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Displaying 181–192 of 213

Pintando Caminos Asociacion Para Recrear el Futuro

Mission To win children away from a life of war and delinquency, with love, through education and the holistic development of their academic, personal, and social abilities, empowering them to construct and achieve their own life projects. Vision That the children of Ciudad Bolivar will be capable of breaking their cycle of poverty and become the kind of persons that they desire to be. Values - Love and respect for oneself and for others - Always put oneself in the place of the other - Pursue excellence - Seek justice About Pintando Caminos Who We Are Pintando Caminos Asociacion para Recrear el Futuro (Pintando Caminos Association to Recreate the Future) is a registered non-profit that, for more than 12 years, has provided spaces and opportunities to improve the lives of boys and girls who live in the oppressed and impoverished neighborhood of Potosi, in Ciudad Bolivar (Bogota, Colombia). We desire to break the cycle of poverty in Colombia ad to provide the children and young adults with all the necessary tools for them to succeed in life in a dignified way, and to help the youth become complete and integrated persons, with values that make it possible for us to build a better country in the future.

Women's Microfinance Initiative

WMI was founded in November, 2007 by seven Washington DC area professional women to address women's economic disenfranchisement in rural East Africa. Two board members were working with a rural women's association in Sironko District, Uganda through a church project, and the village women asked for help to establish a loan program. WMI, unlike conventional aid initiatives, preserves its capital basis by providing loans rather than subsidies. WMI makes loans to impoverished women in developing nations who have no access to banks. Issuing affordable, collateral-free loans for as little as $50, WMI promotes women's economic empowerment to reduce global poverty. WMI's goal is to help poor women build assets to stabilize their income, improve their familiy's living standard, become advocates for their families/communities, and transition into independent banking and the formal economy. In its ten years of operation, WMI has created 13 geographical loan hubs in Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania, issuing over 40,000 loans totaling $5 million to 14,000 women. 5,000 have graduated from WMI's two-year loan and training program.

PEPY Empowering Youth

"Connecting Cambodian Youth to the skills, opportunities, and inspirations needed to reach their potential." This is the mission of PEPY Empowering Youth, a local non-profit (NGO) focused on educating and empowering youth in underserved and remote communities outside of Siem Reap city. With their team's intimate understanding of barriers affecting students' ability to move onto higher education (many team members are former beneficiaries of PEPY's projects), PEPY staff often become student's first role models while building their capacity to achieve their dreams through academic, technical, and professional training- enabling them to make changes they wish to see in their communities. Through PEPY, students' rates of moving onto higher education and obtaining skilled employment are increasing. PEPY's approach to education development is different because they focus on high school and higher education students, an age group often overlooked, while targeting remote areas where higher education is uncommon and often financially impossible. PEPY's programs are comprehensive and go beyond typical scholarship programs, guaranteeing that students graduate and all of them find jobs while they are still in school.

Libraries Without Borders

Libraries Without Borders is an international nonprofit that expands access to information, education and cultural resources to vulnerable populations around the world. Our interventions address the structural causes of economic and human underdevelopment, reduce the digital divide, and promote cultural resilience. By focusing on the curation and customization of educational materials, along with the logistics and security involved with delivery, storage and construction of learning spaces, we have been able to develop innovative programs, create and re-envision library spaces and support librarians in over 25 countries. Most recently, we received the Library of Congress' International Literacy Award (2016) and won the Google Impact Challenge (2015). We advocate the idea of the library as a toolbox for communities to disseminate knowledge, promote social harmony, accompany the least fortunate, and ultimately, pursue human and economic development. We work in five areas of intervention: 1. EDUCATION LWB establishes libraries and information resource centers in universities and schools. This support manifests itself in the donation of materials, technical equipment, texts, and multimedia and electronic resources. LWB also provides support to teachers in their education responsibilities by putting in place educational resource centers as well as creating educational digital content. 2. INFORMATION AND CULTURE LWB supports the development of structures providing access to books, information and culture in developing countries. LWB enters into partnerships with libraries to help them develop their textual and digital resources and set up quality cultural programs. LWB also accompanies the creation of cultural projects for specific and disadvantaged groups such as visually impaired persons, prisoners and refugee populations. 3. CAPACITY BUILDING LWB initiates innovative specialized resource projects to reinforce the capacities of specific groups such as professionals from the medical or justice sectors. In facilitating access to verified and quality-controlled information, LWB accompanies their daily work in servicing their communities as well as their scientific research. 4. CONSERVATION OF CULTURAL HERITAGE LWB assists in the conservation and promotion of local written or oral heritage through the creation of specialized structures (libraries, cultural centers) and the training of personnel in these professions. Within the framework of promoting local knowledge and supporting publishers in developing countries, LWB also promotes the diffusion of local literature. 5. CULTURAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP LWB works alongside cultural entrepreneurs to design innovative and sustainable economic models. By setting up income-generating activities and training in management strategies, libraries are re-invented as social and cultural entrepreneurs with major economic benefits for their communities.

