SAMAIN and elder brother, grade 8 student, have to help the family; after school time have to find food at the fields and collect waste material in the village,  and on  Sunday and holiday to find job at neighbour’s homes; this situation strongly Over ten years ago, the governments of 164 counties including Cambodia together with all development partners jointly committed to expanding educational opportunities for all children, youth and adult by 2015.

Cambodia, as 2015 passed, could not achieve this policy; a larger number of school-going age children have been outside school, especially school-going age for secondary education.  There were, due to the education statistic 2016-2017, 1,051,978 school going-age children for lower secondary education and 1,113,919 school going-age children for upper secondary deduction, but only 586, 042 children enrolled at lower secondary  and 279,409 enrolled at upper secondary school. These data clearly denote that there is a challenge in Cambodia education; this challenge because of poverty.

SENG SAMAIN, 14 years old, studies at grade 9; has four siblings and she is number two. SAMAIN’s father passed away and leaving the heavy burden for her mother to take care of the children.  SAMAIN‘s family has no farmland; her family making the daily life by work exchange; it is to borrow rice or money from neighbours and refund by labour.  

impacts their study and feeling. 

SAMAIN and her elder brother, though living in such situation, struggle with their, because they want to get out of poverty.

To ask them what grade that they want to study; they shortly answer that: “It depends on the living situation of my family”.

There is about 85% of Cambodian population live at the rural area, and most of them engage in agriculture with small farmland, which provides poor product; this causes many families live under poverty; poverty is the main obstacle for education.

The effective key to help improving education of Cambodia is to provide education support to poor rural students; education will strongly encourage students to study, increase and retain enrolment at school.