Special opening day
Located far from the center of Ben Tre city, Bao Thanh Primary School (Bao Thanh commune, Ba Tri district, Ben Tre province) is a school in a remote commune, on the list of 45 communes with special difficulties in the coastal and island areas of the country. Mr. Pham Ngoc Toan - Principal of the school said that in the 2024-2025 school year, the school has 752 students, of which 145 are from poor or near-poor households. Many students have extremely difficult circumstances and may have to stop studying because their parents cannot afford to send them to school.
The school consists of a main campus and 3 satellite campuses, with degraded facilities and difficult teaching and learning conditions. However, with the efforts of the school and the cooperation of parents, in the new school year 2024-2025, Bao Thanh School has welcomed all students to enroll like other schools across the country.
In order to encourage and motivate students on the path of pursuing knowledge, Vinamilk and BTTEVN Fund have coordinated to organize a special opening event to welcome the new school year. Not only decorated with flags and flowers more beautifully than in previous years, the opening ceremony of Bao Thanh Primary School students this year also had nearly 17,000 boxes of Vinamilk fresh milk from the Vietnam Grow Up Milk Fund (abbreviated as Milk Fund) and many special gifts to welcome the students to school.
“Due to difficult economic conditions, the nutritional problems of most students here are still limited. Visiting remote schools, located far from the commune center, I was really sad to see that the children were much shorter than their peers. The milk source supported by the Milk Fund program is a great encouragement for the students, and we teachers also feel happy with the children's joy. Hopefully, drinking milk regularly will help children supplement the necessary nutrients and through this program, it will also help parents better understand the importance of drinking milk, helping children develop both physically and mentally to their fullest potential,” said Mr. Toan.
In addition to milk support, Vinamilk also donated the school the Vietnam Rising Bookshelf, with nearly 1,000 books and notebooks, hundreds of learning tools and 5 laptops for students to practice computer science and access the unlimited information and knowledge from the internet. This entire bookshelf comes from the joint contributions of Vinamilk employees, through the internal campaign "Giving new books, welcoming children to school".
On this occasion, BTTEVN Fund and Vinamilk also presented 30 scholarships to 30 students with difficult circumstances who have overcome difficulties to study well, to encourage them to persevere in going to school. Each gift includes cash and many essential learning tools such as backpacks, notebooks, and Vinamilk water bottles.
In addition, the children also experienced an exciting opening day with interesting activities such as a creative drawing area, dressing up according to their dream career, a game area and quizzes to receive gifts from Vinamilk...
Phan Van Kiet, a student at Bao Thanh Primary School, excitedly shared: “Today is the first time I have attended such a joyful opening ceremony with so many gifts. What I like most is receiving milk, because the milk tastes so good. I also received a new backpack from Vinamilk, from now on I have a new bag and new books to go to school. I am very happy, thank you very much!”
Half a million cartons of milk with you to school
Not only more than 750 students of Bao Thanh Primary School, on the occasion of the new school year this year, more than 2,000 children in difficult circumstances in Ben Tre received more than 135,000 boxes of milk from the Vietnam Grow Up Milk Fund program. Since the beginning of 2024, the Milk Fund program and Vinamilk have donated nearly 490,000 nutritional products to more than 6,700 students in difficult circumstances. Of which, right before the new school year, nearly 200,000 boxes of milk were completed by Vinamilk to many disadvantaged schools in the provinces/cities: Dien Bien, Hung Yen, Binh Duong, Ben Tre, Can Tho and Hanoi.
Speaking at the event, Mr. Do Thanh Tuan - Director of External Relations of Vinamilk - said that he himself was also happy with the joy of the children's first day of school. "I hope that Vinamilk's companionship will help the children feel the community's concern for their studies and health care, thereby making efforts to rise up and overcome difficulties. Over the past 17 years, Vinamilk believes that the greatest value that the Vietnam Grow Up Milk Fund has given is the dreams and motivation that urges the children - the future generation of the country - to reach higher in the future" , Mr. Tuan shared.
According to Mr. Dinh Tien Hai - Director of BTTEVN Fund - although it has been implemented for many years, in every place the Milk Fund stops, there are children who are having a joyful and complete school day for the first time or children who are having the first time drinking milk so freely.
“Since implementing the Vietnam Rising Milk Fund program with Vinamilk, BTTEVN Fund also did not expect the program to go on such a long journey. The more we go, the more we see that there are still many places where children need our attention and care. Hopefully, the program will continue to be maintained for many more years, so that more and more unfortunate children will receive love from society,” Mr. Hai emphasized.
Within the framework of the program, Vinamilk and the Vietnam Children's Fund also visited and presented milk on the first day of the school year to students at the Ben Tre School for Disabled Children (Huu Dinh Commune, Chau Thanh District, Ben Tre Province). The center is nurturing, practicing rehabilitation, teaching culture, and vocational training for about 300 deaf, blind, and mentally disabled children. This is also the place that has benefited from the Milk Fund for the past 14 years. In 2024 alone, students at the center were supported with more than 23,400 boxes of milk from Vinamilk.
Launched in 2008, the Vietnam Grow Up Milk Fund has been implemented by Vinamilk and the BTTEVN Fund for the past 17 years. To date, this is still one of the largest-scale child nutrition care programs and has been implemented long-term and regularly every year to improve children's health and physical condition through nutrition. It is estimated that the program has donated more than 42 million nutritional products with a total support value of more than 200 billion VND to more than half a million children in difficult circumstances across 63 provinces and cities, regardless of remote areas, islands, or borders.
