As 2023 draws to a close and we prepare for 2024, this is a perfect opportunity to invite everyone to reflect on Matilda’s growth over the past year. We strongly believe that every step we took was a priceless journey, filled with lessons and encounters that have shaped us into the organization we are today. The growth highlighted in our recap will serve both as an encouragement to forge ahead into the future and as a reflection to foster our learning and development, hopefully leading to even greater strides in 2024.
Exponential Growth of Break Your Boundary (BYB) Student Loan Programme
Despite the Foundation's determination to provide opportunities for people to further their education abroad with the inception of the BYB Programme in 2022, its newness meant that the Programme was not widely known. In 2023, however, the Foundation took this issue to heart and constantly looked for ways to make the Programme known to its targeted group, which is people who has work experience for at least 3 years and aspires to study abroad, such as getting the information out there through more diverse online platforms, a word-of-mouth from the 2022 candidates, as well as a Live Q&A Session on Twitter (X) to give people the opportunity to ask and get honest and straightforward answers from us about the nature and conditions of the BYB Student Loan. And it paid off, in 2023 the number of BYB applicants increased more than ten folds. What made 2023 even more special was that, with good budgetary management and an extremely competitive pool of candidates, we were able to provide BYB student loans to two excellent individuals.
Another significant progress of the BYB Programme in 2023 is that BYB recipients have begun to gradually travel abroad for their studies. Our first ever BYB recipient in 2022 flew to France and began his Master’s Degree in MiM Business Management in September while one of the recipients in 2023 also travelled to the United States in August for his Master’s in International Trade. In this coming year, the remaining recipient from 2023 will also head for Canada to take her Diploma Course in Effects Technical Director (FX TD) at the Lost Boys Studio, School of Visual Effects.
It can be said that the BYB Programme achieved our goals of growing in visibility and succeeding in highlighting student loans as real opportunities. The Matilda Foundation is strongly motivated to keep growing. For individuals interested in an educational opportunity abroad through the BYB Programme, be prepared, 2024 has a surprise in store for you.
Constantly Learning and Building Rapport
Matilda also did not stay isolated in 2023. Indeed, we are aware that we are the new kid in the block in the realm of Thai education. Therefore, we are constantly driven by the desire to learn and make friends with people or organisation with common goals. We understand perfectly that problems in Thai education is multi-faceted and there are many others who noticed the same issues and are working in their own capacities to provide solutions. Furthermore, friends are essential when you want to travel to a long journey to anywhere, especially one as complicated as finding solutions to problems in Thai education. The places and people we have visited in 2023 are as follows,
May 2023 – Meeting the founders of “Siam Vijalaya Learning Center” that focuses on helping learners learn through distance education with the aim to provide equal, accessible, and sustainable education.
September 2023 – Visited and hosted lunch for the students at “Rai Som Wittaya Learning Center” in Chiang Mai. The Learning Center is dedicated to provide education for students that have been left out of education due to issues with nationality and migration.
September 2023 – Join in the Moon Festival celebration with “Siratthaya Learning Center” in Bangkok. This Learning Center adopts the “Waldorf” philosophy in alternative education.
October 2023 – Visited and hosted lunch for the students at “Baan Luk Ruk” in Kon Kaen, a boarding school for students whose parents or guardians are not in the position to provide them with care.
October 2023 – Visited and hosted lunch for the students at “The Foundation for Children” in Kanchanaburi, also a boarding school, dedicated to students in the Foundation’s network that are in need.
Apart from the fact that building rapport will eventually create a network of allies that has the same objectives to solve problems in Thai education, it also stays true to Matilda’s values and who we aspire to be as an organisation that is inquisitive. Constantly learning from others’ experiences will play a crucial role in widening our perspective, identifying problems as well as solutions, and essential for Matilda’s sustainable growth.
Continuing What We Started
One of the very first missions the Matilda Foundation took on was to support the “Baan Huay Paan Learning Center” in Nan province that is tasked with the mission to provide the children of the rural village with education. In June 2023, Matilda team visited the Village and the Learning Center to check on the progress of the Learning Center’s building renovation and the water system that the Foundation supported through a fundraising project with “Tae Jai”. Furthermore, we also got to know the students, community, and parents more through a detailed survey aimed at creating a database that will help guide the Foundation on how to best continue providing support to the Learning Center and answer to the community’s real needs.
Baan Huay Paan Learning Center continues to provide education to the local kids using student-centered and project-based approach. One of the projects by the students this year was “Bhutan Mushrooms” where students from Grade 4 – 6 studied how to grow mushroom culture and build their own cultivation house for the mushrooms. This skill can be further developed to make real living for the kids in the future.
For the Matilda Foundation, 2023 is a year of learning from the experiences gained in 2022 and working on improvements. This is evidenced in the growth of the BYB Student Loan Program, the network and rapport we have built so far, and the lessons we learned from our friends and allies. All of this will not go to waste. Indeed, it will add on to provide the Matilda Foundation with a concrete foundation to go even farther in the future. We also have not left what we started behind and continued our support to Baan Huay Paan Learning Center and dig deeper to know the real needs of the community so that our involvement leaves a footprint that is both meaningful and sustainable in the village.
We are confident that every step we took in 2023 will serve as an accelerator to 2024. We hope for your continued support and encouragement kindly given to us throughout this past year. Let’s keep on growing together.
Happy New Year!
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