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What do YOU think???

Fri, 21 May 2010 15:23:16 GMT

We will be adding an open blog during the coming month where you can set up an account and post about your own favorite NGOs. We hope this will bring small NGOs a higher profile and new opportunities via the World Wide Web. Please add your comments and let us know what you think of this idea.

AHope Fights Aids

Wed, 05 May 2010 09:11:09 GMT

AHOPE for Children, featured on our site for February 2010, is working to raise awareness for World AIDS Orphans Day. They have launched their Text2Give campaign to raise funds for Ethiopian AIDS orphans.

The Text2Give campaign culminates on World AIDS Orphans Day, May 7. Donors just need to text "AHOPE" to "85944", and respond with "Yes", to donate $10. We would be very grateful if you could help us spread the word by sharing this campaign with your friends.

Thank you for any help you can give!

A Visit To Aarti

Mon, 19 Apr 2010 22:36:11 GMT

Some months back Ellen introduced me via email to Sandhya, saying that as we were in the same corner of the world (India) we should meet. Actually, we both live in the south of India in Andhra Pradesh state. Sandhya lives an eight-hour train ride south of Hyderabad (my home) and one day came to see her daughter and other family members. She invited me to join them for lunch. I did and learned about the Vijay Foundation Trust (VFT), and particularly Aarti Home. I was amazed at her organization and what she had achieved. I resolved to visit her but it took me much too much time to actually do it.

I set out from Jubilee Hills, Hydrabad on Friday, March 26, boarding a train at 5:35 p.m. in an AC 2nd class chair car. Twelve hours later the conductor tapped me to say we’d arrived. Sandhya’s driver met me and took me home to rest. After a delicious meal of dhosas (thin pancakes) Sandhya drove me to Aarti Home in time to see the children streaming out of the school next door. In an interval before lunch they peppered me with questions. Ranging in age from 4-18, the children had different levels of English—some surprisingly good. I sang songs to them and they sang even more back to me. They’d enjoyed a number of English speaking volunteers who has taught them “Hokey Pokey”, “Row Row, Row Your Boat”, and many more.

When it was time for lunch each child took a metal plate and sat on the floor to wait. It seemed like an awful long time but eventually each went up to be served huge portions of an enriched rice mixture and some vegetables. No one touched the food until everyone was served. They sang a simple Hindu grace and used their fingers to eat. Everyone cleaned his or her plate. I’d inspected the kitchen earlier and it was orderly and clean. The food was simple but nutritious.

Everyone took a nap after lunch—or at least pretended to-- lying down on the floor alongside the others. We used the time to go up to the second floor to see the tailoring and sewing workshops. A tailoring professor taught women on new sewing machines. I also saw some of the handiwork and crafts the women made and were selling in bulk to various outlets. The VFT conducts a number of training programs for destitute women.

I spent a very enjoyable time talking to the volunteers from the U.S., Australia and elsewhere. Two were on a gap year and had spent two weeks teaching hygiene to all the children. All were very loving to the children—love that was obviously reciprocated. They knew the children’s names, treasured the pictures they’d drawn for them. The volunteers played a vital role at Aarti to include encouraging the children to use English.

That evening before the sun went down and I had to get my train at 10:00 p.m., Sandhya and her husband drove me out to the land they had purchased to build a new home for Aarti. It is quite far from the center of town but in an area where buildings are coming up. The area is rolling hills and scrub and as the sun’s rays hit the valleys and hills it cast a pinkish glow on everything. The area was still and quiet and I could imagine the new complex. Sandhya’s daughter is an architect and she is designing the buildings.

I departed reluctantly from Kadapa. I loved the children and I could see so much could be done to help each one grow intellectually and emotionally. Aarti Home deserves our support and I saw how donations—of whatever amount—helped provide food, clothes and supplies for the children.

~ Juliet Wurr, Public Affairs Officer, U.S Consulate General, Hyderabad, India

WINGS Visits Santa Rosa!

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 04:32:12 GMT

We are so fortunate that the Director of WINGS in Guatemala, Janeen Simon, will be visiting California.

We will hold a meeting with her in Santa Rosa on Sunday, April 25, from 5 to 6:30 p.m. to hear about the work of WINGS, Guatemala's fantastic NGO providing reproductive services across the country.

Janeen is a terrific speaker. If you wish to attend the meeting and would like directions, please email us.

Hope to see you on the 25th!

So Many NGOs to Choose From!

Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:33:17 GMT

We have featured six NGOs so far and are just about to announce our second NGO in Guatemala! We’d like to know which NGO made the biggest impression on you and why.

The winning NGO will get a contribution from Women’s Giving Tree!

Here’s our list – just fill in the comment form below and tell us which NGO impressed you the most!

For January:

Empowering Women of Nepal
Mayan Families of Guatemala

For February:

Aarti in India
AHope for Children in Ethiopia

For March:

Recyclarte in Costa Rica
Eye of the Child in Malawi

For April:

WINGS in Guatemala

Please vote and help the NGO of your choice!

Warmly, Ellen

Protect This Woman!

Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:56:33 GMT

Sara Spaulding-Phillips (aka Sarita, the artist) one of our Women's Giving Tree board members, says, "spending time in Mexico and Guatemala inspires me to paint icons on "lovingly-used" jeans jackets, friend's give me.

"These paintings are of the "Madonna de Guadelupe" asking to PROTECT THIS WOMAN. They have been so popular in my hometown, I am offerring two for sale on Women's Giving Tree's Giving Blog. They sell for $135.00, including postage. The jackets are size small (10-12) and size 12. They are both washable.

"To purchase a jacket, select an NGO from those featured on Women's Giving Tree, then send your check and postal mail address to me: Sara Spaulding-Phillips 818 Cherry Street, Santa Rosa, California, 95404.

"I will send you the jacket, and your donation will be made. And thank you so much in advance. Your gift will be enjoyed by many."

Art Heaven's Challenge

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 22:42:57 GMT

Art Heaven just donated money to Mayan Families, a Women's Giving Tree featured NGO, after a raffle of two paintings at our current Art Show. Carole Watanabe, the founder of Art Heaven in Sebastopol, California and Sandra Rubin painted collaboratatively under the name of ALMA as we often do, to create art for worthy organizations.

We chose Mayan Families because of our deep connections to Guatemala and Panajachel. Carole had gone to that region when she was 19 to learn to weave with the Mayan weavers and one of our members, Judy Tilt, had family holdings in that area and sponsored a child for many years through Mayan Families. I had attended a wonderful workshop in San Marcos, with Ellen Boneparth, several years before and made nice contacts there. One of our Art Heaven friends, Salli Razberry lives there now.

That gave us an idea. Instead of just donating money we decided to sponsor a young girl, Natalia Belinda, for her schooling; uniforms, school supplies and tuition. (If there is any money in poor Mayan families, the boys are schooled, not the girls.) Now we have contributed to Natalia's future and we feel a deeper connection to Guatemala and Mayan Families.

As Art Heaven, and Alma, in the future we will continue to paint and donate and challenge others to do something through the groups featured on Women's Giving Tree. What can you do you help women and children on the global front?

Buy a Jacket, Help an NGO

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 22:12:44 GMT

Sara Spaulding Phillips, one of Art Heaven's painters, has occasionally turned her brush to jean jackets as a way of making our apparel glow.

Her paintings are of the Mexico goddess Guadelupe and bear beautiful messages such as "Protect this Woman."

I proudly wear one of Sara's jackets and everyone compliments me.

Sending A Mayan Girl To School

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 21:54:23 GMT

Art Heaven in Sebastopol, California is a studio created by artist Carole Watanabe and artist friends as a way to bring light to the world after 9/11.

The Art Heaven studio hosts 10 women who are committed to working together and supporting each other as they show their work collectively and individually.

They decided to contribute to Women's Giving Tree by auctioning off one of their paintings and using the funds to provide for schooling fees for a young Guatemalan girl. She is part of the NGO Mayan Families, one of our featured NGOs for January 2010.

We’re Really Global

Thu, 18 Mar 2010 21:46:22 GMT

When I work on Women’s Giving Tree, I get the fantastic feeling of being in touch with the world. This project couldn’t happen without email and the Internet. I can do searches of NGOs in remote places because today all the world has a website! And I can communicate with the NGO leaders through emails and ask questions, request photos, learn more. Readers can all join me in this by sending their own messages to the NGOs through the NGO web sites.

We have featured NGOs for women and their families in Africa, Asia and Latin America. We want to expand to Eastern Europe, Down Under, and the Pacific in the next few months.

So, readers, send us your ideas for NGOs!

