Since its inception in 1997, Children’s Ger has provided schooling for over 1,000 children and young people who would otherwise not have attended school. ‘Ger’ is the name of the traditional Mongolian felt tent that has housed Mongolian nomads for centuries. Dozens of extremely poor and vulnerable families have been helped to move on with their lives through the project. 

The project was originally established on private initiative in a Mongolian-German collaboration in response to the large wave of street children in Ulaanbaatar in the 90s.

Children’s Ger is located in the Bayankhoshuu district in the western part of Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. It is one of the poorest areas in the capital, with high unemployment and alcoholism, as well as many rural migrants moving to the city in the hope of better living conditions.

There are up to several public schools in the area, but school admission rules are strictly enforced. This means you need to have all your papers in order, preferably a passport. The parents, often single mothers, don’t have the necessary papers. The passport may have been lost in a move or sold for a bottle of vodka!

Many migrant children and young people from rural areas have also not followed normal schooling. For example, they are 13 years old but have only been in school for 2-3 years. Public schools don’t allow for 3rd grade when you should be in 7th grade. Some of the students in Children’s Ger are over 20 years old when they start learning to read, write and do math.

Unfortunately, many of the poorest children are also bullied out of public schools. Not by their classmates, but by their teachers. Public schools are overcrowded. Teachers work in two shifts. There’s a lack of money for everything.