Archive for the ‘Profiles of passion and courage’ Category
Posted by Jon Howard on January 14, 2011 in Big ideas, Profiles of passion and courage
Last night, Gayle and I proudly attended the 17th Annual Latino Dollars for Scholars Award Dinner as LADO scholarship sponsors. We love LADO because it gives deserving and talented students vital help with the steep cost of a college education. We love LADO because it does its work with obvious, all-volunteer joy, pride and astonishing persistence.
But most of all, I think we love LADO because through LADO, we get to see the real American Dream unfolding before us, and the chance to play our small part in making sure that dream never dies.
This year, LADO awarded eighteen $1,000 scholarships to Latino college students from Rhode Island. It’s not a lot of money – unless you need a stethoscope for your nursing classes, like Marissa Laghana, who spoke at last night’s dinner. Or money for books or for travel home. It makes a difference – often it makes the vital difference between staying or leaving.
Marissa’s parents came to Rhode Island from Guatemala. Marissa was her family’s first high school graduate – and she’ll be their first college graduate, too. She knows what her parents struggled through to give her this chance and now she’s going to make their sacrifices worthwhile.
These 18 young men and women are talented, determined, directed. From this point onward they travel their separate paths to destinies they may only guess at today. For most, that future will include reaching back to help those coming along behind.
What strikes me now is the shared road they’ve traveled with their families to arrive at this night. Read More >>
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Posted by Jon Howard on August 4, 2010 in Communicating, Fundraising, Nonprofit Highlights, Profiles of passion and courage
We got a wonderful letter out of the blue last week. The letter was from Alex Marthews, the executive director of Growth Through Learning, one of our very first Cause & Effect clients, and one we hadn’t heard from in the last 13 years.
“Dear Jonathan and Gayle,
“In 1997 a man named Roger Whiting came to you with a story about a Tanzanian woman named Alice Mnaku, who dreamed of going to college but could not afford it. Thanks to your sage advice, Roger went on to found Growth Through Learning. It is lessons he learned from Cause & Effect that has enabled us to become the successful non-profit we are today. This year alone, GTL granted 317 scholarships to bright girls from poor families in East Africa….”
Roger Whiting was a retired insurance man from Worcester, Massachusetts. With no background in international development or education, Roger devised a simple and direct response to Africa’s poverty that has, in the years since 1997, also proven to be profoundly life-changing for hundreds of young women. We were sad to learn that Roger passed away in May of this year. But we are pleased and proud to know that we played a part in setting Growth Through Learning on the path to success.
Just like business start-ups, new nonprofits face an uphill struggle for survival and growth — and with far less access to start-up investment capital. Only yesterday, Gayle and I met a whole roomful of passionate volunteers and staff at the New Roots Providence consultant fair, many of them seeking guidance in their start-up processes.
What might this new generation learn from a file we closed in 1997? We dug deep into Gayle’s hard drive and had a long talk with Alex Marthews to find out. Read More >>
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Posted by Jon Howard on May 6, 2010 in Profiles of passion and courage
Lorén Spears is one of my heroes. The last time I saw her, she was standing in the rain in front of her Nuweetooun School in rural Exeter, RI. The little bridge over Roaring Brook had just been swept away in the massive March floods on March 30. Clearly, our appointment was canceled. I don’t think she saw me wave before I turned around to go home.
It turned out that Lorén was OK, but the school wasn’t. FEMA won’t help pay for the extensive damage it suffered. The loss of the bridge was a final blow, limiting access to a dirt road in poor condition for at least the next two years. I got Lorén’s email announcing a two-year hiatus for Nuweetooun this morning. Rather than mourn, I want to celebrate the seven years that this improbable institution served its community so well.
The Nuweetooun vision was challenging from the beginning: create an accredited, private, alternative K-8 school serving Native children and drawing on Native knowledge, history and values to inform a rigorous science and literacy curriculum. Actually, that was the easy part. At least Lorén made it look easy. It was definitely fun.
The hard part was paying for it. Tuition collections fell far short of costs, so the difference was made up with grants, a little bit of earned money and some individual contributions. Even then, there was always another bill to pay.