Inter-American Restoration Corporation

Vision Statement- To provide social restoration for third-world countries and the US in all phases of social interaction, including: health and medical, spiritual, social, educational, and vocational spheres of human existence. Mission Statement-The Inter-American Restoration Corporation is committed to addressing the needs of impoverished, underprivileged, or traumatized people, both at home and abroad. Established as a 501C3 corporation in 2002, IRC has strategically incorporated first-world resources, business practices, and efficiency with compassion and focus. The result has been to provide necessary and needed relief directly to the people who lack life's essential conveniences. Driven to satisfy the complete spectrum of the individual, IRC is dedicated to facilitating the spiritual, educational, physical, and the community needs of the person. As such, IRC directs projects geared toward the revitalization of the whole person and whole community. VALUES: 1) We Value the strength of community to empower operations, to leverage opportunities, and enhance communication. 2) We Value individual passions. 3) We Value organization that leads to efficient process, purposeful actions, and dynamic results.4) We Value Spiritual leadership as expressed in outward, inward and unseen actions. 5) We Value the necessity of empowering indigenous peoples to take control of their own social destiny. 6)We Value cultures of all kinds 7) We value opportunity.

Girl Determined

Girl Determined is a leadership project designed to assist girls ages 12-17 to avoid the pitfalls of trafficking, dangerous labor and other forms of violence, by facilitating girls' recognition of their personal and group potential. Because of our belief in girls as potential change-agents in their households, communities and nations, our program aims to increase girls' ability to make strategic life-decisions, generate choices and exercise bargaining power. This real empowerment creates opportunities for girls to better cope with their difficulties, envision alternatives and take leadership into their own hands. The underlying premise of Girl Determined work is that educating, connecting, supporting and fostering the development of personal and group voice amongst marginalized adolescent girls will derail cycles of abuse, poverty and neglect. Not only is adolescence a period when girls are gaining abstract thinking skills and sexual awareness, it is a time when they are all too quickly being pressured to take on adult responsibility and this is particularly for girls, resulting in lost growth and development opportunities. The rights of girls in Burma is often regarded as being equal to that of boys and girls rights, in general, is not thought of as a serious issue in the country, despite the fact that the sexual exploitation and the trafficking of young girls to China for forced marriage, for example, continues to increase, or that the so-called "un-wrapping" of girls (selling young, virgin girls into prostitution) continues to take place on the outskirts of Burma's most prosperous cities-Rangoon and Mandalay. This apathy, social acceptance and tolerance of rights violations against girls smacks of an underlying gender discrimination: a discrimination which forces more girls to drop out of school so their male siblings can continue; compels girls to engage in child labour, to support their families income or, more accurately, the short, often paltry economic interests of their parents/household at the expense of the best interest of the child. Girl Determined's work empowers girls to achieve that which is in their own best interest while working structurally to establish mechanisms for greater awareness of the specific needs of adolescent girls, their protection and increasing their life-opportunities. Girl Determined employs a three-pronged strategic approach: 1. Individual transformation - Adolescent girls will go through some form of personal transformation lending to a change in a girl's understanding of personal power and rights. Shifts will include reduction of shame and fear regarding violence, ability to identify and express situations of discrimination, value of self and education, motivation and skill to actively make decisions about ones future. 2. Network mobilization - Girls will develop a sense of connectedness with girls from across the country through their shared experiences and complex differences. By bringing girls together across space, through 'by-girls, for-girls' media projects, Girls' Forum and our Girls Advisory Board, girls will mobilize as defenders and actors. This wide network also creates a structure through which other programs could potentially be realized. 3. Research and Advocacy - Evidence-based research will assist Girl Determined in bringing increased attention to the plight and power of the girl child in Burma. We will focus research and related advocacy domestically, pushing governmental and non-governmental agencies to recognize the specific needs of girls in their programming.

