|
|
WORTHY CHARITIESIn this space are the links to and perhaps a description of some interests I help support through The LeBaron Foundation. You are encouraged to look at them and consider whether they deserve your support, as well . . . they would benefit greatly.
There are three categories (others might support different categories . . .
cultural for instance):
2.
Local
charities that make
life much better for me and for my neighbors.
3.
The neediest of
global
causes.
INSTITUTIONS
Harvard University:
http://www.harvard.edu/
As a leading university, support will help this institution stay among the top
50 or so educational and research universities in the world. Although it has an
enviably large base of support and endowment, enough is never enough when
opportunities for spending are so vast. I benefited from an education, which
cost a lot for my parents but which still represents less than was spent by
Harvard on me. It is my responsibility to provide the same chance for others.
Harvard Business School:
http://www.hbs.edu/ Two years at HBS gave me a chance to pit my business skills against a select group of my peers. The two years taught me that my values need not diminish in the quest for commercial achievement, and I learned what I could accomplish in organizing my time under pressure. I support HBS as one of my major efforts in a sense of responsibility for the chance I was given and in the expectation that HBS has a chance to be in the forefront of the new wave of management self-education using new tools.
Increasingly Harvard Business School, and others, are sharing their
Milton Academy:
http://www.milton.edu/
My secondary school. Like many children from small towns whose goal was a top
university, I sought a private school to “prepare.” Milton was gracious enough to take me for the last two years,
although I had not acculturated to its standards in the earlier years. It opened
my eyes to schoolmates from different backgrounds, challenged my mind, and
tolerated my wandering from the prescribed path. Milton remains a top place and
one that is broader now as it has adjusted with the times.
Santa Fe Institute:
http://www.santafe.edu/
Home of complexity and the institution whose name is synonymous with
adaptability, emergence and complex adaptive systems. SFI arose from the
interest in broad applications of complexity, in many disciplines, by scientists
from nearby Los Alamos. And now it is the closest thing to a Mecca for people
wishing to see if their fields can benefit from a complexity spin. SFI has a
small, dedicated hub staff directing the efforts of a small team of resident
researchers. But its main function is bringing others into contact at SFI across
disciplines to charge new problems. New England Complex Systems Institute:
If SFI is the Mecca, NECSI is the Franciscan Order (excuse the very crossed
metaphors) going out to preach complexity. It is a virtual institute with only a
cyber home, a research base largely composed of leaders in the Boston academic
communities, and the energy of a passionate startup. I support the idea of
complexity being applied to new problems and NECSI is vigorously selling the
effort.
Vassar College
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute University of Chicago
Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research
MIT Center for Genome Research Dartmouth Medical School http://dms.dartmouth.edu/news/publications/dartmed/winter04/html/vs_lebaron.shtml An international medical school with close association between collaborative research and patient care will have a building for the exchange of ideas, translational research and collegiality. LeBaron Commons should be ready for us in 2008.
LOCALLake Sunapee Protective Association:
Clean water. Very clean water. This is the dictum around the world but never
more vigorously pursued than around Lake Sunapee. The lake represents drinking
water to many of the seasonal houses. This mostly volunteer organization
performs watchdog and educational functions for people in the area.
New London Hospital http://www.newlondonhospital.org/
It is hardly possible to run a community hospital with only 27 beds. But it
serves the community and a nearby physicians’ facility. As one would expect,
highly personalized care is a hallmark, but, as near as I can tell, medical
standards are maintained at a high level by proximity to Dartmouth’s Mary
Hitchcock Hospital and the Boston Hospitals.
United Way of Merrimack County/NH
Merrimack River Feline Rescue Society
United Way of the Merrimack Valley :
Friends of Maudslay State Park
http://www.magnet.state.ma.us/dem/parks/maud.htm
GLOBAL
Nepalese Youth Opportunity Foundation:
http://www.nyof.org/ or
http://138.202.136.60/npcerts/resource/samples/case2.htm Here is a picture of the school bus bought with a LeBaron Foundation grant in 2001. Occasionally one has an opportunity to help fund a personal devotion of an individual to the most worthy of causes. Olga Murray is spending her retirement years from the San Francisco legal world by helping - no, rescuing - the neediest of children in Katmandu. Often these are crippled girls who have no value in this society. Olga and her partner give them a home and they flourish. This is a blend of the best of causes, the best of people and the best of outcomes. I doubt if it can be institutionalized... its value may be that it is not.
September 22, 2000 interview with Olga Murray, founder of
December 2000 interview with Olga Murray, founder of Nepalese From a recent letter: February 17, '03 All goes well here. So far, the cease fire between the Maoists and the government is holding, and peace talks are due to start soon. People here are hopeful but cautious that this time peace will prevail. The last time this happened, the Maoists used the truce to regroup. They broke that cease fire in a spectacular fashion a year ago last Nov. in Dang, the remote area where we have our project for indentured girls. (By the way, we now have 500 girls in this program) I was on a site visit in Dang with our Nepali staff at the time, and we were a few miles away from the massacre that ended the truce. We decided to return to Kathmandu immediately. The locals advised us to delay our return until the morning fog lifted because the guerillas might be hiding in a forest we had to cross. "Guerillas in the mist!" I cried, to no one's particular amusement. It will be a relief to be able to pick up the morning paper without reading about the body count of Maoists and government forces.....Olga Murray
Here is an article that appeared in the Marin (County, CA) Journal, with an
e-mail I received from the author serving as an introduction: -----Original
Message----- Languishing in a Katmandu hospital for most of a year, "She liked my smile, and she gave me the opportunity Smiling constantly - "I am always happy"- Santosh Last year, for instance, NYOF (which consists of Two years ago, NYOF opened a rehabilitation home for Those programs are just the newest of many, which Many of the young people have physical handicaps. She discussed the foundation in an interview last Murray found Durga when she was 9, and has been her "Nepal is not a place where you want to grow up For now, Durga lives in San Francisco with attorneys Two-thirds of last year's $394,000 budget came from Murray's interest in Nepal stemmed from a trekking The temptation to expand is great, she says: "Just "Well, when I know that I can save the life of a It costs $50 to send a child to school for one year, Educating one child, she says, has enormous The NYOP has made education its priority. Recently, "She has brightened my life," says Durga. "I can live Durga has not lived at home since infancy, when she Santosh goes home once a year, too; he loves his (Contributions to the Nepalese Youth Opportunity 203 Valley Street, Beth Ashley
Christian Children's Fund
http://www.christianchildrensfund.org/index.stm
|
|
Please send technical comments and problem reports to sgage@tds.net |
