North American Chinese Educational Foundation
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Letter of Hope ProjectRobert Denning and Alex Quintana Writing on Behalf of: China Youth Development Foundation Beijing, China A endorsed letter from our two high school student directors in Conneticut region---NACEF Dear Sir/Madam, Robert Denning and I are working in collaboration with the China Youth Development Foundation in what we believe to be a very worthy charity: building a school in China. We have both traveled extensively in Asia and are currently studying Chinese. After thorough research we have determined that this charity is worthy of our support in attempting to help raise educational standards in the world’s largest country. We hope that you too will come to the conclusion that Project Hope, the educational branch of the China Youth Development Foundation, is a both beneficial and highly deserving charity. Imagine, for a moment, that your family cannot afford to pay the small tuition it costs for you to attend school. Despite the fact that you are both willing and eager to learn your chance of receiving an education, even in such basics as reading and writing, is very slim. Now imagine that through some miracle you are able to attend school, however the school you attend is in such poor condition that you must sit on muddy floors and learn how to read with fifty other students, one teacher, and absolutely no supplies. On top of that, you are struggling to stay warm in your unheated schoolhouse where outside temperatures regularly reach below freezing in the winter. When it rains, and the roof leaks, you must ignore this inconvenience and continue studying, for you cannot afford to miss a day of school. This is, unfortunately, the reality for millions of rural Chinese children who must deal with similar conditions to the ones described, and whose desire to learn is often inhibited because of poor facilities and financial inequality. For millions of children, however, there is Project Hope, the educational branch of the internationally renowned China Youth Development Foundation. When Project Hope first began in 1989, its goal of educating Chinese youth was established, and in 1996 it announced its ambitious goal to provide more than 2.5 million students with scholarships and build over 6,000 Project Hope schools by 2000. By 1998, Project Hope had been able to provide 2,098,766 children with scholarships and build over 7, 111 Hope Primary Schools in the 9 years it had been in operation. In China a total of $5.09 billion is spent on education, leaving every Chinese student with approximately $24 spent on their entire lifetime of schooling. With CYDF still thriving, yet still in need of constant support, the outlook for Chinese youth is brighter than it has ever been. People around the globe have recognized the China Youth Development Foundation and Project Hope as excellent organizations. CYDF has been commended by the United Nations, is a partner with the much respected International Youth Foundation, headquartered in Baltimore, and according to the Chinese National Research Center for the Development of Science and Technology, Project Hope specifically “has become the most prestigious non-governmental social welfare undertaking in China in the 1990’s with the most extensive social participation.” From around the world, praise continues to follow in the wake of Project Hope, including support from major corporations in the United States. World leaders such as Chinese President Jiang Zemin and former Secretary-General of the United Nations Boutros Boutros-Ghali have commended the organization for its outstanding work. The New York Times and other organizations have praised Project Hope for its unbiased approach to education, specifically in its emphasis on ensuring equal opportunities for girls as well as boys. Traditionally, in China, the education of males is seen as a higher priority, and due to this view women rarely are given the educational opportunities that men receive. Project Hope has worked extremely diligently to provide scholarships to boys and girls equally in order to enable both sexes to achieve their full potential and end many of the inherent prejudices so common in rural Chinese life. For many families in China, faced with the decision of which of their children to send to school, the male is almost always given this opportunity. Young women are therefore prevented in many cases from assuming more prominent roles in Chinese society because their education is not at the same level as that of their male counterparts. In supporting Project Hope and CYDF, you are not only enabling children to attend school, but you are also helping to minimize the centuries-old system of female discrimination by helping them to improve their objective conditions. Perhaps the most personally gratifying element of giving to Project Hope is knowing how beneficial your support can be for a rural community. “For each pupil in first or second grade, the tuition and supplies including textbooks costs 18 Yuan (US$2.16) and for each pupil in third, fourth, or fifth grade the tuition runs as high as 19 Yuan (US$2.28). Well, we just asked them to buy textbooks on Chinese language, math, and morality. We do not ask them to buy textbooks on nature, geology, history, music, or fine arts. It’s not that we do not want them, but we cannot afford them.” For only fifty dollars, the cost of a basic textbook in the United States, you can pay for the tuition of one student to go to school for all five years of his or her elementary school career. This small fee includes all textbooks, supplies, and tuition. Truly, this is such a small sacrifice for many of us here in the United States, and our money can make such an enormous difference on the lives of so many. For only $24,400 it is possible to build an entirely new school that will provide a clean, safe, and warm facility for more than 300 students to attend. With the construction of a new school, generations of villagers will be enormously impacted and hopefully the vicious cycle of poverty can be ended. Therefore, we are asking for your donations not only because this is such an excellent cause, but also because through your donations we can provide hope to so many impoverished and destitute rural Chinese children. Both Robert and I are studying Chinese and have either visited extensively or lived in Asia, and feel that our connection to this area of the world warrants your special attention. Our goal is to raise the $24,400 needed to build a new Hope Primary School and spend $5,600 to endow scholarships for 112 students to attend our school. We expect to maintain a strong relationship with the students, faculty, and village that will be so positively affected from your support. We will endeavor to ensure that the school continues to prosper and educate children with the goal of ending the desperate poverty that is so common in many rural Chinese villages. Currently, we are working to establish a “sister school” relationship between Greenwich High School and the school we will build in China. We have founded the Project Hope Independent Study at Greenwich High School and are working with our faculty advisor to raise awareness of the plight of rural education in China. We are also working with the North American Chinese Educational Foundation (NACEF), which has ties at many major universities, to ensure that all donations are tax-deductible. We hope that after examining the enormous inequalities in the educational standards between our community and the village where the school will be built, you can come to the same conclusion that we have: this is not only a truly deserving cause, but your support can make such an incredible impact on the lives of so many.
Sincerely, Robert Denning & Alejandro Quintana The information in this letter was collected from public relations information of CYDF, including, but not exclusively, their annual report, brochures, and publications. All references and factual information were provided to us by CYDF with the exception of one New York Times article, entitled “for China’s Rural Migrants An Education Wall,” which appeared on Sunday, December 12, 1999, and was the original impetus for this project. ReferenceBoth Robert Denning and Alejandro B. Quintana are high school students at Greenwich High School, Greenwich, CT. Both of them are excellent and outstanding fellows in academic and society activities at Greenwich High School. They received many honors including National Honor Society of Secondary Schools, Model UN Award, University of Michigan Book Award, Spanish Honors Society, History Award(Greenwich Country Day School). They are working very productively with Project Hope for years and funded/co-chaired The Project Hope Independent Study club. Moreover they are active members of Model UN club, Sailing team, Student Leadership, Peer Mentors, ABC Tutors, Piano, Latin Classics Club, Teen Scene, Tennis, Christ Church as well as Columnist in Student Newspaper, The Beak. Both of them are serving as project directors of NACEF.
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Contact InformationNorth American Chinese Educational Foundation(NACEF) is a section 501©(3) charitable organization dedicated to the purpose of public education. Accordingly, your donation to North American Chinese Educational Foundation is tax deductible, If you have any question, please contact us through address bellow.
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