Hope Foundation for African Women (HFAW)

Mission: Hope Foundation for African Women (HFAW) is a nonpartisan not for profit national grassroots organization committed to women and girls empowerment, their sexual and reproductive health and human rights as well as elimination of gender disparities in all our communities. We work for the empowerment of grassroots women and girls through income generating activities and education about their rights. We address gender inequalities through raising awareness, trainings, motivating, inspiring and mentoring the women and organizations we work with. Our identity statement: We have firm believe in the power of ordinary people to change their situation and seek to unveil it Guiding Principle: To promote gender equality and equity for all Core Strategies: HFAW has adopted the strategies in addressing gender inequalities. We work with grassroots women and women's organizations to facilitate women's empowerment. We do this through various means: Engaging them in economic growth through individual and group projects Providing skills to address sexual and reproductive health knowledge and services Involving them in innovative strategies to total eradication of female genital mutilation (FGM) Supporting them to question gender based violence and use whatever formal or informal means available to them to end this vice in their community We mentor women with self-advocacy skills and motivate them to be leaders in their families and communities Educate women on their rights as guaranteed in the 2010 constitution We build the capacity of women to promoters of health, safe environment and other rights Our Core Values -To fight against marginalization of individuals -To be professional, confidential and respectful -Commitment to women's empowerment and seek respectful teamwork with individuals and groups and to uphold every person's human dignity and to do our work with utmost integrity, honesty, transparency and accountability -We have passion, calm and logic in our work to eliminate gender disparities Our History: HFAW was started in August 2011 by Dr. Grace B. Mose Okong'o and Mrs. Hellen Njoroge as a response to debates in our country that suggest that Kenya's women are not ready or willing to take up political leadership positions to fill the one third constitutional mandate. Currently only a few seats in the National Assembly are occupied by women, we have not met the 1/3 mandate. HFAW leaders see the problem as originating from our extreme patriarchal society which discriminates against women. Advancing women's participation in leadership has to start with addressing the whole spectrum of inequalities at the grassroots. We must address economic and educational inequalities. Women have to be economically empowered and educated about their constitutional and women's human rights. HFAW leaders are engaging women in civic education, women's rights, violence against women, reproductive health and services, and total eradication of FGM.We have started with two marginalized communities of Kisii and Maasai where FGM practice is universal with nearly 97% girls undergoing it. This practice is so detrimental physically but also mentally as it socializes women to accept their poverty and low status position in their families, communities and nation. The overall goal of this project is to improve economic and health of poor and vulnerable women,and advance human rights of Kenyan women and families through education, leadership training and the development of community health teams. One of our current objective is to adopt popular education model as implemented by EPES Foundation in South America to train 30 health and human rights promoters to work in rural villages in Nyamira. We will use the model to eradicate FGM in these communities; advance reproductive health, economic prosperity and human rights. Ultimately these women will lead much higher quality life and participate in their families and nation as full human beings.

MEDRIX

MEDRIX works to save lives and improve the quality of life of disadvantaged people in Vietnam by providing Medical, Educational and Development Resources through International eXchange. In 2000, MEDRIX became an official non-profit organization in Washington State and in 2002 MEDRIX received official Non-Government Organization licensure to operate in Vietnam. Prior to this, co-founder and Executive Director LaRelle Catherman was invited to conduct research alongside Vietnamese physicians on home treatment for diarrhea in Hue, Vietnam. It became evident that most children suffered from diarrhea due to lack of safe water. Co-founder of MEDRIX, meteorologist, and businessman Robert Catherman undertook the task of finding a method of providing safe, drinkable water. He, along with many MEDRIX volunteers, began to work with provincial leaders to develop an affordable and sustainable water treatment system. MEDRIX began to grow as a result of these initial project ideas and new programs were put into place to address the greater healthcare, nutrition, and hygiene needs of under-served rural villages. MEDRIX accomplishes its goal of saving lives and improving the quality of life in Vietnam through the following endeavors: -Health and hygiene education for children in hand washing, oral care, and nutrition. -Providing education for women in nutrition, food preparation, food safety, along with health and hygiene during pregnancy. -Autism education training for health workers and community education efforts to ease the burden of autism in children. -Life-saving heart surgeries for disadvantaged children and young adults. -Pediatric education workshops in World Health Organization approved curricula for health workers in rural Vietnam. -Nursing education workshops for professional nurses at National Pediatric Hospital and Hue Central Hospital. -GIS mapping workshops to teach Vietnamese healthcare workers how to gather pertinent health information for epidemiological tracking purposes.

