Local Education and Economic Development Organization – LEEDO

About us

Local Education and Economic Development Organization (LEEDO) is a not-for-profit, voluntary-based development organization founded in 2000. The organization was initiated by a group of educated social and human rights activists and educators aiming to improve the life chances of children forced to live in extreme difficulties on the streets and also to address the needs of the growing number of vulnerable street children in Bangladesh.

Vision
Through raising awareness of the plight of highly vulnerable street children, all members of society will take responsibility for ensuring the protection of street children and thereby allow them to have a bright future.

Mission
• To educate and empower people throughout the world so that they can help to bring about positive, lasting differences in their communities through holistic missions.
• To transform communities through the implementation of programmes that affect all areas of community life including: health, education, economic empowerment, rehabilitation and advocacy.
• To protect and bring back into the mainstream community, highly vulnerable street children, whose lives are being shattered by poverty, domination, exclusion, abuse and conflicts, and to provide suitable opportunities for the betterment of their futures.

What we do:
• Rescue from Streets: Our volunteers and mobilizing team regularly rescue destitute children from streets, train terminals, bus stands and police stations. These transformative processes enable us to recover vulnerable children, who are struggling to exist on the streets, and give them shelter and a route back to a healthy and dignified life
• Transitional Shelter SETU (the bridge from streets to homes) at Babu Bazar, where children, who are in need of a shelter, are invited to stay.
• Reintegration to Families: When a child is rescued from the streets, we provide basic services (i.e. food, shelter, healthcare) and with the aid of police and other linkages, we seek out his or her family.
• Mobile School: We run a Mobile School specifically for Street Kids in various catchment areas in Dhaka. It is an innovative project to educate street kids and make them aware of how to keep safe and develop a goal for life.
• School Under the Sky: LEEDO runs informal Schools in areas where street children are concentrated. This approach to schooling is designed to educate street children, enabling them to read and write as well as to receive essential life-skills training. These schools offer a safe place, where children can socialize, network with each other and learn from each other´s experiences. This is also a platform for informal group therapy, where youths can pick up information, grasp opportunities and develop life skills through hearing firsthand about the experiences of other children and how they learnt to be resilient.
• Peace Home: LEEDO has a new home named Peace Home with full facilities where parentless and destitute street children can begin to lead more normal lives. It is the first permanent home specifically built for street kids and there is no discrimination between boys and girls, abled and disabled. They are provided with facilities such as food, education, clothes, healthcare, etc.
• Medical & Health Care: On and off site of the Schools under the Sky, our volunteers are providing health and medical care support for the street children and conducting group discussions with the children about how they can live a hygienic life, avoiding hazardous situations.
• Orphan Sponsorship: LEEDO sponsors orphan and street children who are desperately need support to live as human being.
• Primary and Mass Education: We are starting a literacy and primary education programme in Habiganj, Sylhet.
• Street Family Village: Rehabilitating street families that have no shelter in which to sleep and live. They lost their homes due to various disasters. We support these families. We are trying to enable the adults to become self-employed and the children to gain an education. We also give them full livelihood support.
• Raising Awareness: LEEDO organizes campaigns to raise people´s awareness about health, nutrition, HIV, family bonding and planning etc.

Forhad Hossain is the Founder and Executive Director of the Local Education and Economic Development Organization (LEEDO).

For other net participants we can offer an expert guidance through trained staff, give an expert opinion, procure expert information and establish new contacts in the field of our work.