WellesleyWeston Magazine

FALL 2012

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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Meanwhile, with the students at WHS working and learning, Dr. Kaplan was mak- ing repeated trips to Haiti, each time return- ing home with huge suitcases full of tin art. Over the past two years, he estimates having sold roughly $18,000 worth of art through channels like overstock.com, his own Web site, and, of course, the WHS global market- ing students. The Haitian artists are paid directly for their art and this cash infusion has a multiplier effect such that Dr. Kaplan estimates that the payments to the artists have resulted in approximately $35,000 being distributed back into the community. No small feat in an area where most resi- dents live on one to two dollars a day. But it's what Dr. Kaplan has been able to do with the profits from the sale of the art, as well as other charitable donations, that really gets him excited. Unlike many of the non- governmental organizations that flooded Haiti after the earthquake—organizations that came in, dictated what needed to be done, and then exited, leaving behind little lasting impact—Dr. Kaplan has formed a continuing community run organization that he sees as an entirely different model for what can and should be done in Haiti. He affectionately refers to his organization as "The Cite Soleil Rotary Club." It's a group of about fifty people, mostly men, who meet monthly with Dr. Kaplan to decide how the money that's been raised should be distrib- uted. "I ask them how they would like the 147 fall 2012 | WellesleyWeston Magazine

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