Mahmoud, 11, always dreamt of completing his education. Because of his harsh family conditions, he had to leave school when he was very young, roaming the streets and begging to feed his seven brothers and sisters. Mahmoud dad's illness meant that he could no longer work as a knife sharpener, turning his son's life upside down. "If poverty were a man, I would be that man," Mahmoud told volunteer Yasmin Helal (26), when she first met him during her campaign that helps children who've dropped out of school. Mahmoud and many others like him have abandoned their studies because of the increasing poverty in this North African country, many of whose districts have been totally ignored by the Government. The easy choice for Egyptian families living below the poverty line is to get their children to beg, something you see happening everywhere these days in the streets and on public transport. Young Mahmoud has made his first step to put his harsh past behind him and return to school via a voluntary campaign entitled ‘Alimny' (Educate Me). "We have succeeded in getting about 135 children who left school to go back, and we pay their fees," explains Yasmin, adding that Alimny began with only four young volunteers; now they have 50. The main goal of their campaign, which began in a poor district of Giza, is to help needy children go back to school. The idea for this initiative came to Yasmin when she met Hoda, another child suffering from the consequences of poverty. “It was Hoda who inspired me to help these poor children. In this poor area in Giza, the families are suffering from many problems and it's almost as if it's been erased from the Egyptian map," says Yasmin. According to the Education Ministry, nearly 18 million children are enrolled in the country's 47,000 public-sector schools and they require more than 150 million textbooks. Another reason for some children dropping out of school is that they fail their exams, according to some educational experts. For students to succeed, they need to be carefully guided. Experts say that students, their families and their schools all need to work together on this. “The 'Educate Me' campaign is trying to solve the difficulties posed by the curriculum by letting the children express themselves with useful hobbies," adds Yasmin.
