Girls' Boarding School

Talitha Kumi was initially founded in 1851 to provide educational opportunities for Palestinian girls. At this time, nobody felt responsible for their security, education and training. To this day, we have taken on this responsibility, supporting in particular, girls from the most socially disadvantaged families. Currently, 32 girls live in three family-like communities, each community with a supervisor. Besides the Boarding School manager, three employees and our volunteers who serve for one year at a time form the heart of Talitha Kumi.

We try to provide a place of peace and calm in times of political unrest. We aim at creating an intact, intimate atmosphere in which the girls can lead a happy, normal life. That means not only to establish rules and duties but also to promote the self-esteem of each individual person. During their time at our boarding school and due to the separation from their families many different problems may arise. We solve them together by involving the parents and, if necessary, a female psychologist.

Talitha Kumi offers a high-standard of education to the girls. We would like to encourage them to become a future-minded generation despite the fact that their home country is still occupied and surrounded by a wall.

The Boarding School at Talitha Kumi doesn't receive any financial support from the state or any other official sources. We therefore attempt to find new sources of funding from private initiatives and donors, through the sponsorship of individual students and from the guest house in order to cover our running costs.

Previous volunteer worker Eva Stoelzel reports about her „Life with 26 girls at the boarding school“ in „Im Lande der Bibel“ 1/2009, pages 39 – 42 (in German).