Yearn to Learn

Upon returning from Russia after a two year mission living among the people and volunteering weekly at orphanages and childrens' hospitals, I was determined to continue the habitual service I had initiated. Thus the passion behind the budding nonprofit organization I started entitled, “Yearn to Learn.” Essentially this nonprofit will bring an educational model into the orphanages teaching orphans life and moral skills to aid their adaptation into society. This angled strategy is to ameliorate the cyclical problem of orphans having no marketable and family skills once they enter the ravish world. Below is the proposal I have written for “Yearn to Learn.” I will be living in Russian next year laying the logistical ground work of this nonprofit. If you have any desire to assist, please make note in the comment option at the end of this entry.

Orphanages in Russian are vastly overpopulated and the number of abandoned children has reached catastrophic numbers. As of January of this year, 600,000 children are under the care of the state in Russia. The number of children added to the system reached 113,000 this year, nearly double the number of orphans in 1992.

These statistics have been increasing yearly with no end in sight and consequently the end result is more orphans who leave the orphanages ill-equipped and ill prepared for reintegration and adaptation into society.

In order to ascertain and understand what societal organizations can do to help provide service in this most needful area, we want to learn first hand how existing programs work to combat this problem in Russia.

Our hope is that this extensive and unique research will eventually result in more effective NGOs, adoption agencies and shed light on how we can assist the tragic cycle of orphans in Russia once they leave the orphanages unequipped for life.

In order to learn first hand how existing programs work in Russia, I aspire to the following:

I will intern with a well-respected program entitled “Women and Children First,” under the facilitation of an established American NGO (MiraMed Institute - www.miramed.org – my American NGO in Russia that approves and is aware of what I am doing).

I will place myself in the system to learn and observe. I will not be doing direct research with, or on, any individuals. I will intern with MiraMed's professionals and become accustomed to their work.

My research will be based on course and curriculum evaluation of “Women and Children First,” my observation of their program and perhaps some limited involvement.

They have a great deal of crucial curriculum. By researching the program, “Women and Children First,” I will gain a greater understanding of how such current programs utilize their curriculum and how they work and interact with orphanages in order to prepare the orphan for integration into society.

This will help us in answering the question – How we can better address the tragic cycle of orphans in Russia once they leave the orphanages unequipped for life?

Our objective for this research is to make baby steps towards better understanding that issue.

Students for Children

A special annual orphanage fundraiser brought to you by the BYU Slavic Club.

Since the fall of the Communist regime in the former Soviet Union, the economic stability of its fundamental organizations has faltered considerably. Throughout the Nineties, the Russian people suffered greatly because food, warm clothing and paying jobs were scarce. By 1992, Russia was at the helm of one of the worst economic depressions in Russian history. Russians were penniless and helpless, unable to support their families.

Consequently, with the rise of poverty in Russia also came the catastrophic influx of orphans to Russian, State-run orphanages. Due to the massive increase in children admitted to the orphanages, the government simply could not provide for all the needs of the children and many were forced to do without the basic necessities. Thousands have died and many more are enduring the consequences of inadequate nutrition, poor living conditions and severe lack of education.

Today the struggle to support the children left to the state has reached horrific proportions; the yearly number of admitted orphans has more than doubled since 1992. The Russian government, despite its noble efforts, cannot provide sufficiently for each child’s needs. Furthermore, the needs of the children have grown. Many are afflicted with aids, cancer and other debilitating diseases, whose parents leave them to the state because it is their child’s only hope of recovery; the costs of health care are prohibiting them from helping their own children.

The BYU Russian Club, however, refuses to give up on the lives of these children. Having enjoyed the blessings our country has to offer, we believe we can make a difference to the innocent children, currently suffering in Russian orphanages. This year our club has decided to begin a new annual fundraiser called the Students for Russian Children Fundraiser, in an effort to gather sufficient funds to aid orphanages in Eastern Russia provide the necessary items for the children to help them through the long and arduous winter.

Our Goal

Through correspondence with representatives in Khabarovsk and Vladivostok, we have learned that the children are in dire need of winter clothes, especially warm coats and boots. These items in particular are outside the scope of the orphanages’ budget and therefore it is our desire to make sure that these children have adequate clothing to make it through the harsh Russian winter.

Our efforts to gather money to help the children are two fold:

(1) Our "Students for Russian Children" Talent Showcase on Friday, February 24th, 2006, will be an event designed to raise both money and awareness of the current plight of Russian Orphanages. For more information click on the link at the end of this post (BYU Slavic Club).

(2) We are also talking to our friends, neighbors, families and local businesses for donations toward this great cause.

Your Role

With the help of private donors and the money we receive from the Talent Showcase we hope to raise funds in the thousands to go toward helping Russian orphanages. Whom we are able to help and what we are able to supply will depend greatly upon the donors.

If you have any desire to help these children, please send your donations to:

Students for Russian Children
3112 Joseph F. Smith Building (JFSB)
Provo, UT 84602

Make donations out to "Students for Children"

For additional information, please visit the BYU Slavic Club website