The heart of the Smiling Gecko Campus
Opened in 2017 as the SGC HISF Education Campus, our school is at the heart of our work. What began with 140 children has grown to more than 600, with a goal of 1,000. In rural Cambodia, education is the path out of poverty.
Bilingual teaching
Because local teachers often have limited access to adequate training, we employ international English-speaking teachers alongside Cambodian teachers at every year level. Their primary role is teaching the children, but they also support the professional development of their Cambodian colleagues. Everyone benefits.
School meals
Widespread malnutrition is one of the greatest barriers to our pupils’ age-appropriate physical and mental development. We therefore built a large school canteen, where every child receives a balanced meal in the morning and at lunchtime. For many, these are their only meals of the day.
Hygiene
Our children live in extreme poverty. Very few families have running water, let alone adequate sanitation. On campus, children can shower every day and receive a freshly washed school uniform. We brush their teeth with them, while lice treatment and regular deworming are also important parts of our hygiene programme.
Healthcare
Children are sometimes injured on local roads or at home. We can treat them in our clinic and only need to call on our partner organisations for more serious cases. Thanks to the University of Zurich, we also have two dental chairs for regular check-ups and dental care.
Physical education
While school sport is rare in much of Cambodia, we make sure our children get plenty of exercise. Running and a range of ball sports are therefore part of the curriculum. The children take part barefoot, as they do not have sports shoes.
Music education
Thanks to the generous support of more than 400 individual music lovers and Musik Hug in Zurich, we have been able to offer our pupils lessons on a range of musical instruments. This is an important part of our wonderful children’s intellectual and creative development.