Nepal Youth Foundation

Tue, 10 Aug 2010 07:21:11 GMT

I have been a supporter of the Nepalese Youth Foundation (NYF) for years, and a trip to Nepal in October, 2009, intensified my enthusiasm for this extraordinary NGO. NYF was founded by Olga Murray in 1990, when she retired from her career as a legal researcher. Retired?? Olga, the most active 85 year old I know, made her fascination with Nepal into a new, lifelong commitment.

Let’s start with the Nepali children who are the focus of NYF's activities. NYF started out by setting up two children's homes in Kathmandu, one for boys and one for girls. Many of the children have been street kids, working as beggars and abandoned by their parents. The children live in a NYF community in which, together, they form their own caring family, finish high school, and many go on, with scholarships, to university and professional careers.

Olga took a special interest in malnutrition in existing poor families. She established Nutritional Rehabilitation Homes for malnourished children who are referred by hospitals. These are small hospitals dedicated to restoring severely malnourished children to health and educating their mothers about nutrition and all aspects of child care. At the end of this year, there will be 12 such facilities around the country. After five weeks of the feeding program, most children gain enough weight to reach average for their age and the mothers gain an average of 12 pounds. Best of all, the mothers learn how to cook and grow healthier foods than rice and lentils so they can better feed their entire families when they return home.

NYF's program that moved me the most is Indentured Daughters in which NYF buys back daughters in the western Terai region who have been indentured at a young age to work as a servant for a wealthy family. NYF buys the girl’s family a piglet or goat to make up for lost income from indenturing the girl and then sends the girl to school in her home community. NYF has liberated 10,000 bonded girls and is on the verge of eradicating the bonding custom. The best part is that the girls have formed their own groups to publicize the illegality and cruelty of indenturing.

Always innovating, Olga has recently started a children's counseling center. As reported on NYF's website, "Nepal is in its infancy as far as psychological counseling is concerned. However, many children suffer from emotional trauma as a result of the insurgency which raged through the country for ten years and was only recently resolved. Furthermore, disabled children, orphans, and homeless youth suffer from oppression and discrimination, and they, too, are in need of counseling."

Please read in detail about NYF and consider ways you can contribute to this amazing work!

The Butterfly Project

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 08:21:39 GMT

I'm sure we've all thought about the power of one – how one person can make a huge difference in the world. For me, the work done by Carole Peccorini in East Africa symbolizes beyond measure the power of one.

Carole, a nurse, counselor and writer, traveled in 2005 to 14 orphanages in Uganda to bring children health-giving glyconutrients and vitamins. There, she met Evaline at an orphanage in the north, and was completely taken by this bright and shining girl of ten. Carole asked the orphanage director if Evaline could go to college. "Intellectually, yes," he said, "but it would be a question of money. Who would pay the $6000 for three years of college?" Carole knew it was doable and immediately committed from a place deep within to become a partner in funding higher education for Evaline if she wanted to go to college.

She created the Butterfly Project based on the 1200 Blue Morpho Butterflies, iridescent blue mylar butterflies, she had tucked in her suitcase for gifts. Before she left Uganda, she vowed to raise $60,000 to send ten orphan girls to college.

But Carole does not sit still. The Butterfly Project is now in Kenya and Tanzania with 9 promising young women currently in college. Five are studying to be teachers and four are training to be nurses. There is still an open promise to Evaline awaiting her graduation from high school. The program is administered by Village Volunteers through three local, African program directors who select the girls and administer the funds. Shana Greene, Director of Village Volunteers, notes, "We do not have staff in country and I never go there because they want to treat me as a hero. Village Volunteers does not believe in simply giving aid but in partnering with stakeholders.”

For Carole, the butterflies symbolize transformation and she uses them to attract donations. She shares her dream with anyone who will listen and has received donations from over 400 individuals. As Carole tells her contributors, "Girls are the change agents for their culture when they have the opportunity for higher education. Educated girls lower the birth rate and the incidence of HIV/AIDS. They change communities, villages, countries." The gift for contributing partners is knowing they have made a real difference that changes a young woman's life and ripples out to touch many, many more. It gives everyone wings. Butterflies are beautiful; butterflies glide through the air. And so do the girls whose lives take flight from the Butterfly Project. And all this is happening from the power of one.

Please visit the Butterfly Project website to find out how you, yourself, can tap into the power of one.