The International Legal Foundation

The International Legal Foundation assists countries emerging from conflict or transition to establish public defender systems that provide effective, quality criminal defense services to the poor. In 2003, the ILF opened Afghanistan's first independent public defender office in Kabul, and has since established public defender offices in Nepal and the West Bank. The ILF's mission is to assist post-conflict and transitional countries to establish public defender systems that provide quality and effective criminal defense services to the poor. In carrying out its mission, the ILF is driven by the belief that defense lawyers - as guardians of due process - are indispensible to any fair system of justice, and every person accused of a crime should have access to one. We work solely in countries emerging from conflict where governments have recognized the right to counsel and are committed to building a strong and fair system of justice, and aim to ensure that laws that guarantee the right to counsel are meaningfully implemented in ways that respect the historical, practical and cultural context of each country. The lack of qualified lawyers available to provide criminal defense representation to the poor is a serious problem in post-conflict and transitional countries. Many of these countries guarantee the right to counsel to persons accused of crimes in their constitutions and other domestic laws. Moreover, many have ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which requires them to ensure the right to counsel. Yet in practice, there are few defense lawyers for the poor in many developing countries. Those that do practice are often grossly unqualified. Without access to counsel there can be no rule of law and accused persons remain vulnerable to arbitrary detention, coerced and tortured confessions, wrongful convictions and other abuses. The ILF fulfills an essential role in post-conflict reconstruction. Although there is a growing focus on rule of law in post-conflict countries, rule of law projects have placed a heavy emphasis on rebuilding courts and law enforcement institutions and give little attention to the critical role of defense, particularly criminal defense services for the poor. The ILF addresses this need by providing indigent accused persons with access to competent, well-trained defense lawyers. This helps to ensure that laws and constitutional provisions protecting the rights of the accused are implemented and that all citizens have equal access to justice.

Karuna Deutschland e.V.

Karuna Deutschland is committed towards ending caste-based discrimination, dedicating efforts for poverty-alleviation, and ensuring equality in India and Nepal. Our mission is to serve individuals and families of the poorest communities in India and Nepal. The women and children as well as people from lower cast backgrounds come under the most vulnerable population in India and Nepal. The former "untouchable" castes are still suffering from social exclusion and violence and also form the largest chunk of 'ultra-poor' in these countries. It is extremely difficult for them to access healthcare, education, housing and a dignified livelihood. Dalit women and girls particularly are subjected to gender-based violence and exclusion. Although caste-based discrimination has no legal premises, the stigma attached to the lower castes in India and Nepal hinder their dignified participation in all spheres of life. They are pushed further behind by a variety of forces such as existing discrimination, inequality, poverty, illiteracy etc. Therefore, we endeavour to remove the root causes of discrimination, exclusion and poverty. We seek to run our projects and activities based on the principle of inclusion, justice, diversity and equality in order to drive a positive as well as holistic change at the community level. The foundation of our work lies in engendering a dignified life for the people; helping them build a better future for themselves as well as empowering them to take their destiny into their own hands. To elicit lasting solutions to the problems we intend to address, our approach is based upon self-help, self-determination and self-reliance at the community level. The principle of 'leaving no one behind' as mentioned in the Sustainable development goals is enshrined in our core values. Changes often happen at the local level. Creative and innovative solutions are pertinent to reach our goals. Our activities are thus built upon a wealth of local skills and knowledge. We seek to understand the vulnerabilities, strengths and needs of our target groups. Evidence based approach rooted in in-depth analysis, research of ground needs and realities is extremely important for us to promote accountability and responsibility. The four pillars of Karuna Deutschland's work are made of Education, Health, Dignified Livelihoods and Gender Equality. These four pillars are the key focus areas of the work carried out by Karuna Deutschland in India and Nepal. More information about Karuna Deutschland's activities can be found on our website.

