WellesleyWeston Magazine

WINTER 2012/2013

Launched in 2005, WellesleyWeston Magazine is a quarterly publication tailored to Wellesley and Weston residents and edited to enrich the experience of living in two of Massachusetts' most desirable communities.

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Some of the first children FOF served will soon graduate from high school, and the Wellesley partners are thinking about what's next. "The kids there are so motivated," Bradach says. "They all want to be doctors, lawyers, and teachers but that's tough to hear because it's not a reality when the University of Zambia is $1,000 a year. " FOF has a waiting list of children for school and high school graduates who would like to attend trade school. FOF has raised $125,000 in five years, from the sale of donuts at coffee hour on Sunday morning to individual gifts and foundation grants. "Our yearly budget is $26,000 and there is so much more we want to do. It's a constant struggle to fund our programs," says Rose. In late summer 2010 attorney Eleanor Uddo got a call from a professional friend, an accountant, who asked if she would be inter- ested in setting up a 501(c)(3) for a well-estab- lished Canadian charity, Sleeping Children Around the World (SCAW). Uddo agreed. By late October she had the US arm of the highly respected organization up and running. SCAW was founded in 1970 in Toronto by Murray and Margaret Dryden, whose dream was that every child could have a comfortable night's sleep. In more than 40 years, the char- ity has raised $23 million (with no govern- ment grants), and has distributed more than 1,240,000 bedkits to children in 33 countries. All bedkit items are sourced locally or from neighboring countries. No bedkit dona- 141 tions are used for administration and, like FOF, volunteers pay their own travel expenses. Bedkits generally include a mat or mattress; pillow, sheet, and blanket; mosquito net where needed; T-shirt and shorts or skirt; khaki fabric to make a school uniform; backpack; flip-flops; and a water bottle and school supplies. A bedkit donation is $35 Canadian. In April 2012 Uddo was one of six members of a SCAW team of volunteers who travelled to the West African nation of Togo. Volunteers supervised the distribution of 5,000 bedkits in ten winter 2012/2013 | WellesleyWeston Magazine

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