Frequently Asked
Questions

Government primary schools in Bangladesh are free to attend, but the real challenge is keeping children enrolled. Nearly 20% of primary school students drop out often because they need to earn money for their families. Your scholarship is not for school fees; it offsets the opportunity cost of attending school. The monthly amount is set to be greater than what a child could earn doing small jobs, so families no longer face the impossible choice between education and income. It also helps cover hidden costs like uniforms, school supplies, food, and transport that many families cannot afford.

The first month's payment covers the purchase of a mobile phone for the student's family and sets up a bKash mobile banking account. From the second month onward, the scholarship amount is transferred directly to the guardian's bKash account every month. You can view the bKash transaction ID in the app as confirmation of each transfer.

This is completely normal. After your payment is processed, our counselling team contacts the student and their family to confirm school attendance before releasing the scholarship. This call is mandatory and no scholarship is disbursed until it is completed. The full process of bank processing plus counselling verification typically takes 5-10 working days but may sometimes take longer. You will receive a notification once the transfer is complete.

AlterYouth prioritises students who are at the highest risk of dropping out: children of single mothers, orphans, and children with disabled fathers. Students must maintain a minimum of 75% school attendance and passing grades each term to continue receiving their scholarship.

If a student fails to meet the minimum requirements once, they receive a formal warning (probation). If they fail to meet them for two consecutive terms, the scholarship is discontinued and automatically reassigned to a new deserving student.

Scholarships continue until the student completes primary school (Grade 5). Depending on which class your assigned student is in when you start, the scholarship can last anywhere from 6 to 60 months. There is no minimum commitment, you can cancel at any time through the app or website.

Before any scholarship is opened to users, AlterYouth's team visits each school, interviews students and families, collects official documents, and takes photographs. By the time you make your first payment and are matched to a student, that student's full profile is already prepared. Ongoing updates like photos and report cards are sent by the student's teacher through the teachers' app each term.

The decision to repeat a grade is made by the student's teacher and parents, not by AlterYouth. In some cases, teachers recommend an extra year to strengthen a student's foundational skills, particularly in rural schools with limited resources. When a student repeats a class, AlterYouth's system automatically places them on probation as a monitoring measure but this does not mean the student has failed.

AlterYouth currently operates on a monthly subscription basis. Annual payments are not available through the app because the scholarship is tied to monthly attendance and grade checks. E.g. If a student fails mid-year, the scholarship must be paused or discontinued. In exceptional cases, organisations have arranged annual bank transfers by contacting the team directly; individuals are encouraged to use the monthly subscription.

Yes. Contact the support team at support@alteryouth.com with your preferred date and they will update your billing schedule from their end. Note that a change may shift the date starting from the following billing cycle, and the next payment will count toward the previous month's scholarship.

Yes. If you have multiple scholarships billed on different dates, the support team can align them to a single date each month. Contact support with your preferred date.

Open the AlterYouth app, go to Settings → Payments, and look for the 'Pay Now' button next to your student's name. If you subscribed via PortWallet and are facing recurring payment issues, note that PortWallet has been discontinued for local users, you will need to switch to bKash by cancelling your current subscription and starting a new one.

AlterYouth does not charge foreign transaction fees itself, but your bank may add international purchase or transfer fees. These are charges from your bank, not from AlterYouth. If you notice unexpected fees labelled 'NON-GB PURCHASE FEE' or similar, contact your bank to clarify.

In the AlterYouth app, go to Settings → Payments → Change Payment Method and select bKash. If you cannot see this option, cancel your current subscription first, then refresh the Payments page. The Pay Now button will appear and allow you to set up a new bKash subscription.

This is a technical error. Contact the support team immediately and they will cancel the subscription and issue a refund. Refunds typically take a few days to appear in your account.

Yes. Email the support team and they will send you a summary or receipt of your scholarship payments for any period you request.

AlterYouth is a social enterprise registered as an education technology company, not a registered charity or 501(c)(3) nonprofit. As a result, payments are not tax-deductible in the US, Australia, Canada, or the UK. AlterYouth is not registered for Payroll Giving in the UK. The team is exploring partnerships with nonprofit organisations to enable tax-deductible giving in the future.

AlterYouth does not officially certify scholarships as Zakat-eligible because that determination depends on personal intention (niyyah) and the specific conditions you follow. However, the students AlterYouth supports orphans, children of single mothers, and children with disabled fathers are among the most financially vulnerable, and many Islamic scholars consider scholarships to extremely poor families to be Zakat-eligible if the intention is made at the time of giving. Note that a service fee of 300 BDT is charged per scholarship. The final decision rests with you.

Direct, unsupervised communication between scholarship backers and students is not permitted, as the students are minors and AlterYouth has a duty to protect their privacy and safety. However, you can: (1) send a written message or letter via the support team, email it to AlterYouth and they will pass it on through the student's teacher; (2) participate in a supervised video call arranged by AlterYouth, where a teacher and guardian are present throughout.

Yes. Email your message to the AlterYouth support team and we will forward it to the student through the school teacher. You can also send a photo of a handwritten letter.

