ESCUP has been supporting secondary schools in several rural districts of Kampong Cham Province to make educa-tion for students more dynamic and locally relevant. One of the small projects along these lines has been organizing History Youth Clubs where students under a teacher's guidance learn about 'real' history in their local area and do something to preserve it. Most of the schools targeted are located in areas where there are several totally aban-doned and uncared for Angkorian ruins of great antiquity that are truly beautiful. Without engaging in actual resto-ration of buildings, students have been caring for the ruins by collecting trash, weeding, and doing limited landscap-ing to make sites attractive as well as accessible to visitors and a more appreciated community asset.

ESCUP has sought to build a local consortium of stakeholders that not only includes the subject clubs and schools but also the Provincial Department of Culture and Archeological Center of Maemot District. These stakeholders have so far been active in explaining the history of sites to stu-dents and leading field trips. ESCUP seeks to expand project activities so that more improvements can be made to sites through conservation grants to clubs as well as develop a colorful brochure for foreign visitors, which can also be used for instructional purposes in schools, and which will encourage foreign visi-tors to visit sites and make donations to local stewards to maintain them. To this end, the project has been assisting local partners to develop small grant proposals to such do-nors as the Ford Foundation and other private donors.