Seeds of Learning

Fri, 11 Jun 2010 16:54:06 GMT

Sometimes, right from your own backyard, you can discover an amazing NGO that works overseas. Recently, I met Annie Bacon, Executive Director of Seeds of Learning, in Santa Rosa. The US office of Seeds of Learning (SOL) is just down the road in Sonoma.

SOL's work is in depressed communities in Nicaragua and El Salvador. In the past 19 years, SOL has built 114 classrooms in 38 schools in Nicaragua and El Salvador. SOL's mission – a bit like Greg Mortenson's efforts in the Himalayas, made so well-known by his book Three Cups of Tea – is to promote quality learning in developing communities.

SOL was started in 1988 by two volunteers working for Habitat for Humanity in Nicaragua. Todd Evans and Patrick Rickon first made rustic school desks out of scrap lumber from Habitat’s saw mill. Soon they went on to build one-room schools, created SOL, and in 1995 put up a Learning Resource Center in Dario, Nicaragua, with books, puzzles and eventually reference materials for high school students. SOL also has a scholarship program to help students pay the costs of tuition, books, uniforms, and transportation to school.

All the education-building work is done Central American community members and US and foreign volunteers, often high school students. Volunteers have become so attached to the Central American communities they work in that they have begun a sister school program, now involving 2000 students and 80 teachers.

What impressed me most about SOL is its community development model – Central Americans must participate alongside the foreign volunteers and learn practical and leadership skills. As Annie Bacon put it, “Communities have to invite us and commit to work with us before we go.”

Best of all, SOL’s activities are only a short distance from the US. It’s easy to go and volunteer and the SOL work is a phenomenal learning experience for high school students and US community members. Please visit the SOL web site to learn more.

Knysna Educational Trust (KET)

Fri, 21 May 2010 15:15:13 GMT

You probably never heard of Knysna, South Africa, and neither had I until I launched Women’s Giving Tree. It turns out that Knysna is a beautiful town along the Garden Route on South Africa’s southern coast.

A resident notes, “As in all South African towns, the affluent residential areas lie within view of all who pass through. More than half of the town’s population dwells in poor living conditions on the outskirts of town where the dwellings are substandard and services, up until the last few years, have been little more than basic.”

In 1993, the Knysna Educational Trust (KET) was established to help upgrade early childhood development centers (ECD) in the town’s disadvantaged communities. Unfortunately, as informal settlements around Knysna grew, no provision was made for additional educational centers. As a result, many unemployed and uneducated women opened their homes for child care but failed to provide much educational stimulation.

KET, consisting of 8 Trustees and 4 members of staff, seeks to bridge the gap in the foundational years of children up to six years old by assisting 27 partnered edu-centers to comply to regulations as set out by Department of Social Services, Education and Health. KET has sought to upgrade early childhood development in the following manner:

partnering with South Cape College on teacher training;
providing skills development opportunities as the need arises, e.g., bookkeeping, IT literacy for teachers and principals at early childhood development centers;
offering basic conversational English to children at affiliated centers;
upgrading preschool buildings and equipping preschools with educational books, games, posters and playground equipment;
sourcing sponsorships for healthy feeding programs and endeavouring to establish vegetable door gardens at each of our edu-centers.

As a Board Member at KET observes, “We are in the process of empowering principals and practitioners by providing training and skills in order for them to effectively teach learners up to six years old. We help them upgrade their buildings in order to comply to regulations, ensure skills learnt in training is implemented in the classroom, assist in finding the necessary resources and materials. We have made it our mission, not just to hand over educational items, but through skills development to uplift the selfless individuals who are committed to the task at hand.”

Please visit the KET website to see how you might help.

Mujeres en Cambio

Wed, 05 May 2010 09:04:25 GMT

When I was on vacation in San Miguel de Allende in Mexico, I was pleased to discover Mujeres en Cambio, a 15 year old, all volunteer, grass roots organization committed to helping girls in the campo (countryside) finish school and, in a number of cases, attend college. Girls in the campo are more likely than city girls to drop out of middle or high school because of the expense. While public education is free through sixth grade, middle school and high school are costly for the indigent, especially the $40 per semester tuition that must be paid up front.

Families in the campo are desperately poor, often making only $5 per day. They lack the funds to pay for school fees, books, transportation, uniforms and shoes. Without scholarships, most girls have to leave school to work or help out at home.