Email the support team expressing your interest and provide your available days and times. AlterYouth will coordinate with the school to confirm availability. Video calls take place during school hours (Sunday–Thursday, 10 AM–2 PM Bangladesh time) with a teacher and guardian present. AlterYouth staff also join to facilitate translation and supervision.

Yes. Let the support team know your travel dates and availability and they will coordinate with the school. All in-person visits must take place under the supervision of AlterYouth and the student's teacher to ensure the safety of both the student and the visitor.

The letter is written by the student. Teachers provide guidelines on how to structure it and share the scholarship backer's name with the students so they know who they are writing to.

AlterYouth does not facilitate additional monetary gifts or physical gifts to individual students. This policy exists to ensure fairness and harmony as not all backers are able to send extras, and doing so could create inequality among students in the same school. If you would like to support the broader school community, you are welcome to donate books, stationery, or supplies directly to the school, the AlterYouth team can provide the school address and help coordinate. Additionally, if you plan to visit, AlterYouth can help arrange the logistics.

Additional financial gifts are not permitted outside the regular scholarship, for the same fairness and safeguarding reasons. You are welcome to send a written Eid or Ramadan message, and the support team will deliver it to your student.

The scholarship amount is fixed per the current program structure and cannot be increased for individual students. AlterYouth notes user feedback on this and is exploring future options for expanded support.

In the AlterYouth app: log in, go to the Home tab, and tap the 'Add Student' button in the top right. On the website: log in at alteryouth.com, scroll to your scholarship section, and click 'Add Student'. The new student will be randomly assigned to you once payment is complete.

Students are assigned randomly from the eligible pool to ensure fairness. However, if you have a specific preference such as a particular region, gender, or background please contact the support team after signing up and they will do their best to manually reassign your scholarship to a student matching your criteria.

When a student completes Grade 5, the scholarship ends and is automatically reassigned to a new student in need, unless you contact the support team beforehand to request that the spot not be refilled. You will not be charged further unless a new student is assigned and you continue the subscription.

Currently AlterYouth's scholarships are limited to primary school (up to Grade 5). Once a student graduates, the platform does not support continued scholarships for that individual. AlterYouth is actively working to extend support into secondary schools and will notify users when this becomes available.

Yes. Contact the support team before graduation and let them know you do not want a new student assigned. They will cancel the subscription once the graduating student completes their scholarship.

You can cancel directly through the AlterYouth app or website under Settings → Scholarships. You can also contact the support team and they will cancel it for you.

This is only possible if the student has not yet been reassigned to another user. Contact the support team as soon as possible and they will check whether the student is still available. Once a student has been reassigned, the scholarship cannot be restarted with that student.

Report cards are uploaded by class teachers each term and typically become available in the app within 1–2 months after the term ends. If you have been waiting longer than expected, email the support team and they will follow up with the school to expedite the upload. All updates are accessible in the app under the School tab (report cards) and the Student tab (photos).

Uploading errors may occasionally cause a wrong photo to appear, but these are rare and the support team can correct this right away. It is also worth keeping in mind that some students were onboarded onto the platform a while ago, so their profile photo may have been taken months or even over a year before their most recent report card. Children grow and change quickly, so it is completely natural for a student to look a little different now compared to their onboarding photo. Regarding name and roll number discrepancies on report cards: in rural Bangladesh, surnames such as Begum, Akter, or Ahmed are often used interchangeably, and roll numbers change when a student is promoted to a new class. These discrepancies do not indicate the wrong student as all uploaded report cards are verified by both the class teacher, the head teacher and the AlterYouth team before being uploaded.

This is a known intermittent system issue. Check your spam/junk folder first. If the OTP still does not arrive, contact the support team and they can investigate and resolve the issue from their end. You can also try using your phone number instead of your email to request the OTP.

Email addresses cannot be changed directly from the app for security reasons. Contact the support team with your current email and the new email address you want to use, and they will update it manually. All your scholarships and account history will be preserved.

No, the system supports only one email address per account. Contact the support team to switch to a different email if needed.

AlterYouth currently operates in Narayanganj, Panchagarh, Thakurgaon, and Nilphamari. The team is actively expanding to additional districts. If you are interested in a specific region not yet covered, contact the support team to be notified when it becomes available.

AlterYouth works directly with government primary schools. Schools register through the AlterYouth teachers app and submit details of students who meet the eligibility criteria (orphans, children of single mothers, children with disabled fathers). Each student then goes through an onboarding process that includes document verification, a photo session, and an interview with the student and their family. Only after this process is complete does a student appear in the scholarship pool available for assignment.

AlterYouth is a social enterprise registered as an education technology company, not a traditional charity or nonprofit. It operates through scholarship service fees, which fund the platform, onboarding, counselling, monitoring and the AlterYouth team. The full scholarship amount goes directly to the student's guardian via bKash; only the service fee reaches AlterYouth.

The service fee covers the cost of running the platform: maintaining the app, onboarding new schools and students, monthly counselling calls, monitoring attendance and grades, and supporting the AlterYouth team. The full scholarship amount is transferred directly to the student's guardian without deduction.