Agathians Shelter

The setting of the shelter:

It is a single story terrace home located at Petaling Jaya with 3 rooms, 1 bathroom, 1 toilet, kitchen and a living room. The home houses a total of 27 boy aged between 3 years and 16 years old. These boys are orphans, abandoned children, children with single parent who is unable to fend for them and from broken.
families
The basic idea in setting up this home was to provide a healthy environment for these boys to grow up in. ‘Agathians’ were initially a group of people who were attempting to rescue a handful of children from an illegal orphanage. At this orphanage, the caretaker subjected the children to physical, mental and emotional abuse. He was using the children to generate income illegally (child labour). The situation for the children became so unbearable that the police force had to be roped in to seal the orphanage. But unfortunately the caretaker had absconded by that time and escaped from the clutches of the officers of Law Enforcement.

The ‘Agathians’ then took over. After much deliberation with the Welfare Department about the plight of these children, registration process with the Registrar of Societies began. In August 2003 the shelter was set up. At that time the main purpose of the shelter was to provide the basic necessities – accommodation, food and clothing – for the children.

Currently apart from providing the basic necessities the boys at the shelter are also sent to nearby schools for primary and secondary education. Besides that, the boys at the shelter are brought up with important values such as discipline, honesty, cleanliness, manners and respect. It is crucial that the boys pick up these values while being at the shelter as they come from backgrounds where these values were trivial or never existed.

The boys’ mental health is also being attended to. They are ‘treated’ for past traumatic experience, counseled to get through their previous pain, anger and hurt. The shelter also provides medical care for the boys. Regular health checkups and supplements are provided to the boys to overcome malnutrition.

After being established for 3 years, the Agathians Shelter is now making appeals to the public for help. They are in need of more resources to enrich the lives of these growing human capitals of the society. There is a dire need to have a permanent house to root the organization.

Law Society-Charity Wing’s proposal:

• In aid of the building fund for the Agathians Shelters new home we would like to have a donation box set up to collect funds from HELP University College students and staff. We are aiming to raise as much funds as we can as the shelter is in need of RM210, 000.00 to demolish a 50 year old house in order to rebuild a double-storey house. All cheques are to be made payable to AGATHIANS SHELTER and all donations would be issued a tax exempt receipt.

• We have proposed to help the home with their monthly grocery needs to feed the children by launching grocery donation campaign among HELP students and lecturers. Our plan is to put up posters with a list of groceries needed by the home and the details of persons in-charge for collection of the groceries every month. The donors would be expected to hand in their donations in the last week of every month to the designated persons.

We have also decided to adopt 5 boys from the shelter namely Devan (7), Dhilip Kumar (8), Haran (8), Kesava (9) and Hari (9). We are planning to fund their schooling expenses for year 2007 and also hope that the committee that takes over for the next term follows through with the boys until they complete primary school at least. Besides that we are also planning on providing all the 24 school going boys with their stationary for next year. It is estimated to cost us about RM400. In total, we would require RM1975 from the Law Society for the boys schooling expenses for year 2007.

• Fortnightly, we are planning for 7-8 Charity Wing members to go to the shelter and spend time with the boys. The activities at the shelter would be very flexible depending on the group members who are there. Basically, these visits are to ensure that the members build a rapport with the boys and the boys are exposed to English Language via the communication amongst our members and the boys. These visits would also help the boys to acquire the necessary life skills. Our visits would be on Saturdays from 9am to 12pm since the boys are free then. The members would go on a rotation basis so that every member gets a chance to be involved. The members would be given address of the home so that they can get there on their own or carpool from our campus. Once a month we would also like to take the boys out for a field trip. Transportation for these field trips would either be arranged by the members itself or for certain trips we would want to rent the HELP bus. Expenses that would incur for these field trips would either be sponsored or claimed from the Law Society.

• Monthly, we would have fund raising events for the Agathians Shelter. Where necessary, these events would include the boys from the shelter.
(Monthly calendar attached)

Also attached, are some pictures of the boys at the Agathians Shelter.

Our charity wing vision is to see the children adopted by us growing into great humans with all necessary intellectual capitals. Our mission is to see our vision happening through continuous support of all the members and the lecturers in-charge of law society in executing our action plans.

Prepared by,

…………………………………….
(SHIVREENA SIDHU)
Chairperson,
Charity Wing – Law Society.


………………………………………………….
(MS. VIJAYA SUBRAMANIAM)
Head,
Charity Wing – Law Society.


Approved by,


………………………………………..
(MICHELLE G LEE)
President,
Law Society.


…………………………………………………
(MS NALINA)
Head,
Law Society.


…………………………………………………
(MS VASANTHA)
Head of Department.