COVID-19 Updates

Three months ago, the COVID pandemic sent most of the world into lockdown. While many countries are opening businesses to reinvigorate the economy, this school year has come to an early end. But while we at C2C continue to follow the guidelines of social distancing, our concern is for the health and safety of our young girls in India and finding ways for them to forge ahead in their education while remaining vigilant against this pandemic.

In India, the lockdown has been called one of the harshest in the world, shutting down travel along with businesses, factories, and schools. Starting on March 25th, the orphanage and rescue homes where C2C operates have remained closed until early June. Most of the young women in our program remain onsite and C2C continues to provide critical support for basic necessities like accommodation, food, and clothing. As an economic downturn looms over the horizon, we are working closely with our partners as we expect to see a growing need for essential items.

With school closed during the pandemic, the C2C staff have improvised effective short-term solutions. We are working with the orphanage administrators to mitigate the effects of missed learning on the girls’ future academic performance, graduation rates, and employment prospects. Because of unreliable internet service, virtual learning is not consistently effective in India. In lieu of this, we are engaging the girls in independent learning through worksheets and activities accessible without technology, including some lessons that can be conducted via free telephonic service. Some technological learning has been made available through apps and programs like Mindspark-Maths for STEM subjects and Bolo for English and language skills. We continue regular, virtual trainings for our teachers and we are actively designing lesson plans for the coming year, focusing on any educational gaps caused by the pause in schooling.

Like the rest of us, the girls are doing their best to cope with the quarantine measures and relieve their anxiety over the risk of contracting the disease. From attending seminars about effective handwashing to practicing social distancing, the students have learned how to reduce the chances of contagion. Some of the girls with sewing skills have donated their time to making protective masks for the local hospitals.

These are challenging times that represent an unprecedented risk for girls’ education worldwide. At C2C, our commitment to girls’ education and empowerment remains strong. We will weather this health and economic crisis. We hope you will continue to support us during this difficult time. Rest assured that once this quarantine lifts, C2C will be ready to resume at full speed, providing holistic educational services to the most vulnerable of girls.

Welcoming a Baby Girl

In early November 2019 one of C2C’s partners, the Infant Jesus Children’s Home, greeted a new baby girl at their rescue home in Bangalore, India. Anita had been abandoned by her parents at just 24 days old. The program staff welcomed her with open arms and they tell us that Anita is happy, healthy and very active -- in spite of her HIV-positive status.

All the children at Infant Jesus Children’s Home have been abandoned because of their HIV status. The parents and guardians who give up these children are typically unable to care for them due to extreme poverty and other life circumstances. The parents are often sick themselves.

India has the third-largest HIV epidemic in the world, behind South Africa and Mozambique. In 2017, HIV prevalence among adults was an estimated 0.22%. This figure is small compared to many other countries but because of India's huge population, this equates to 2.1 million people living with HIV. Children with HIV are more likely to be orphaned, and the stigma related to the disease can reduce access to treatment and basic civic amenities like education.

Since 2000, the Indian government has made impressive progress in curbing the spread of HIV disease. Government funding even provides country-wide free medication to those who are infected. But many HIV-infected children do not receive government support for things like schooling, nutrition, housing and other supportive services due to lack of regulations and bureaucratic hurdles.

That’s where C2C steps in and provides these vital services for girls at the Infant Jesus Children’s Home through our Education & Holistic Support Program. With proper treatment, HIV can be a chronic, manageable illness. We believe these girls deserve a chance to overcome their disease, and we know they can serve as role models in their communities if given the opportunity through education.

The difficult context in which the girls are educated makes their successes all the more inspiring. Just last month a C2C-sponsored girl at Infant Jesus, successfully passed her 10th Standard exam -- the US equivalent of graduating high school. She is now attending a computer course and excited to find a job and support herself. Two more C2C-sponsored girls are preparing for their 10th Standard exams in early 2020. Many more, younger adolescents are showing initiative and progress in various stages of their studies.

