Muslim females of all ages around the world are often denied the opportunity to receive a quality education and to develop the professional skills needed to remedy the health, social, and economic needs of their communities. However, the potential for success is unlimited. One shining example of the untapped potential is Miss Zee, a formerly homeless Muslim girl from a remote island in the Mindanao region of the Philippines. A brilliant student but abandoned by her family at age 14. Zee's dream is to become a doctor. She is currently on a scholarship from the Asia America Initiative and Notre Dame College in Jolo to study nursing at Our Lady of Fatima College in Manila.
Beginning in 2016, AAI has helped support the successful licensing of more than 350 new nurses in Sulu Province. The ability to sustain this success has been due to the generosity of our donors in the GlobalGiving community. Today, Zee is beginning her second year of college after earning a more than 93% [A level] grade point average in her first year. Due to the COVID19 pandemic lockdown, remote classes are challenging without adequate technology, electricity, or wifi access. However, Zee is determined to not give up her studies. "Like many students, I lacked a proper laptop or tablet computer to take the electronic classes," she said. "My old computer made it difficult to see or communicate with professors during and after online sessions. It is very difficult to try to work with 30 other students on a Zoom computer or cell-phone screen."
To remedy these matters, Zee's benefactors at Asia America Initiative and Notre Dame have increased her scholarship to include grants for upgraded learning technologies. AAI is making sure she gets proper nutritional sustenance to keep her energy high and immune system strong to ward of the COVID virus. "Zee is a bright light who we would never wish to abandon," said Father R of Notre Dame. "It is difficult for all of us educators to keep promising children from impoverished and unemployed families in school during this pandemic. We must rely on the kindness of good people of all backgrounds and religions who have big hearts and strong faith. Peace is a product of mutual support among diverse people."
If you would like to continue to support nursing students facing these challenges, click the link below to make a donation with GlobalGiving. We thank you for supporting AAI’s great projects and we will continue to send you inspiring progress reports!
Support 50 Muslim Girls to Become Nurses
Wishing you peace,
Albert Santoli,
Director, Asia America Initiative
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AAI is participating in GlobalGiving's Little by Little Campaign THIS WEEK - March 23-27.
Donations up to $50 will be matched at 50%. Click through this report if you would like to continue your support of this important project. Thank you!
Dear Friends, thank you for supporting this program. Asia America Initiative is currently coordinating with nurses in at least five provinces of the Philippines as the numbers of Covid-19 victims is inreasing daily.
With your support, Asia America Initiative sponsors female nursing students so that they will receive basic educational needs, classroom materials, graduation fees, and the cost of licensing exams. These young women demonstrate the potential success of Muslim women around the world. As health care providers, the nurses are providing vital services to all community members and expanding the employment base in one of the most economically deprived areas of the world.
Due to the Covid-19 Virus pandemic, the capital, Manila, and most of the country's 7,000 islands are "locked down." We are among the relatively few organizations able to provide support in some of these areas. We were fortunate to have a large donated shipment of food, clean water, and medical supplies, including sterilized gloves, face masks, and anti-bacterial soaps and sprays ready to ship in January and February.
We were proactive due to our more than 20 years of emergency relief experience. Our ongoing relief for typhoon survivors funded by GlobalGiving donors has enabled us to pre-position supplies from abroad and purchase scarce essential goods from local markets. To maintain our inter-cultural focus, we are also donating food to child feeding programs in the Washington, DC - Northern Virginia area.
As you know, for the past six years, Asia America Initiative has been committed to supporting the education of Nurses in areas of natural disasters and man-made conflict. Your support is critical now as medical personnel, equipment, and supplies are urgently needed.
AAI sponsored nursing students are working with local health workers to distribute hygiene and other supplies to families in their local areas. This emergency has created a real-life opportunity for students to experience service in their chosen field. In coming months, we are hoping to support additional young women who will now seek to become nurses.
Our mission is to stabilize the medical and social systems of impacted communities. Our strength is in our multiple partnerships with local, national and international organizations. Your donations especially matter to keep our network in place in order to be able to respond to events as they happen.
Thank you for all you have done to help this cause.
Wishing you peace,
Al Santoli,
Director, Asia America Initiative
Links:
Yes, every nurse matters, especially when your community is impoverished and most residents live well below the poverty line. On the island of Sulu in the Philippines, 19 districts are subdivided into 410 barangays [villages] serving a population of close to 1 million people. There are fewer than 16 medical doctors. Nurses are the framework of public health.
Globally, Muslim women have been denied educational opportunities that could benefit their communities. AAI began this program in 2015 to provide 50 female students in Sulu, Philippines a quality education in order to launch their nursing careers. With your support since then, AAI has helped more than 225 young women to become nurses.
We support female nursing students with their basic educational needs, classroom materials, graduation fees, and the cost of licensing exams. These young women demonstrate the potential for success of Muslim women around the world. As health care providers, the nurses are providing vital services to all community members and expanding the employment base in one of the most economically deprived areas of the world. They also are positive symbols for local youth.
