Textbooks and workbooks might have been a key part of our childhoods in school. However, not everyone has the privilege of beginning each school term with fresh copies of their own.
Fortunately, initiatives such as NTUC FairPrice’s Share-A-Textbook project helps collect and share pre-loved textbooks to lower income families in Singapore. While at it, the community project under NTUC’s Back-to-School programme also helps promote a greener Singapore.
Just ask 16-year-old Alsyifa Hutmani, who has been benefiting from this project ever since she was in Primary 3. She was back returning the favour by going down to Gan Eng Seng School in the early morning of 13 December to collect used textbooks for her cousin.
Tremendous Benefits
“Usually these revisions books come with guides and if I find them useful, I would share them with my classmates. If the books are good, I would even recommend my friends to buy them,” shared Alsyifa.
While Alsyifa still had to spend some money on textbooks every year with changes to the teaching syllabus, she never had to spend money on revision books. “If I can find the following year’s textbooks during the distribution, then that’s money saved.”
“It helped to lessen the burden on my father, who is the sole breadwinner in my family,” she added.
Thanks to these educational resources, her school grades had also improved. She also credits her improvement in school to the subsidised tuition she received from Mendaki.
Not only is she a beneficiary, she makes it a point to give back. Every year, she donates the books back to the project once she’s done with them. This is so that more students can have the same chance as her.
Being Thankful
While Alsyifa has progressed to tertiary education this year, she remains grateful to the project as it was a great help during her primary and secondary school years.
She explained, “Every year I would take three to four books per subject that I was studying. These books are usually very expensive and they can cost $20 to $30 each. It helped me to save a lot of money.”