We are proud of these girls! With critical aid from our supporters, we are doing our part to provide an enriching, supportive, stigma-free environment to help the girls reach their full potential, in spite of their HIV status.

*Name changed for confidentiality

**More on Infant Jesus Children’s home can be found here.

The Cycle of Uneducated Mothers

According to the Census of India 2011, female literacy is at 65.46% while the male literacy is at 82.14%. Compared to boys, lesser girls are enrolled into schools and many of them drop out. Numerous economical, social and even political factors are to be held accountable for this distressing result. One of the most obvious, yet least spoken about contributing factor is the parent's, especially the mothers' level of education.

 Studies continue to show that children's educational performance is linked to their parents' level of education. Having well-educated parents would be that the household income is higher, enabling the child to attend better schools, equipped with a high quality of life. Education parents also means that they are likely to stay married longer, before having children, meaning they would have worked on their relationship communication skills, and would raise a child in an emotional sound environment. 

 However, the effects of uneducation do not boil down to this entirely, as studies have shown that a mother's education may be the most defining factor in a child's upbringing. Why mothers? Since we want to focus on girls getting educated, it is important we look at the repercussions of girls not benefiting from an education system and the setbacks in the society due to it. The cycle of uneducation prevails; an uneducated girl is more likely to get married early due to societal and cultural norms outside of her control, and similarly, have children soon in the marriage. This very lack of social/cognitive functions have crucial consequences on a child, especially a girl. A study done by Foundation of Child Development shows that low level of education in a mother can significantly impact a child's level of economic status, educational success and their health. 

 An educated mother can help curate cognitively stimulating activities to enhance a child's academic potential. They are more equipped to help the children with tests, exams and homework. Educated mothers are also more likely to encourage a child to partake in extra-curricular activities, those not necessarily linked to academic excellence but rather the growth of their social-cognitive abilities. They can also provide tips to increase or better their performance at school without coming across patronizing, as well as become excellent role models for younger girls to look up to.

 So, what can we do to break the cycle and enable more girls to take up education?

• Changing the negative attitude towards a girl's education can help. In the Indian society, the girls are not expected to make any economical contribution to the family and so, the environment for a girl to get educated is incredibly unhealthy. 

• Unlocking a girls potential by increasing her self-esteem growing up. A good level of self-esteem can help a girl push through some of the tough times in her academic path and also, make her proud of her work.

• To continue to increase awareness about the importance of girl's education. The more we talk about this issue, the more we do, and thus, reduce the prejudice about education.

 While we cannot overcome this struggle overnight, our restlessness to create change, our efforts to change the conversation and the fight to continue on despite the setbacks, will bring the positive growth in girls education that we hope to see. 

 Help us unlock some of their potential today by contributing here or maybe even donating some of your time! It's never too late to start the process of change. 

References- 

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jomf.12156

https://www.fcd-us.org/assets/2014/07/Mothers20Education20and20Childrens20Outcomes20FINAL.pdf

Written by Ruwi Shaikh, a content strategist living in Brooklyn.

IWD2019- On Our Way To Empowerment.

"What makes you feel empowered?"

 This International Women's Day, we want to focus on empowerment. What makes a woman feel empowered and why is this so essential? While attitudes are changing, women still face a considerable amount of issues. For instance, three in ten people globally (30%) pick out sexual harassment as the top issue facing women, which is in line with findings in 2018 when the figure was 32%. 

 More often than not, the culture we are a part of has the utmost demands from a woman. The societal standards are patriarchal in nature, which has adverse and negative effects on the way a woman lives her life. These norms can be worse depending on the culture or the society you are a part of. In most parts of India, women aren't allowed to speak in front of men, women must dress "decently" always and ask the permission of their husbands before leaving the house. The statistics aren't so good either. According to National Crime Records Bureau, in 2016, over 58,000 rapes were reported across India. In Delhi, the capital of India, almost 4,000 sexual harassment cases were reported in the same year. 