The nursing programs in Sulu are a beacon of hope for the entire community. With support from AAI, Sulu State College and Mindanao State University nursing students are performing among the top 20 percent of all such schools in the Philippines - compared to just a 30 percent student pass-rate in the national nursing exams four years ago.
The challenge is to sustain this success.
If you would like to continue to make a difference to these nursing students in 2020, please click through the project report and select the orange Donate Now button. With your help, we can continue to support young women to become nurses who are vital for a community's survival. (If you are interested in a monthly donation, GlobalGiving is offering a 100% match!)
Support 50 Muslim Girls to Become Nurses
Thank you so much for your past contribution.
I wish you peace throughout the holiday season and in the New Year.
Albert Santoli
Asia America Initiative
Links:
In 2016, Asia America Initiative made a commitment to provide scholarships, books, and other learning materials to support 50 Muslim girls in Sulu to achieve a nursing degree and license to practice the healing profession. In the past 3 years, we have surpassed that goal by supporting more than 225 students to become registered nurses and midwives and revitalized degree programs at both Sulu State College and Mindanao State University.
At the elementary school level Asia America Initiative, in partnership with the School Nurses of Sulu, the Nursing School of Mindanao State University, the Jolo Fire Department [Bureau of Fire Protection], and the National Red Cross, hopes to inspire students to become part of the nursing or first-responder profession. We have organized and funded the training of more than 500 elementary and high school students in approximately 55 schools to become volunteer Little Nurses. They receive a "go" backpack with basic first aid items and a bright orange vest that will identify them in a large crowd.
Dire poverty, armed conflict, classrooms without books or chairs and lack of quality public health facilities has led Sulu in the Autonomous Muslim Region in Mindanao to be considered as one of the most impoverished regions of the world by the United Nations. Sulu, currently under martial law, is considered the most underdeveloped province in Mindanao. Any hope of higher education seems out of the realm of possibility for most of the 400,000 school children in Sulu. With less than 20 doctors for some 1 million residents of the province, nurses are often the lead health care providers.
"We highly value our young nurses," says Tanjung Elementary School Nurse Monira, RN. "They participate in all of our health and hygiene programs in the school where we have more than 1,400 pupils. In case of an emergency inside their classroom, they can immediately assist a sick or hurt child. Their role is to intervene until the school nurse can arrive."
I asked Little Nurse Sarhada, a fifth-grader at Tanjung Elementary, why she volunteered to become a Little Nurse. She responded with a big smile: "I want to help other people, and how to cure any type of pain. I want to show my gratitude for all the blessings I have received. Like for example, if another student stumbles and falls down, I will rescue that student. I want to share the lessons I have learned by being a Little Nurse."
We invite you to contribute whatever you can afford to this beautiful platform for children to express their desire to serve others. Please continue to be part of our Nursing team by clicking on the link below.
Happy Holiday Season to all!!
Support 50 Muslim Girls to Become Nurses
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To foster enthusiasm in youth who come from impoverished environments to enter the nursing profession requires exposure to performing service for family and friends at an early age. Sulu Province in the southern Muslim Mindanao area of the Philippines is such a place. Dire poverty, armed conflict, classrooms without books or chairs and lack of quality public health facilities has led to Sulu to be considered as one of the most impoverished regions of the world by the United Nations. Any hope of a higher education seems out of the realm of possibility for most children. With less than 20 doctors for some 1 million residents of the province, nurses are often the lead health care providers. In 2016, Asia America Initiative made a commitment to provide scholarships, books and other learning materials to support 50 Muslim girls in Sulu to achieve a nursing degree and license to practice the healing profession. In the past 3 years, we have surpassed that goal by supporting more than 200 nurses to become registered nurses and midwives and revitalized degree programs at both Sulu State College and Mindanao State University.
"The contribution of hundreds of textbooks and other learning materials has been a great help to our instructors and students," states Dr. Annisa, Dean of the Graduate School at Mindanao State University. "In addition, test scores have dramatically improved."
The Rainy Season of 2019 in the Philippines has fostered an epidemic of deadly dengue fever across the Philippines. Helping to stop the spread of this deadly mosquito-borne disease has involved elementary student nurses, especially in the southern province of Sulu. The little nurses are inspired to make nursing their career by the pride they feel in fighting the epidemic conditions through cleaning stagnant water and debris piles where mosquitoes breed. The confidence level of the little nurses in each school is raised when they know they are helping to protect their friends from the deadly dengue virus. They feel the appreciation and love from those children’s parents, their own, their teachers and school nurses. These real life experiences are the impetus the students need to seek higher education as qualified nurses.
Asia America Initiative supports the Nursing program with funding support by Global Giving donors.
Thank you!
UPCOMING EVENT
On Thursday July 18, Global Giving is offering a Bonus Day which will match your donation at the $100 level or above. If you are interested in providing a smaller monthly contribution for these young nurses, Global Giving is offering a match at 100% ! Just select "monthly" when making your contribution. Thank you !
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