Secours Catholique - Caritas France

Our purpose is to reduce poverty, bring hope and solidarity to poor communities or individuals in France and worldwide. We bring assistance to families, children and young people but also to the most vulnerable (homelesses, migrants, prisoners etc.). We fight against isolation, help them to find employement and we ensure their social reintegration. We provide emergency responses but also long term support, development aid and we work on the causes of poverty. The action of Secours Catholique finds all its meaning in a global vision of poverty which aims at restoring the human person's dignity and is part and parcel of sustainable development. To do so, six key principles guide this action, both in France and abroad: Promoting the place and words of people living in situations of poverty Making each person a main player of their own development Joining forces with people living in situations of poverty Acting for the development of the human person in all its aspects Acting on the causes of poverty and exclusion Arousing solidarity The actions of Secours Catholique are implemented by a network of local teams of volunteers integrated into the diocesan delegations and supported by the volunteers and employees of the national headquarters. On an international level, Secours Catholique acts in cooperation with its partners of the Caritas Internationalis network. Key figures of Secours Catholique: 100 diocesan or departmental delegations 4,000 local teams 65,000 volunteers 974 employees 2,174 reception centres 3 centres : Cite Saint-Pierre in Lourdes, Maison d'Abraham in Jerusalem, Cedre in Paris 18 housing centres managed by the Association des Cites of Secours Catholique 162 Caritas Internationalis partners 600,000 donors Every year Secours Catholique encounters almost 700,000 situations of poverty and receives 1.6 million people (860,000 adults and 740,000 children). This daily mission led in the field by the local teams and delegations, with the support of national headquarters, pursues three major objectives which aim at exceeding the distribution action and limited aid: Receiving to reply to the primary needs (supplying food and/or health care aid, proposing accommodation, establishing an exchange and a fraternal dialogue, etc) Supporting to restore social ties (bringing together people in difficulty with an aim to reinsertion, encouraging personal initiatives and collective projects, establishing a mutual support helper-receiver of help relationship, etc) Developing to strengthen solidarity (proposing long lasting solutions, establishing a follow-up over the long term, encouraging collective actions carried out by people in difficulty etc.)

Seeds for a Future

Perched atop the buried pre-classic Maya city of Chocola, the village of Chocola on the back slopes of the volcanoes that form Lake Atitlan, is poverty stricken yet poised to become a model of cultural celebration and self-sufficiency. What it needs most is leadership training and technical support to develop its potential for diversified agriculture, archeological-tourism, health care for its families and education for its children. In its simplest terms, the mission of Seeds for a Future is to help this impoverished community plan and achieve prosperity based on balanced development principles that protect cultural tradition, the natural environment and preserve the Mayan and post-colonial history of the town. Seeds for a Future traces its roots to the period from 2003 through 2006 when many Earthwatch Institute volunteers came to Chocola to work on the archaeological site, which was then being excavated under license from the Guatemalan government. The volunteers embraced being associated with an important archaeological endeavor and learned about the vast pre-Classic Maya city that may hold keys to the early development of Mayan language, system of time and other fundamental cultural practices. At the same time, many of us fell in love with the community, its families and children and the fabulous, healthy mountain environment. As a result, groups of volunteers organized to help a community struggling with terrible poverty and deprivation to find a way to prosperity without destroying their way of life or the delicate balance of their natural environment. A vision emerged among a core of volunteers, Guatemalan visionaries and local leaders in which Chocola is seen as lifting itself into a more healthy and prosperous community based on its historic farming skills, adding value to its coffee, vegetable and cacao producers and through community cooperative action. In the future, there is great promise for the development of Chocola as a tourist destination based on archaeo-tourism; conservation of the natural resources in which the community is embedded and conservation of one of the first and greatest coffee processing plants (beneficios) established during the 1890s. But we also discovered in the early years that before Chocola could begin to realize its potential, the people needed training in identifying their own vision for the future, learning to work together and acquiring the technical skills needed for success. Overcoming 500 years of economic and social servitude is not easily done, but real progress is being made and our program has been recognized as ground-breaking, by the Guatemalan Ministry of Culture and others. Four operating principles guide the work we do: We provide information and technical assistance to the people of Chocola to help them evaluate new opportunities and to plan. We provide direct funding and other forms of support for community requests for assistance on specific projects. These requests must come through Chocola leadership and must demonstrate sustainability and a willingness and capability of the community to provide part of the needed resources. All programs must aim at achieving self-sufficiency. We will help with programs that governmental agencies believe may be of value, provided that they too meet the same test as is noted for the community above. All such requests must be consistent with our mission to help the people and do no harm to either the Maya archaeological site or to the 1890 Coffee Finca site. In all of our programs we try to ensure that the participants become more engaged in the social and civil fabric, that they gain self confidence in their ability to change their own future for the better, and that we provide knowledge and coaching for a sufficient period of time that their activities and new ideas become self-sustaining in the community.