one.
This made her to look into the bigger picture into many such tumbledowned anganwadis,as she personally felt that the government schools are in much disadvantaged condition compared to the private schools, which made her to establish an Ngo – Positive power of children for eV. With the help of which she renovated around 22 such anganwadis to date, which benefitted no less than 800 students of Kerala.
Apart from revamping anaganwadis, Maria even constructed eight new schools with the collective effort of the land donators, teachers. Also she is training girl students in self defense meachanisms, through a coach at Thiruvananthapuram. All these efforts of her in improving conditions of financially poor government school going children has earned the recognition from Kerala government, which now is also dispersing funds and working in tandem with Maria to continue this work with good intention.
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-Anusha Pappala