 Changing dynamics, however, means that women have to learn to protect and empower themselves in the spaces men would have dominated before. Among the few things women can do is learn to empower themselves emotionally and mentally. 

 When the world seems bleak, or rather, we seem to be losing hope, it is important to continue to do little but significant things in our lives to uplift ourselves. On top of our daily lives, we also face an abundance of ongoing news from all platforms such as Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. Switching off from these can be hard to do when most of us rely on them to keep in touch with our family and friends. However, such news can often leave us feeling empty and confused, while questioning our self-worth. 

 For this article, I interviewed some of our very own women in the Commit2Change team. Commit2Change is founded and run by women, and it is because of our education and persistence that we are here today. We recognize that thousands of girls do not get the same opportunity and that is why we urge you to donate so women can continue to inspire other women to do their best. 

Gayathri Segar says, "Taking ownership of a project, professional or personal - and seeing it through to its succesful completion. The sense of satisfaction in taking something from start to finish is incredibly empowering." 

Being help responsible for a project, as Gayarthri put across so well, can help boost the self-esteem because you are accountable to make a certain project come alive. Whether it's the next big presentation at work or simply buying groceries to cook yourself a hearty meal- finding ownership in the little things one does can help feel empowered. 

 Sanwari Gupta believes in putting in her 100% to everything she does. She says, "I may not be able to become anything I want to be, but I can be a whole lot more of what I am." She continues to try to apply this to everything she does and claims there is nothing more empowering than that. 

Shruti Ganguly pipes in to say that the endless possibilities make her feel empowered. The notion of possibilities would mean having the hope and desire to make change happen, to make the space for positivity and growth. 

 Sumana Setty and Kiran Rai mentioned freedom and love as their tools to reach a level of empowerment in their lives, which could mean various things to different people, but we do know one thing for sure: love is freedom, through love we can find healing, compassion, care and growth. 

We need to continue to show such compassion towards women right's- because while we have achieved a considerable lot in our time, there's still mountains to climb and rocks to turn. We can do it, by being mindful allies to women, and continue to support the causes that can help drive the society forward.  

Happy IWD from the Commit2Change team, and Women's History Month. Stay strong, stay empowered. 

Donate to commit2change today and help us help women!

Written by Ruwi Shaikh, a content strategist living in Brooklyn.

Crafting Designer Ritu Patel Empowers Female Villagers through Embroidery

Fifteen years ago, a chance encounter forever altered the course of Ritu Patel’s life, as well as the lives of hundreds of Indian villagers. While visiting family on the Indo-Pakistani border, Patel stumbled into a room where an artist from the remote Indian village of Kutch was creating intricate murals on the walls using mud and tiny mirrors. Struck by the man’s craftsmanship and finesse, she recognized she could help alleviate the villagers’ endemic poverty by translating their traditional handiwork into goods the modern world would consume. And in that room, Craftings was born. 

“I was so fascinated by his work, but I realized that my generation of people doesn’t want to be associated with the villages because they find them very outdated and boring,” she said over coffee in New York, where she’d recently showcased her work through Commit2Change. “That was my challenge. How can I make it modern so that the villagers can improve their livelihood? This artist was dying for work and he had so much skill.”

Patel began her career in graphic design, but after having two daughters, she realized the work left her feeling drained and unfulfilled. “I realized graphics was not what I wanted to do. I wanted to do something more meaningful,” she said. So she decided to visit the villages and revive their art form. Her Goal was to revive the lost tradition and revive these dying arts by adding a contemporary touch and syncing them with today’s lifestyle.

At first Patel hired villagers to create their customary mirror work on decorative trays and picture frames, but it wasn’t until she discovered their inimitable embroidery skills that Craftings really took off. She began to place orders with the villagers for bolts of painstakingly embroidered fabric she herself would transform into modern garments.

