Meet Lurn Kham, a bright driven woman from Myanmar who has fought against the odds to inspire and uplift her community.
Lurn Kham was born in the Shan State of Myanmar and moved to Chiang Mai, Thailand at the age of eight. She began her journey in a new country with her father and was later placed in an orphanage after her parent’s divorce. During her time at the orphanage, she was not permitted to attend formal Thai education due to her legal status, so she received informal education from the orphanage. Through NGO connections, she also learned English and attended community development programs. At 17, she wanted to share her newfound knowledge with her community and taught Thai and English at the Thai-Myanmar border. After completing her volunteer work, she assessed the conditions she saw and determined that she had to pursue higher education to enact the level of change that would uplift her community. She returned to Chiang Mai and began pursuing Thai non-formal education; this journey would take six years to complete.
As a Myanmar student without legal Thai status, she had very few opportunities, and still faced major setbacks accessing higher education in Thailand. Over the years, the “Migrant Worker” status became available to people from Myanmar but still presented significant obstacles. The Migrant Status allowed residents to work, but if they didn’t have a complete bachelor’s degree, it would require them to attend six full years of non-formal Thai education: two years in primary school, two years in lower secondary, and two years in Higher Secondary.
Lurn Kham soon realized that it was very difficult to pursue Thai non-formal education and heard about the BEAM Education Foundation. This foundation focuses on providing marginalized youth in Chiang Mai with non-formal secondary education. Lurn Kham now had two options, take a year to prepare for the American GED exam through BEAM or sacrifice six years. Selecting the GED route seemed more feasible so Lurn Kham redirected her path and passed the GED in 2012.
She later enrolled at Chiang Mai University and through scholarships, completed her bachelor's in Social Science. She entered university intending to improve education access for migrant workers so they wouldn’t have to pursue alternative routes and face the obstacles she endured. After completing her bachelor's at CMU, she wanted to give back to the organization that made it possible to attend university and worked at BEAM for four years. She felt a responsibility to improve ways BEAM could support people from her community and continues to faithfully work there. She’s enjoyed working at BEAM and states that: “many workers at BEAM have the same mentality of learning, and improving their education to go give back and empower the communities they came from”.
From the beginning, Lurn Kham knew the importance of education and relentlessly pursued it because she wanted a better future for herself and wanted to learn how to adequately address issues prevalent in her community.
Through BEAM, personal experiences, and common struggles in the Myanmar migrant community she determined that systemic levels of change were necessary to achieve education equity. Most people from her community don’t pursue education after migration because of the extreme legal roadblocks, financial burden, and mindset prioritizing work over education. After 4 years of working at BEAM, she decided to pursue her master's at CMU under the Social Science department to work with her already established network and increase her expertise in the field. As she pursues her master's, she plans on raising awareness about education equality in the Myanmar Migrant community through research and academic discourse to influence favorable legislation.
In the future, Lurn Kham plans on leading an executive board of an organization that promotes education access for the people of Myanmar and creating systemic level changes such as a standardized exam accessible to all.
Lurn Kham is an exceptional individual that embodies a type of leadership fueled by genuine passion and love for her community. Please join us in supporting Lurn Kham complete her master’s and make education possible for all.