Sunday, March 24, 2013

Grant Update #2 and Material Donations List

I would like to thank all of the generous people that have donated to my Peace Corps Partnership grant. When my counterpart and I originally applied for the grant I thought, for sure, that it would take much longer to fund, thusly making my stay here in Ethiopia a bit longer than I’d planned. However, the donations have added up quickly, and I’m very pleased to announce that, as of March 22nd,
$2,722.50 out of the $3,202.50 needed has already been raised! That means there is only a mere $480.00 left to raise!
Thank you all so very much.
With the end of fund raising in sight, I’ve begun to plan the training I will be giving to the local Kindergarten teachers and teacher’s aids. I’m happy to inform everyone interested that I’ll also be able to include school supervisors in the training, giving them the information they need to be able to make sure their KG teachers are utilizing the skills they’ve learned. Without the grant, this whole project would have been much harder, if not impossible, to accomplish.
I’ve been asked several times if it is possible for people to make donations of materials rather than money. The answer, of course, is yes. I’ve created a basic list of items that would be most useful and beneficial. If you are considering sending material donations, there are a few things to consider before you do so.
v  It can be quite pricey to send packages here so avoid too many heavy items, consider a smaller package, or get together with a friend to share the cost.
v  No electronic items! Electronic items are subject to very ugly taxes. It can be up to the amount the item is worth, so if I can’t afford the tax, the post office will not release the package or any of it’s contents to me.
v  If an item you are sending is not on the list below give some thought to whether or not it is a sustainable item. For example, if it breaks, how easy will it be to fix? Can it be used over and over and over again? If it’s a toy, can it be washed easily by hand? Does it require other components or parts that may not be available here?
I will gladly accept any and all donations, but if you have any questions about whether something you’d like to send is appropriate, please don’t hesitate to ask me. You can contact me via this blog, or if you are a Ravelry user, you can send me messages through there. My name on Ravelry is OneSquareBird. If you are a member of the Doubleknit podcast group, there is a thread dedicated to my project in which you can ask me questions as well.
Okay, the time has come. Here is a list of items that we’d love to recieve. They are in no particular order.
1.       Books -                
a.       Hard, cardboard books.
b.      Simple picture books with few words.
c.       ABC books
d.      Any pre-school and/or KG appropriate books
2.       Colored pencils
3.       Big Crayons (no regular sized crayons please. They break too easily and don’t last very long.)
4.       Pencil sharpeners
5.       Blocks, tinker toys, linkin’ logs, etc.
6.       Easy puzzles
7.       Memory games
8.       Hi Ho Cherry-o board game
9.       Small smocks or aprons (for KG aged kidlets)
10.   Wooden toys
11.   Outdoor toys (such as digging toys or dump trucks)
12.   Posters that can be used for educational purposes (such as the feelings poster that you often see in pediatric offices)
13.   Imaginative toys such as animal figures or people figures (please make sure they can be cleaned easily with soap and water. Stuffed animals are a bad idea as they are likely to get very dirty and there are no washing machines here.)
As I said, we will gladly take ANYTHING you’d like to send whether it’s on this list or not, but please don’t hesitate to ask whether something is suitable before you spend the money to send it.
Much love, and much thanks! Until next time!

Monday, March 11, 2013

Grant Update #1

For those of you who have donated to my Peace Corps kindergarten project, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. I was hoping to post an update before now, but my other projects must be seen to as well. Now that I have a few minutes, I thought I’d update everyone on how the grant is going, and I must say it’s going quite well.
The grant requested $3,200 and we have already raised more than half of that thanks to all of you generous donors.
I recently gave my counterpart, the man with whom I am founding the kindergarten,  a little computer training so he can check the Peace Corps donations website and track how the grant is progressing. We’ve made him a happy man.
Thanks again everyone! I’ll continue to post updates.