“It started off as a small exhibition, and it became a rage” Patel recalls. “Suddenly, I had buyers from all over the world wanting my goods.” But when business was at its peak, the designer had to make the incredibly difficult decision to close shop. She realized that with the amount of travel and hours she was pouring into Craftings, her own young daughters were being neglected. And so for more than a decade, her work with India’s poor villagers was put on hold. Fast-forward to the present, and Patel, now an empty nester, was free to dedicate herself to Craftings again in good conscience. But when she revisited Kutch, she was alarmed to realize the village women hadn’t had any outside work since she last collaborated with them for Craftings. This is largely because of their isolation, both coincidental and enforced. Patel said, women aren’t allowed to travel from one remote village to the next. A great distrust of outsiders, as well as a deeply patriarchal culture, besets these communities. Patel, though, had earned the villagers’ trust. For weeks at a time, she’s lived among her employees in their nomadic conditions, eating meals with them and gaining their confidence. They now call her "Ritu Ben,” “Ben” meaning “sister.” The fact she’s helped to provide them with regular income hasn’t hurt, either.

“I’m like their Santa Claus,” she laughs. “When I go to the villages, all of them come in hoardes. ‘Give us work, give us work!’ they say, because they know I’m somebody they can trust.” and work she gives them. Patel commissions embroidery from the villagers in certain colors that she then transfers onto pure silks and crepes hand-selected from Bombay, ultimately making her hand-drawn designs as individualized as possible. She and the villagers only make twelve items of each design, and they’re as sumptuously gorgeous as they are unique. Currently, Craftings works with seven villages, including one specializing only in gold thread work, and Patel hopes to expand that number soon. Prices for the collection range from $120 up to $350, depending on the amount of embroidery that’s gone into an item.

“See this one,” Patel says, pointing at a coral dress covered in swirling blue stitching. “It took the woman one year to do the embroidery on that garment. She’d work about two hours a day on it.” When it comes to payment, the designer says she always offers the women the highest possible premium to ensure they’re motivated to work. Between child rearing, housekeeping, and caring for their animals, free time in which to embroider is sparse, but irrefutably worthwhile. Craftings has singlehandedly enabled many of its 120 female workers to bring plumbing and electricity into their homes, and Patel especially hopes her business will help bolster future prospects for girls. Two percent of the proceeds from every garment is set aside expressly for the upliftment of the girl child, and Patel soon hopes to begin paying her female workers partially with bonds so they have more autonomy over their earnings. “I’m just very passionate about uplifting women and giving back to society,” she concluded. “I feel I have a short life left and I don’t want it to be meaningless. There’s much more I can contribute before leaving this world.”
https://www.facebook.com/Craftings-By- Ritu-Patel

Guest Blogger: Investing in Girls’ Futures Makes Cents

How Developing Economies Benefit from Educating Women and Girls
 
Developing economies can present many special difficulties when it comes to economic growth and expansion. Often, education is one of the largest of these problems, as an educated and productive workforce is necessary for any economy to grow into the modern global marketplace. While educational standards can be a problem for all, however, women and girls in underdeveloped nations often have even more difficulty gaining access to even basic education than their male counterparts. This is a problem that most developed nations have faced at some point in their own history, and so it should come as no surprise that it is still very real in less developed parts of the world. However, curtailing the ability of girls to access quality education puts a severe limit on the growth potential of any economy.
 
How Denying Women and Girls Education Harms an Economy
 
There are two primary ways in which limiting access to education for girls can damage the growth of an economy. The first is that those girls will tend to grow up to be either unskilled workers or, worse, not be able to participate in the workforce at all. This effectively relegates half of a country's potential labor force to low-wage jobs or dependence on families or husbands. In a developing economy, a skilled workforce is essential to create economic value. Limiting this workforce by effectively keeping women out of it is nothing short of disastrous from the economic standpoint, as the creation of value acts in direct proportion to the economically active population of a country.
 