Yet, this exciting little two-room school in the woods has flourished educationally for seven years, and so have its Native students. How? Because of the inspired labor of love provided by Lorén as master teacher and by her extended circles of family and friends. Hundreds and probably thousands of hours of unpaid work, infinite patience on the rent money and the chipped-in services of craftspeople and others made it possible to hang on from year to year.
Sure, that’s no way to run a business, but Nuweetooun never has been a business and never needed to be. It has been a circle of people helping each other create something wonderful. I hope and expect that something wonderful will happen again and that we’ll see a new bridge on Roaring Brook and new students at Nuweetooun in two years or so.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on January 18, 2010 in Profiles of passion and courage, World News
“Together we must learn to live together or we will perish as fools…
America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. … There is … nothing except shortsightedness to prevent us from guaranteeing an annual minimum—and livable—income for every American family…”
” … Our only hope today lies in our ability to … go out into a sometimes hostile world declaring eternal opposition to poverty, racism and militarism …
“… We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now … Over the bleached bones and jumbled residues of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: ‘Too late.’ ”
From: “The World House“ chapter in Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?, The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on December 8, 2009 in Profiles of passion and courage, World News
This week we are blogging stories of human rights to commemorate International Human Rights Day, December 10th.
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Some of you may have seen the “60 Minutes” program Congo’s Gold that aired November 29, 2009. The story detailed how the selling of “conflict minerals” such as gold are paying for the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). With almost five million dead, this war has been described as the deadliest war since WWII.
Amnesty International USA describes this as a ” ‘war against women’ where “women and girls are being raped in great numbers as a means of destroying their families and communities.”
What seems so far away and removed from our lives came to us up close Sunday when Congolese refugee Albert Mulenda Rajabu spoke about his experiences in the DRC at the Write-a-Thon for Human Rights sponsored by Group 49 of Amnesty International USA.
Mr. Rajabu, a former teacher, stoically shared his own story of surviving two civil wars despite arrest and jailing for his human rights work in the DRC. But he wept when he reported incidences of sexual violence perpetrated against women and girls. He shared with the room the following story of a survivor’s account of the sexual violence. Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on September 21, 2009 in Great quotes, Profiles of passion and courage
“We will not build a peaceful world by following a negative path. It is not enough to say we must not wage war. It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war but on the positive affirmation of peace… We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, a cosmic melody, that is far superior to the discords of war.”
- Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Nobel Peace Prize Lecture, 1964
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on August 29, 2009 in Big ideas, Great quotes, Profiles of passion and courage
“Circumstances may change, but the work of compassion must continue. It is surely correct that we cannot solve problems by throwing money at them, but it is also correct that we dare not throw our national problems onto a scrap heap of inattention and indifference. The poor may be out of political fashion, but they are not without human needs. The middle class may be angry, but they have not lost the dream that all Americans can advance together…
“A fair prosperity and a just society are within our vision and our grasp, and we do not have every answer. There are questions not yet asked, waiting for us in the recesses of the future, but of this much we can be certain because it is the lesson of all our history: Together a president and the people can make a difference. I have found that faith still alive wherever I have traveled across this land. So let us reject the counsel of retreat and the call to reaction. Let us go forward in the knowledge that history only helps those who help themselves.
“There will be setbacks and sacrifices in the years ahead but I am convinced that we as a people are ready to give something back to our country in return for all it has given to us.
“Let this be our commitment: Whatever sacrifices must be made will be shared and shared fairly. And let this be our confidence: At the end of our journey and always before us shines that ideal of liberty and justice for all.”
Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democratic National Convention 1980
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on January 20, 2009 in Profiles of passion and courage
Words seem inadequate to express all that I am feeling today. But this one, Jubilation, comes closest. Def. Jubilation – “a feeling of extreme joy”, “full of high spirited delight”, “a joyful occasion to celebrate a special event.”
Congratulations, President Barack Obama. The hopes and dreams of the world’s people rest with you today and throughout your presidency. Courage. While there is much to do, there are many who are willing to help if asked.
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