Through Mujeres en Cambio, girls receive $25 per month or $275 per year, college students, $1000 per year. To qualify for the program, girls are closely monitored – they must attend school regularly and maintain a grade point average of 8.5 out of 10.Mujeres en Cambio grew from supporting 8 girls in the beginning to 150 girls today and 43 in university. The girls, from 8 small communities, are chosen by their teachers and principals. The organization’s funds are raised through individual contributions and through ten luncheons held in San Miguel each year where the food is prepared by volunteers and Mexicans and foreigners buy tickets.

What impressed me most about the organization was its commitment to working in the campo and raising the status of women. The state of Guanajuato, surrounding San Miguel, is one of the poorest in Mexico. Although some local workers have access to new opportunities in the tourist sector in San Miguel, campesinos are stuck in farming, mostly growing beans, in a rugged agricultural environment. Mujeres en Cambio reaches those at the bottom, in terms of both poverty and gender. Over 97 percent of the scholarship students are the first in their entire extended family to have the opportunity to study beyond elementary school. For a Mexican campesina, education makes all the difference between a life on a struggling farm and a job as a skilled worker in a town or city -- and personal independence.

WINGS in Guatemala

Thu, 01 Apr 2010 04:22:04 GMT

Having visited Guatemala twice and done a fair amount of research on the country, I am well aware that most low income Guatemalan women do not receive contraceptive services because they cannot afford them or because cultural barriers stand in the way. Guatemala has the highest fertility rate in Latin America. Because women have so many children, one-half of Guatemalan children suffer from chronic malnutrition.

WINGS is an NGO that started in 1999 when a retired US Foreign Service Officer living in Guatemala was asked for help for seven women, each of whom had eight children, and who wanted tubal ligations. In ten years, WINGS has become an extensive program, working in all parts of Guatemala, that provides birth control, does cervical cancer screening, and offers peer education on reproductive health and family planning to adolescents.

There are several aspects of WINGS’ work that are extremely innovative. First, WINGS is committed to capacity-building across Guatemala which means that it shares what it knows with other organizations. How does WINGS do this?

It trains other organizations and their staffs in WINGS methodologies;
It provides funds to other organizations, such as family planning programs at various clinics;
It shares its educational materials and programs with other groups.

Second, WINGS has broadened its scope to include men, the only organization in Guatemala to do so. As WINGS notes, "Guatemala remains highly paternalistic with widespread machista attitudes about women’s roles. The fact that virtually all reproductive health and family planning programs target women rather than men only compounds this problem." WINGS for Men provides educational workshops and puts on mass media campaigns targeting men.

Finally, and perhaps most important of all, is WINGS for Youth. Almost half of the population is under 15 and has almost no information about sex and reproduction. Approximately half of Guatemala’s young women have one child by the time they are 19. Even though the government passed a law requiring access to family planning for all, youth rarely get access in large part because teachers and health providers remain unaware of their obligation to provide sex education. WINGS trains youth to be peer advisers to make up for this gap in services. Hopefully, the next generation of Guatemalans will be more knowledgeable and prepared than today’s adults.

Please learn about WINGS’ invaluable work and contribute in any way you can at their excellent website.

RecyclArt - Costa Rica

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:49:35 GMT

On the Women’s Giving Tree site, we suggest different Ways to Give to NGOs in the developing world. Well, here’s another way to give that most women will appreciate:

You Can SHOP!

Specifically, you can buy RecyclArt Eco-Jewelry: hand-made in the socio-environmental project of a Costa Rican NGO that helps women artisans make a living, by transforming trash into designer accessories. The artisans at RecyclArt are women from rural communities who recoup materials such as pull-tabs from discarded beverage cans that they weave with colorful fabric remnants, and turn into unique necklaces, bracelets, earrings and belts.

The RecyclArt project has two activities. First it trains the women recyclers in this special kind of craftwork. Second, it markets the accessories and manages the sales, providing alternative streams of income for the recycling activity managed by women artisans. The proceeds directly support the environmental education that the recycling women carry out in their respective communities.

Here’s the history of RecyclArt. In 2007, a small environmental coalition and a Costa Rican NGO join their efforts to develop a project that unites art, recycling, environmental education and gender equality. By 2008, a network of production centers had developed and national marketing had begun. These accessories are now being offered in hotel gift-shops and souvenir stores around the country, reaching a small market of eco-conscious tourists. All project activities are still carried out by a team of women volunteers.

In order to sustain the sales in Costa Rica and to develop exports, RecyclArt urgently needs to train more women. This additional production will help the project’s viability, and hopefully permit the women to found their own cooperative.

