Primary Education for most of our countries includes grade levels ranging from Pre-K to 7th grade. In some countries the government covers the cost of primary education, in others, there are substantial fees accompanying the "free education" that prevents many students from enrolling.

In Namibia, the government makes primary education compulsory and covers all school fees yet this assistance ends after three years. In Zambia, the government also covers all primary school fees, yet Deep Roots continues the sponsor-child program, which offers additional support to the young scholars. In Nepal, our students live at an orphanage that supports primary education. In Guatemala, the government offers free primary education to all, which does not cover the cost of supplies, uniform, shoes, or monthly fees, all of which add up the prohibitive costs of sending a child to school. As students advance to higher grades there are added fees that fall on the students and their families, primarily being tuition, travel, room and board costs.

GUATEMALA

• Primary school scholarships are awarded to members of a local children's Shoeshine Labor Union and their siblings.
• Deep Roots scholars are in grade levels ranging from Parvulos (Pre-K) to 5th Grade. Primary school in Guatemala goes up to 6th grade.
• Scholarship recipients are awarded monies based upon grade level as school supply costs increase significantly when students are promoted to the upper grades. Although Guatemalan primary education is technically "free", the Deep Roots money goes to cover the matriculation fee and school supplies, whose prices fall beyond the parents' grasp.
  • Pre-K to 1st Grade: Q150 or about $18.00
  • 2nd and 3rd Grades: Q200 or about $25.00
  • 4th and 5th Grades: Q250 or about $31.00
• Parents are required to attend a monthly meeting to ensure that students' needs are being met through the schools and by the parents. The other major purpose is to discuss problems occurring within the Shoeshine Union. Participation is always active and meetings are notorious to run two or three hours, sometimes even without the aid of a formal agenda. Parents are required to attend these meetings in order for their children to continue receiving the scholarship.
• A recent addition to the parental meeting has been meetings with the scholarship recipients themselves. These meetings are short workshops to ensure the healthy development of the students through creative thought (lacking in the local school system) and are used to begin training them as model students and future leaders. The shoe shiners also participate in an extra-curricular soccer team and are consistent crowd favorites in Chisec's nascent youth soccer league.
• Parents must submit the student's report card each term and a student who fails his/her academic year will lose the right to the scholarship for the coming year. However, should they pass the grade the following year the student will be accepted back as a scholarship student.

ZAMBIA

• In Zambia, primary school is grades 1 - 7.
• Though Deep Roots is no longer accepting new primary school sponsorships (due to government provision of tuition for primary school, a change that took place in 2003), we have maintained the sponsor-child relationships that were in existence before the government paid for tuition; these sponsors still receive school reports, photos, and letters and drawings from the children, collected by DAPP.
• Primary school sponsors provide $28 yearly, which covers costs of school supplies, clothes, counseling through home visits, and the correspondence with the sponsor.