THE YEAR IN REVIEW
The ChAngels team had a year with fewer projects but we were especially honored to support ChAngel Lily with her Digital Dreams project.
Lily hosted a luncheon to introduce other mothers and daughters to Myanmar (Burma) where her family built a clinic a few years ago. It was through their involvement at the clinic that she discovered a new way to help the people there and Digital Dreams was born: a project to provide schools in Myanmar with laptops to improve the quality of education for children.
At the lunch, Lily shared how privileged she feels to attend a school where technology is so readily available and taken somewhat for granted. Her goal for this year is to provide 10 laptops, and each year thereafter, so that by the end of her high school career she will have helped supply laptops for an entire school. She fielded questions, shared an inspiring power point she created and introduced a representative from Partners Asia, the agency she is working with to ensure the laptops reach their intended destination.
By the end of lunch, Lily's goal was met and funds for 10 laptops were donated, included one from ChAngels. Next month, Lily will travel with her family to Myanmar to deliver the laptops. We can't wait to share photos of this important global work and are so proud of Lily for her hard work.
We were also proud to put on our pink (one of us is wearing a tutu) and participate in the Hike for Health on a beautiful sunny California morning! This annual event hosted by our friends at Poised raised funds to buy scarves for women who have lost their hair during treatment for breast cancer. It was an inspiring morning and the hike provided ChAngels time to brainstorm about the future.
After learning that there are an estimated 30 million enslaved individuals in the world, many of them women and children, ChAngels Sara and Lisa were inspired to action. They hosted a hot chocolate stand at school to raise funds and awareness for the Bay Area non-profit Not For Sale, which fights modern-day slavery around the globe. The sisters worked with friends to raise $500, the cost to free one slave. Through their sales and support from ChAngels they were able to reach their important goal. They also were able to increase awareness about this tremendous problem by arranging a speaker to present to the students in their school. We hope to continue our partnership with Not For Sale in 2014.
CHANGES AHEAD
Although we had fewer projects this past year, we had a lot of long-term strategy meetings and we can tell you, there are great changes ahead for ChAngels in 2014! When we began in 2007, we were a group of girls, aged 8-11 working with our amazing moms. Now that we are in middle + high school, we are looking for ways for ChAngels to grow up too.
WE WILL BE UNVEILING A NEW TEENAGE EDITION OF CHANGELS
IN THE COMING WEEKS AND WE CAN'T WAIT TO SHARE OUR NEW LOOK AND OUR FUTURE PROJECTS. WE ARE INSPIRED!
