Children's India Fund

Learn and Serve

Learn and serve are the goals of a semester in India sponsored by the State University of New York College at Oneonta. In addition to academic work in Indian philosophy, religion, culture, history, economy, and language, students will be involved in a service learning component. This includes volunteering in urban community service agencies such as Mother Teresa's homes, orphanages, and organizations for the handicapped and for battered women, as well as working in rural villages in health care, agricultural and road building projects.

The students enrolled in this SUNY semester in India have gone beyond what project directors Ashok Malhotra and Suzanne Miller imagined. On their own the students initiated the "Children's India Fund" campaign to raise money in the USA to take it to India for service projects. Josie Basile, one of the students in the program, is coordinating the drive with the goal of raising $15,000 by September.

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Children's India Fund

Children 's India Fund Coordinator Josie Basile:

When I decided to go to India my first thought was, "What about the children of India?" Many times I have seen children on television, children that are hungry or need medical attention. Would I be able to face them and not feel the pain of seeing them in those conditions? Whenever I see them on television, I immediately flick the remote control to change the channel. I will not be able to do so in India because I will have to face this reality head on. The pain would be too great and I know I would fall apart if I couldn't do something about it, or at least try. Raising money for children seemed to be one of the immediate solutions to me. Perhaps if we raised enough money we could help these children. What we will be bringing back from India is far greater than what we can possibly give to India. Learning about another culture, and another way of life is just a fraction of what we can learn. I believe that we are "our brothers' and sisters' keeper," and perhaps this is our opportunity to show it.

When I presented my idea to the other student participants, who were gathered at SUNY Oneonta for a week-long orientation for our India trip, the idea was embraced enthusiastically. My fears were alleviated, and we immediately started discussing how we could raise money. We brainstormed various ways to use the funds for charitable purposes such as helping children through medical care, medicine, school supplies, and possibly hiring a teacher in a village.

We are twelve students from different universities and from various parts of the country. We come from varied backgrounds and religions. Like India, with all our diversity we seem to have a kind of unity that cannot be explained, it can only be felt. We have a common bond, an interest in helping the children of India.

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Please help us help the children of India!

Josie Basile SUNY Oneonta	Heather Mason SUNY Binghamton
Jennifer Borst SUNY Fredonia	Bipina Patel SUNY Albany
Partrick Hickey SUNY Binghamton	Purnima Patel SUNY Stony Brook
Aaron Hunter SUNY Oneonta	Amber Rehling San Francisco State University
Maegan Lee SUNY Oneonta	Esmahan Succar SUNY Plattsburg
Luke Mahoney SUNY Oneonta	John Wickett SUNY Fredonia

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Send your donations to: C.I.F. P. O. Box 862 Oneonta, NY 13820

Please make checks payable to C.I.F.

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