The second outcome of a cultural policy of keeping women away from education and the workforce is that a country that pursues such a policy will tend to lose some of its best and brightest potential workers. Many young girls in developing economies will grow up in extreme poverty and will have little choice about the education and opportunities they receive. However, in even the least developed countries, there is some element of a middle economic class. Daughters born into this economic class may, through their parents, have access to a higher degree of education than their poorer peers. In many cases, however, the parents that are able to do so will send their daughters to universities in other countries in order to give them better opportunities abroad. This is one of the worst economic outcomes than can possibly occur, as it means that many of the few girls who have received access to decent education will leave their home country to create economic value in another.
 
Solving the Problem
 
In most developing nations, the prejudice that keeps women away from quality education is a cultural tradition that is hundreds or even thousands of years old. While this certainly doesn't justify denying education to young girls, this cultural factor must be understood in order for any meaningful dialogue about changing it to take place. Most who perpetuate this tradition do so because it is the way of things in their country and the way they themselves were raised and educated. Fortunately, many studies have been conducted by competent economists that have produced hard data showing the potential economic benefits of providing girls with access to education. While some individuals will ignore these studies, governments and leaders tend to take more notice, as economic growth is one of their largest concerns.
 
The use of external funding to open and sustain schools that provide education to poor girls is also a critical part of solving this problem of educational disparity. Many excellent organizations, like C2C, exist that use private and public donations, as well as volunteer teachers, to accomplish this. Opening schools that provide girls living in poverty with the quality education usually only made available to their male peers is one of the best ways to circumvent prejudices in existing national education systems.
 
Conclusion
 
Getting quality education to girls in underdeveloped countries can be a long and slow process. However, the results are well worth the time, effort and money that are required to make access to education for all girls and women a reality. National economies benefit from a more informed and productive workforce, while the lives of individual women are changed immensely by allowing them to earn higher wages and to participate as full economic members of their society.
 
*****
 
This article was written by Jessica Jones at www.investing.co.uk  - a financial news site in the UK, and a proud supporter of Commit 2 Change.

Wisconsin College Students will Dance for Change

Madison, Wisconsin, is a pretty traditionally American Midwestern town. Named after the United States’ fourth president, the city is home to a bratwurst festival professed to be the world’s largest, a sizable producers-only farmer’s market and tens of thousands of college students.
 
For one weekend in April, however, Madison will also serve as mecca to Indian dance enthusiasts across the nation.
 
ADZ Entertainment, a student organization at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, organizes the weekend-long dance competition centered on two quintessential Indian dance styles, Bollywood-Fusion and Bhangra. In it’s fifth year, the competition has proven an extremely popular event for the organization. This year’s co-chairs, Keerthana Pittala and Khushboo Patel, decided to translate that popularity into philanthropy by partnering with Commit to Change.
 
“We hope to raise awareness about the education of girls in India because the art, Bollywood-Fusion and Bhangra, is such a big part of Indian culture,” Pittala said. “We can bring the community together through cultural awareness.”
 
Patel added, “This is the first year that we’re trying to develop this partnership with a nonprofit. Everyone on the (ADZ) board loves Indian culture and the dancing, so this is just a way to give back.”
 
Both women were born in India but have received the bulk of their education in the U.S.; Pittala and her family moved to America when she was 5 years old, and Patel’s family moved to Chicago when she was in middle school. Although Patel was fortunate to go to a private school in India, one difference she has noticed between her experiences in India and the U.S. is the varying standards of sexual health education.
 
“In India, and from my personal experiences with my family, sex ed is not something you talk about in the open,” Patel, who now works in a sexual health clinic, said. “People talk about it more openly here compared to the Indian culture and background I grew up in. I don’t think I ever had a sex ed class in India. Here in high school, they try to tech you the basics at least.”
 
