The StreetWise School currently meets five days a week in and provides its students with meals, clothes, washing facilities, education, books and supplies, and basic health services. StreetWise engages its students in constructive activities, and explores ways in which to cope with health, poverty and injustice, while offering positive methods of conveying feelings and emotions through art, drama, music and dance. StreetWise offers children survival tools to prepare for a sustainable future and an alternative to life on the streets.

Much of the success of StreetWise can be attributed to the philosophy of starting small and growing organically. The whole concept of StreetWise began as a pilot project in January 2006. We started off with only 10 children, and simply met once a week for a hot meal and playtime. We borrowed a playground from an existing school on Fridays when it was not in session. Two months down the road, we asked to borrow the school garage where we began our first Bangla class. We added on English and Math a few months later, followed by medical check-ups.

It took us an entire year of preparation, getting to know the children, sharing their trust and friendship, until we decided we were ready to rent a space in Badda in January 2007 to meet 3 times a week. By March 2007, we began meeting 5 times a week, offered lunch and a few core classes.

Today we still remain small and host only 30 children. We offer Breakfast, Lunch, Bangla, English, ESL, Math, Health & Hygiene, Art & Crafts, Story-Telling, Coaching, Games, and Healthy Kitchen & Cooking, and Theater, Song & Dance Improv classes.

In order to build a strong program, we needed to learn from each student, their families and their environment. We needed to cater to their particular needs. We needed to remain small in number to be flexible enough to address the challenges that arose and adapt to any necessary changes, our main objective being to retain our core students.