My colleague, Alexis Fournier, recently visited one of RecyclArt's rural groups and wrote:

RecyclArte has made a huge difference in their community. The women are now invited to participate in municipal meetings, receiving a piece of land for a new recycling center and are in a good position to receive a subsidy to build it. They have been empowered, suddenly have status, are no longer garbage-handlers but nationally recognized artisans, close to exporting! We must replicate this in other villages, and we will!

The environmental commitment and buying-power of first-world consumers directly supports these campesina conservationists, whose creativity contributes to preserving the planet.

Contact RecyclArt in Costa Rica to know how to order from them. Should you wish to become more involved, the project can help you organize “eco-jewelry parties” in your area. This kind of informal sales network has proven effective in generating purchases, especially with “exclusive” articles that are each of a different style and color.

Alexis Fournier alexisf@terranostra-cr.org, elmalex@racsa.co.cr

ReciclArte: Artesanía para la Naturaleza

Tel/Fax (506) 2231-2712 or 8321 2743

For more information and photos visit the RecyclArt blog.

Eye of the Child (EYC)

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 17:49:14 GMT

Malawi is one of the poorest countries in the world, ranking at 160 out of 182 on the UN’s Human Development Index. Where is Malawi? Formerly a British colony named Nyasaland, Malawi is a small landlocked country of 14 million in central sub-Saharan Africa (between Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique) that survives on subsistence agriculture.

It is possible that you first heard of Malawi because Madonna adopted two Malawian children. Her foundation works for hundreds of thousands of orphans (640,000 according to UNAIDS), who have lost their parents in the AIDS epidemic. The national rate of HIV/AIDS infection in Malawi is 14 percent, with 67,000 victims dying each year.

Women and Girls At Risk

Girls are the most vulnerable group in Malawi. For most families, the priority is for girls to get married with the result that very few girls complete primary and secondary school. Other reasons for girls failing to complete education include: girls are often needed by their parents for housework and petty trading; and, in orphan families, girls often end up as breadwinners for their siblings.

Eye of the Child is an exceptional program working to promote and protect child rights in Malawi. They campaign and educate so that an increasing number of girls complete their education. Another campaign linked to this is their plight against child labor. According to the UN, Malawi has the highest level of child labor in the central African region. Eye of the Child trains child protection workers and community-based watch committees so that they can work to identify and then move children out of exploitative work situations with the aim of returning them to school. As Executive Director Maxwell Matewere notes, “Our message is that every child has a right to go to school.”

Here are a few portraits of girls who have been helped. Pilirani, aged 14, lives with her mother and 9 siblings and was withdrawn from prostitution by Eye of the Child and returned to school. Veronica, aged 16, was admitted to secondary school but her parents could not pay school fees so Eye of the Child provides support. Catherine, whose family survives on piece work done by 5 children, was married at 13 but was rescued from her illegal marriage and is attending boarding school. Silviya, a 12 year old orphan, lives with her grandmother and lacked clothes for school or writing materials until Eye of the Child provided support.

Early Marriages

Eye of the Child is also working to limit early marriages and to prevent parents from selling their daughters for dowry payments. Marriage in Malawi is allowed from 15 to 18 with parental consent, and is only “discouraged” for children under 15. Eye of the Child wants to prohibit all marriages under 18 and allow marriages under 21 only with parental consent. “A child bride has to fulfill her conjugal rights,” observes Matewere, “and this has severe health consequences such as maternal mortality. Being young and female is a major risk for HIV/AIDS infection with young girls infected at a considerably disproportional rate to that of boys.”

Trafficking

The 2010 soccer World Cup, to be played in South Africa this summer, represents a threat for Malawi’s girls. The fear is that Malawian children will be rounded up and trafficked to South Africa for prostitution with tourists seeking virgins to protect themselves from AIDS. Matewere notes that “Our greatest fear is that many Malawian children could end up in South Africa brothels.”

Read more about Eye of the Child in Grantee Profiles at The Firelight Foundation.

The World Needs Girls

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:48:29 GMT

Indian women from poor families lead extremely difficult lives – if they even survive. When I was in India five years ago, I was shocked at the rampant discrimination against women. I learned, for instance, that there are fewer women than there should be under normal circumstances due to abandonment of girls, inattention to female children, and even abortion of female fetuses.

