Fall 2010 Emily Grantees Announced
The Emily Sandall Foundation and the International Initiative to End Child Labor’s Board of Directors and staff are pleased to announce the new Emily Grantees for the fall of 2010. From a wide and varied group of applicants, four Emily grantees have been selected. These grantees represent three regions of the world—Africa (Liberia), Asia (India) and the Middle East (Pakistan). With so many worthy applicants that proposed a wide variety of creative and meaningful projects, the decision was very difficult. However, the four projects selected stood out among the other applicants for their unique and innovative approaches to addressing child labor in their local communities and to raise awareness that highlights the vulnerabilities of the children in need. The four grants will be awarded to:
1. Buchanan Child Community Based Care (BUCCOBAC)- Liberia
2. Women and Child Development Charitable Trust (WCDCT) – India
3. Ms. Vasanthan Padmavathi – India
4. Mr. Fayyaz Adrees – Pakistan
There were numerous other worthy applications. These applications will be provided another chance for funding during the spring 2011 application cycle. In the event that additional funds are raised to support Emily grants in 2010, additional grants will be awarded from the existing applications.
If you or your organization is interested in supporting an Emily grantee, please follow the link under “Donate Now.” Funds raised will be used t further support one of the above grantees or assist with the funding of an additional applicant. The only cost deducted from contributions for Emily Grants are those associated with the cost of processing the payments to the intended grant recipient.
Africa – Liberia
The Buchanan Child Community Based Care (BUCCOBAC), an NGO formed in 1994 with the support of Save the Children UK-Liberia, will be funded an Emily grant to conduct a local community awareness campaign against child prostitution. The goal of the project is to work towards supporting the successful eradication of child labor in the families and communities of Grand Bassa and Rivercess Counties. In particular, the project will target child labor education, prevention, and withdrawal of girls sent by parents to engage in commercial sex as a means to support their family. In particular, the project will be carried out in the city of Buchanan and the surrounding Grand Bassa County, both in urban and peri-urban communities. Later, the project will be extended into Rivercess County where a new logging company (Liberia Timber Trading Company) has begun operations. The project’s first objective is to increase awareness in Grand Bassa County by 25% by identifying victims of child labor and their parents in 80 targeted communities, facilitating 8 meetings with victims of child labor and their parents on the danger of child labor (prostitution), and facilitating the establishment of a network of four (4) child labor monitoring groups (CLMGs). The second objective is to increase knowledge of the dangers of child labor by 80% of community members targeted through artistically informed activities that will aid in awareness raising and behavior modification through establishing one artistic club to dramatize the activities of child labor, facilitating radio broadcasts on the issues involving child labor, and developing one video clip on child labor dramatized through music and video by the members of the artistic club and presented throughout the targeted communities.
Emily Impressions: This project would be very important to Emily. She worked tirelessly to improve the lives and futures of child laborers and street children around the world. She would have felt passionate about supporting a project to help prevent girls from entering a life of prostitution.
Asia – India
Women and Child Development Charitable Trust (WCDCT), an NGO operating in Tamil Nadu, India, will be funded an Emily grant to target child labor prevention services for children working in brick kilns, wheelers, spinning mills, agriculture, construction and domestic service in Nalikkalpatty, Gajalnaickenpatty, Dasanaickenpatty, Thammanaickenpatty and Nillavarapatty villages of the Salem District in India. The project will establish a micro-loan program and provide orientations to 30 mothers who are parents of child laborers on alternative income generation methods, such as sheep rearing and growing Azore that allows for children to attend school as opposed to working providing income for the family. More specifically, the project will: 1) provide orientations to parents of children at work on alternative methods of income generation, ram rearing and growing azolla; 2) establish a micro-loan program to distribute revolving funds to targeted families to purchase and raise a pair of rams and grow azolla; and 3) orient the families on the ills of child labor, the importance of education and the need for enrolling their children in school.
Emily Impressions: Emily believed strongly in the philosophy of micro-loans as a way to empower women and improve their family’s future. She would be very excited about this project.
Ms. Vasanthan Padmavathi is a young woman from an artisan community living in Tiruchirapalli district of Tamil Nadu, India. She has worked on human rights issues for the past 12 years before forming the Community Renovation and Organization Advancement Trust (COROAT), a newly formed NGO soon to be registered in India. Ms. Padmavathi is from a vulnerable family and is the first woman from her community to obtain a post graduate degree. She is working to mobilize the artisan community into a self-help group to seek alternative employment that will lead to support for the education of artisan children. Ms. Padmavathi will be funded an Emily grant to develop two folk songs as a communication tool for sensitizing artisans on the benefits of education for children and the risks to that education associated with child labor. Specifically, her project objectives are to: 1) sensitize the artisan community on the importance of education for their children, 2) reduce the vulnerability of artisan children from entering child labor, and 3) to motivate the children of artisans to continue their education and not drop out of school. Project activities and outcomes will include: a) developing two folks songs for sensitizing the artisan community, b) training children and youth volunteers on using the songs for street performances, c) training five volunteers in folk dance for dissemination of messages through song and dance among the artisan community, d) recording the two songs on a CD, e) releasing the CD to government officials, f) using the CD as an advocacy tool for attracting support for the education of artisan children, g) supporting the education of 10 of the most vulnerable children from the artisan community through the purchase of education materials, h) motivating other children to continue their education, and i) garnering media support to spread the work of the project.
Emily Impressions: This project would be very dear to Emily’s heart. She believed strongly in the power of music as a tool. She was very creative when she worked with disadvantaged children and had hoped to work in India.
Middle East – Pakistan
Mr. Fayyaz Adrees is a film-maker, journalist and researcher from Lahore, Pakistan. He has assisted CNN, BBC and the NewsHour teams with filming while on location in Pakistan for news and other film documentaries. Mr. Adrees will be funded an Emily grant to support his developing a five-minute short film story of the impact of the floods in Pakistan on children’s education and involvement in child labor. Millions have been affected by the floods and most of the families have lost their homes and means for earning an income, especially those who had a farm or small business. They have lost all in the flood waters just now beginning to recede. Further, most of the schools that children formerly attended have been destroyed or severely damaged, meaning that once it is possible to return to school, there will be no school for the children to attend. With the rebuilding that occurs during recovery, there is a high risk that children will become a large part of the workforce used in construction, brick making and other hazardous work. Currently, many of the families are living in camps and even some families are living in graveyards as they have nowhere else to go. Mr. Adrees’ project will include his traveling to the flood affected areas, researching the impact of the floods on schools, examining the nature of the recovery efforts and how children’s needs are being addressed during the emergency and recovery phases, filming and photographing the interviews with flood-affected parents and children, and producing a short four to five minute film story that tells their story of the floods from the children’s perspective.
Emily Impressions: Emily believed strongly in the power of images to get a message across. She often worked with disposable cameras with street children,”to see the world through their eyes.”She would feel it very important to support this project.