As a psychology and neuroscience double major and aspiring healthcare professional, she believes access to comprehensive education is crucial to making Indian girls informed of their options.
 
“Education makes them aware of the choices they have and helps them to analyze those choices so the can make decisions for themselves and don’t have to rely on others to make them aware of what resources and choices are available to them,” she said.
 
Pittala, who has visited a C2C-sponsored orphanage, the Center for Social Services in Hyderabad, believes providing stable living environments is imperative to the mission of girls’ education.
 
“The biggest factor for change is providing a home for the girls and an environment in which they are comfortable and able to focus on their studies without having to worry about money or health or where they’re going to be sleeping of the night,” she said. “I think taking those stressors out of their life gives them a chance to really concentrate on their education and look to the future rather than looking only to the next day.”

Pittala’s mother is herself a highly educated Indian woman; despite an early interest in medical school, she ultimately got her Masters in Hindi literature and language. Her love for the sciences, however, was passed on to her daughter.
 
“I think the biggest influence she has had on me is that she really encouraged me to go into the sciences because it’s such an interesting field,” Pittala, who is currently studying neuroscience and studio art, said. “She emphasized that I should concentrate on my career and my education for as much of my life as possible so that I can have financial independence and enjoy my career when I grow older.”
 
Recognizing their privilege in growing up with supportive parents, ADZ Entertainment’s competition will benefit girls in India who are growing up without this advantage. All proceeds will benefit C2C.  
 
The event is April 2nd from 7-9:30 p.m. at the Shannon Hall Memorial Union. General admission tickets, soon to be sold via ADZ’s website, are $10. 

ritten by: Liv McConnell

Not a Niche

Leave it to Aziz Ansari to give culturally relevant commentary a comedic kick.
 
In his Netflix original series, Master of None, the comic devotes an episode to the prevailing stereotypes of how Indian people are depicted on Western television. After running into an Indian friend at a casting call, Ansari’s character, Dev, is thrown by the man’s ravings over a bodybuilding supplement called Mumbai Muscle.
 
“A Pea Protein marketed just toward the Indian weight lifting community? Seems a little niche,” Dev says skeptically.
 
His friend responds: “If you call a billion Indians niche.”
 
Although this scene may seem an unlikely opening note for a Commit to Change blog post, I believe Ansari’s point here is quite applicable to our organization. India is second only to China in population density, representing roughly 17 percent of the global population, according to the World Population Clock’s most recent numbers. India has also consistently been ranked as one of the worst – in some polls, THE worst – place to be a woman. Meaning that, in a lot of ways, this country has become the epicenter of women’s plight in the modern world.
 
In their groundbreaking study on women’s oppression, “Half the Sky,” former New York Times reporters Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn write that girls in India aged one to five are twice as likely to die as boys their same age, with the best estimate being that “a little Indian girl dies from discrimination every four minutes.” 
 
At the seven orphanages C2C serves, our girls (many of whom weren't technically orphaned, but rather abandoned by their families) have survived this initial gender-based purging. But the odds are still largely stacked against them, as limited employment opportunities and oppressive marital practices (including the horrors of honor killings and bride burnings) await them.
 
At the orphanages, however, we are faced with both the unique opportunity and challenge of crafting a safe space for these forsaken girls to heal and grow beyond what a traditionally conservative household may have condoned. By aiding and ensuring the development of educated, strong and self-reliant individuals, we can help transform India’s cast aside girls into tomorrow’s empowered women. 

ritten by: Liv McConnell

Guest Blogger: Melissa Foley, "Be the Change You Wish to See in the World."

Guest blogger Melissa Foley volunteered at Asha Sadan, one of Commit2Change’s partner centers in India. Melissa gave up a high-paying career in the corporate world, selling all of her belongings in order to travel the world and volunteer with women, children, and animals in need. This is her perspective on Commit2Change, and why education for all women and girls matters.
 