Aarti is a multi-faceted program in Kadapa, India (located in Andra Pradesh, between Chennai and Hyderabad) that takes a wide-ranging approach to female needs. Aarti was started by Sandhya Puchalapalli who named the organization after her niece who died in a car accident in 1992 in Massachusetts. The organization took shape when "a young girl, Radhika, three years old, was abandoned on the streets of Kadapa. She was a daughter of a woman killed by her husband.; Sandhya and a few local citizens decided to bring up the girl and a few more like her and Aarti home was born." Aarti Home presently cares for 97 abandoned children, ages 1 to 20. While Aarti accepts both girls and boys, 90 percent of the abandoned children that come to the home are girls.

Sandhya knew it was not enough simply to provide a children's home. Aarti also makes sure that girls are educated because "education is the greatest equalizer." The Aarti school provides Montessori-style education for the young and the Aarti Bridge School offers a program for children who missed schooling and need to be integrated into regular schools. Aarti also provides scholarships for young women.

Aarti has not forgotten adult women. So far, it has assisted over 2500 women with vocational training and has created self-help groups that produce embroidered home furnshings and apparel. And, Aarti has established a Women's Support Centre that offers health services, legal aid, and counseling for abused women.

Aarti is the kind of organization that can make real change in India because it is grass roots and works with the poor. While middle class Indians move into jobs in the high tech world and call centers, the poor fall further and further behind, and the gap between the rich and poor becomes wider. Aarti is a grass roots effort that is supported by the local community but also needs help from the outside. As Sandyha put it, "Saving 10 million girls is difficult, educating 41 million children is tough, protecting 300 million women is next to impossible. Yet, Aarti home, with your help, aims to start this tough task."

Sandyha Puchalapalli understands that the fundamental goal behind her work is a change in social attitudes. She writes, "My dream is for all Indian women to feel truly equal, wanted -- no child is made to feel unwanted just because she is a girl. I would like to see a society where every girl has enough independence to say no to dowry. I would like to see India where the birth of a girl is celebrated, a country where girls grow up to be confident, independent and strong women – with opportunities to do what they please, where girls can dream and dream big."

It's a beautiful dream and Aarti, in one small Indian city, is showing the way.

Please visit www.vftrust.org

AHOPE For Children

Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:48:11 GMT

The numbers of orphans in Ethiopia -- 960,000 -- is phenomenal, the second highest concentration in the world. Perhaps 10 percent are HIV positive, and each year an additional 30,000 children are born HIV positive. Only 2 percent receive treatment, and, without treatment, half of these children will die by the age of two.

I first learned about Ethiopian AIDS orphans in Melissa Fay Greene's extraordinary book, There Is No Me Without You. One Ethiopian woman, Haregewoin Teffara, confronted the AIDS crisis by opening her small home to 1, 2, 3 and ultimately 40 children. At the end of Greene's book, I was moved to do something myself and found a list of organizations that help AIDS orphans. I chose to give to AHOPE for Children and have never been sorry.

In 2002, AHOPE established Layla House, the first organization in Ethiopia to care for HIV orhpans. Today, AHOPE has two children's homes serving 204 orphans, providing them medical treatment, food, clothes, education and emotional support.

In addition, AHOPE works to help orphans stay with their extended families. This is a difficult task because of the stigma of AIDS in Ethiopia, resulting from misinformation and superstition. Thus, families need support to care for their orphaned relatives. The AHOPE Child Development Center, established in 2007, offers services to destitute extended families, including an in-house preschool program, and, for older children, school fees, books and uniforms. The children's guardians receive training in nutrition, hygiene and care for children. The Center even set up a community library so AHOPE orphans would have a chance to interact with community members in a natural social setting.

Together, the children's homes and Child Development Center serve around 300 orphans per year. Volunteers are accepted for 6-week programs. Here's what AHOPE has to say about its volunteer program:

We need and welcome volunteers in Ethiopia. Volunteers are a vital part of our team and take an active part in our programs including health care, care giving, and teaching and tutoring English. If there’s a particular area you are interested in or have expertise in for example music, art or sports, there will be ample opportunity for you to develop programs and work with the children.

All of the children at AHOPE Ethiopia are HIV positive. Volunteers must be medically educated and mentally prepared to work with HIV positive children. Volunteers are required to have proof of current HIV/AIDS awareness training before their application is considered complete. We can only offer one guarantee…….it will change your life!

Volunteering is an exceptional way to help, but so is giving a contribution from your funds or talents.

Please visit the AHope website.