The Mountain Trust

Who we are

The Mountain Trust is a charitable organisation based in Pampisford, and has been working with disadvantaged communities throughout Nepal since 1996. We aim to deliver low-cost, high impact projects in the fields of education, healthcare and human rights.

Education

This year alone, we are providing sponsorship for over an hundred bright students in private schools, as well as funding school supplies and meals to government schools. Further to our sponsorship programme, we run a radio broadcast called Radio Guru for students sitting the SLC (the School Leaver’s Certificate exams) in Grade 10. They are notoriously hard to pass, and only 50% of students nationwide get the sufficient marks to continue their education. Usually those who attend schools in rural areas have the most difficulty in passing the exams. In these areas, the training of the teachers is minimal, and the students have very little access to resources. In response to this crisis, we broadcast lessons written and presented by the teachers of Pokhara’s best private schools across the country so that those rural students can have some of the same teaching that urban students benefit from.

Human Rights

Following on from the Radio Guru programme, we are soon to launch our Civic Education Programme. It will raise awareness and increase knowledge of some of the large issues facing the Nepalese people in their new democracy. Our volunteers work with experts to create an interview framework through which people all over the country can learn about topics such as local elections, community disaster preparation and vaccine education.

Healthcare

At least once a year, we arrange a large rural health camp for between 200 and 300 people. We bring doctors from some of Pokhara’s best hospitals to areas where there are no medically trained staff and medication often only extends to ibuprofen. We provide logistical and administrative support, helping direct patients and providing necessary medicines. We also arrange placements for medical volunteers in both inner city hospitals and rural health posts. Not only does this benefit the students, being able to have a complete overview of how the healthcare system works in Nepal, but also the places where we send them. We donate funds and much needed materials to these organisations so as to support them in the work that they do.

Earthquake Reconstruction

In response to the April 2015 earthquake, we developed an Earthquake Reconstruction project to rebuild a school and a village of 57 houses. The school was completed in May 2015 and the house construction is on-going. We provide steel-reinforced frames, which are manufactured in Pokhara and transported to the village via truck and tractor. The frames then allow the villagers to use traditional techniques such as stone and mud mortar to construct the walls. 

Volunteering and Internships

Our extensive intern and volunteer programme recruits people from all backgrounds and of all ages to work across the whole panoply of our projects. Some of their fantastic work includes formulating and running a survey to evaluate our Radio Guru project, desigining a nut bolt system with which to construct our steel-reinforced frames, in 3 weeks and designing the establishment of an online shop to sell local produce from the deprived communities in which we work. We rely on the commitment of thse volunteers to support our two permanent members of staff in Nepal. The size and flexibility of our organisation allows our volunteers to develop skills in a wide range of fields including fundraising, project management and research.

If you would like any more information about MT, please visit our website to find out the latest news of our projects!