Be the Change You Wish to See in the World
Each of us, no matter what country we come from, has a dark history of oppression and human rights challenges. What have we learned? What promises have we made to do better? What is our obligation to the rest of the world to protect the innocent? 

In a global world with readily available information, those of us in the first world have no excuse for ignorance. Genocide, war, child slavery and sex trafficking, legalized rape, and infanticide are just a few of the horrors still occurring as we sit here today. What can we do? What can YOU do?

As an American, I am appalled at our historical intolerance of women and minorities. While we still have work to do, things have progressed through the heroic efforts of those brave pioneers fighting for equality. 

However, as a citizen of the United States, I recognize how fortunate I am to have been born here. Although I am female, I have the right to an education, to vote and even drive a car. There are laws meant to protect women and children from abuse, oppression, and slavery, as well as to prevent a father from selling his daughter into marriage at the age of 12. Just a few simple liberties we rarely even take notice of, while our sisters and daughters abroad can only dream of such freedoms.

Helping the Women of the World
After spending my career as an executive riding the corporate hamster wheel, I recently asked myself: What can we do to support our fellow sisters of the world? What can I do to help give them a voice? 

After trading everything I own for a backpack and the freedom to travel around the world volunteering for various non-governmental offices (NGOs) supporting women, children, and endangered wildlife, I found myself in India. 

India has an unexplainable beauty amongst the chaos, corruption, and poverty. The spirit and kindness of the Indian people will forever touch your heart. At times it was impossible for me to imagine the dark side of a culture so complicated that a cow is considered more sacred than their girls. 

As Westerners, it should never be our place to ever hold judgment against the cultural differences we don’t understand. But at what point do we question or object when an entire segment of a population is at risk, or worse—being oppressed? How can social change come about for the greater good of all a society? 

Is it our responsibility to solve this dilemma? I personally believe we all have a responsibility to speak against the injustices of the world. Have we not learned from our own history? These people, these children deserve freedoms and opportunities. To not advocate for those being oppressed, makes us as guilty as those oppressing. 

But how…how can one person make a difference?
Education. Educating our girls and women of the world. Every woman is your mother, every woman is your sister, every woman is your daughter, every woman is your friend. Education is the power that will set them free, and set us all free as a global family. 

There has been amazing research and statistics of social movements throughout the world, showing the astounding economical, environmental, and social benefits of educating women. This is how each of us can make a difference. Support efforts that provide access to education to these girls—anything from collecting donated books, to sponsoring a child, a school, or even a village.

While in India, I had the experience of a lifetime—working with some of the most incredible people I have had the honor to meet. Asha Sadan is a humble orphanage in Mumbai, started by one of the oldest NGOs in India, The Maharashtra State Women's Council. A handful of extremely dedicated, very busy women run the facility. They not only provide full-time schooling to boys aged 5-10 and girls through the age of 18, they have an on-site nursery for the infants of many of these teenage girls, most of whom have lived a life of unspeakable horrors. 

Through a well-established adoption program domestically and internationally, these young girls now have options for their future at their choosing, and always have access to an education. Educational programs are customized for each girl, depending on her interests and aptitudes, offering both academic and vocational training to ensure future success and opportunity. Once the girls leave Asha Sadan at 18, there is an established network of alumni to support with housing, job referrals, and love. 

The Future in Our Children
Never before have I seen children so hungry for knowledge, so eager to learn, so grateful to be in school, as I do in third world countries. These are the lucky ones. They are the survivors, the ones who will have a chance at a better future because of programs like Asha Sadan and partner organizations like Commit2Change that are helping to create awareness and support.

To see the spirit of these young children and girls will change you forever. They have nothing and offer so much. They give so much love and joy even though they have been given so little themselves. All they need is a chance for the future and WE are the ones who have the ability to give it to them.

As you read this, it is my sincere hope you will find it in your heart to give these kids a chance and help a child at Asha Sadan. Together, we can make a big difference.