UPDATE LETTER FOR APRIL ‘11

Hello everyone,

Thanks to the support of friends like you, La Isla Foundation has a lot of news to share:

• We have formed new alliances with organizations like Fairfood  
• Funding appears likely for new studies to find the cause of the Chronic Kidney Disease epidemic in this region
• We started a new cooperative, which teaches women job skills
• We have a new team of people applying for grant money, and great new interns and volunteers are arriving
• A high school student started a pen pal program connecting youth in Nicaragua with students in the U.S.  
• The office has a new home in Nicaragua
• We have an incredible opportunity to work with NASA’s Engineers without Borders Brigade

It has been an amazing month as La Isla Foundation moves into the next stage of its strategy!  Through it all, we couldn’t accomplish any of this without you.  I hope you are proud to know that your donations are making a difference in the lives of those who truly need it.  Not only are you and I fighting this epidemic of Chronic Kidney Disease, we are working to help the members of this community support themselves and each other in the face of this challenge.  

Your support makes positive change happen!  The community of La Isla needs 300 monthly donors of 10 dollars or more by August 1st.  

These monthly donations will make sure we can keep helping the community while applying for the grants we need to uncover the truth about its Chronic Kidney Disease epidemic.  You can click here to make a single or monthly gift to help those served by La Isla Foundation.  Look for the PayPal buttons on the left.  

Please lend your support!  This is a solvable issue and your support will save lives.

The Community

Our goal is to address the larger epidemic of Chronic Kidney Disease throughout western Central America.  We’ve begun our work in one of the communities that’s been hit hardest, La Isla.  It is from that community that we take our name.  

Over the last 5 months our community liaison, Roberto Leon, has worked with the community to set up a women’s cooperative.  It will teach women whose families have been affected by Chronic Kidney Disease, women who often have no job skills, how to sew.  Roberto worked with the women to write their own proposal and secure funding.  He also involved the local government, who is providing the classes for the women and have also provided them with their first clients!  As of now, 16 women will be making the school uniforms for the local schools in and near their community.  

We’re still looking for funding for a project to teach young men in the community blacksmithing and welding.  These two well-paying trades are in high demand in the region.

Our new coordinator, Viola Cassetti, has implemented a paper recycling program.  Not only does it cut down on waste, but it provides a product that will save money for widows while eventually creating a series of items for sale in the local market!  The process is surprisingly simple and cost-effective.  

I’d like to take a moment to thank our two remarkable English class volunteers, David and Leigh.  They came all the way from Scotland to help us implement a formal structure in the English classes we offer children in the community.  As Nicaragua’s tourism industry grows, English becomes an increasingly marketable skill.  Mark and Leigh designed a system that enables long term volunteers to pick up where the last have left off, which is a great accomplishment.  I love the idea that students may well be speaking English with a Scottish accent now.  Brilliant!

Finally, thanks to the Peace and Justice Committee at my parent’s church, we’ll be purchasing a computer for the learning center we have set up with the Ministry of Education.


Important Study Funding

Keep your fingers crossed please!  On April 29th we find out if our colleague Nate Raines in New York City has been awarded the grant he applied for to work with SALTRA and CISTA.  This grant will allow us to test blood samples for heavy metals.  This will help us identify the cause of the illness and will help us in acquire funding for further investigation.


Yale Conference

I attended the Unite For Site conference at Yale two weeks ago and shocked myself at how much was achieved by sharing with people what we’re working on.  Over one weekend we began a relationship with some fantastic organizations.  Dean from Dean’s Beans is interested in partnering with us to open a café at the offices that would employ women from the community.  A rep from NASA’s Engineers Without Borders chapter has invited us to come see their work at Mission Control next week—they are interested in working with the community to install new rain traps and provide food dehydrators to create marketable items.  

One of the most exciting developments is that I met an engineer who is working to provide affordable dialysis machines for use in countries with some of the limitations found in Nicaragua!  

Alliances

As La Isla Foundation grows, so do our alliances.  This week we finalized a partnership with an organization that focuses on corporate advocacy.  The idea is to open a meaningful dialog with sugar producers in the region in order to improve their business practices.  

Our new partnership with Fairfood International and ongoing partnership SALTRA and Solidaridad will help us to follow a 3-tiered approach while tackling the Chronic Kidney Disease epidemic facing western Central America.  Fairfood will focus on corporate advocacy, and SALTRA and CISTA will focus on discovering the cause of the epidemic.  La Isla Foundation will focus on consumer education, fundraising and community programs, with a focus on bringing treatment to those that are ill.

La Isla Foundation is also in the early stages of creating an alliance with Nourish International, an exciting student network aimed at facilitating change in the developing world.

Pen Pals

One of the projects I’m most excited about is an evolving pen pal program organized by Roberto on the Nicaraguan side and 15-year-old Whitney Rhoades on the US side.  Whitney is spearheading a letter exchange between 1st – 5th graders at the bilingual school in Cascade, Michigan and the students at the school in La Isla.  This will be a wonderful experience for all involved and certainly inform a wider audience about what the La Isla community is facing.  I look forward to organizing a photo exchange between the two groups of students.

New Home

The Foundation has a new location and we are rapidly working on fixing it up.  This week, our tile roof was completely taken off and replaced.  Now the rainy season will not leave us living and working in puddles!  Now we’re painting and working on our organic garden.  Come down and see it!

Tours and Trips

In May, Luisa and Viola will be running three days of tours with a group from the University of Colorado via Comunidad Connect.  This group’s main focus is on youth and development.  They’ll be touring the city of León, participating in youth run art workshops, and exploring the seaside community of Las Peñitas.  Proceeds from day trips run by La Isla Foundation go directly to our work helping this community in need.  

We aim to cover our overhead through our tours and trips program.  But we need your help in creating the bridge to that goal.  We are working to raise awareness of the epidemic, as well as find and address its cause.  To do this, we’re looking for 300 people to give 10 dollars or more a month.  This will continue our work towards self-funding and getting grant support for larger projects.  

Your donations truly help the members of the La Isla community.  Please make a gift today; we need your support in order to continue this important work.  Please consider a monthly or one time donation at whatever level you can afford.  Click here to do so using PayPal.  On the left column of the page you’ll see the PayPal buttons.  Remember, we’re in need of 300 monthly donations by August 1st.  To donate using a check, mail it to: La Isla Foundation, P.O. Box 816, Ada, MI 49301.

On behalf of those in the La Isla community, I thank you very much for your continued interest and support.  If you have any questions or wish to get more involved, please don’t hesitate to write me at laislafoundation@gmail.com.

With Gratitude,

Jason Glaser
President

P.S. Please click here to see the new pics at the La Isla Foundation Facebook Group!  Thanks again for your support!