Group reaches out to children world
away
Goal is to build school
in Karakoram Mountains
By DANA DUGAN
Express Staff Writer
A group of Wood River Valley residents are
part of a group spearheading a fundraising drive called "Build a School, Change
the World!" Their goal is to raise $25,000 to build a school in a mountain range
that straddles Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Children write on slates in a Panbrok
village in Northern Pakistan. Photo by Greg Mortenson
Based in Bozeman, Mont., the Central Asia
Institute is a nonprofit organization started in 1996. Initial funds to
establish CAI were provided by Dr. Jean Hoerni, a Swiss physicist who was one of
the pioneers of the Silicon Valley microchip industry.
Hoerni’s widow, Jennifer Wilson, a
resident of the Wood River Valley, owns Isabel’s Needlepoint shop and was
instrumental in restoring the Ezra Pound birthplace in Hailey, which now serves
as the Hailey Cultural Center.
Greg Mortenson, who co-founded CAI with
Hoerni, spoke at the Environmental Resource Center in Ketchum in 2003. The
"Build a School, Change the World!" project materialized as a result of his
presentation.
Since the establishment of CAI, 34 schools
have been built in the remote mountain villages of northern Pakistan, the
steppes of Mongolia and Kyrgyzstan.
As a condition of funding, CAI requires
that these schools commit to increasing their enrollment of females.
"Educating girls reduces infant mortality,
levels off the population explosion and improves the quality of health and life.
It’s an important step in reducing terrorism and helping the nations rebuild,"
Mortenson said.
"A literate girl passes on the importance
of education when she becomes a mother. Literacy also prevents a despotic
Islamic mullah from using illiteracy to control people and undermine a
community."
Young Northern Pakistani girls,
who’ve never been in a school before, discover the wonders of books. Photo by
Greg Mortenson
The key is also in empowering villagers
through educational programs to manage and run their own school and the other
projects that CAI has helped fund. In fact, before a project starts, the
community matches project funds with equal amounts of village resources and
labor.
The schools, built with timber, rock and
mortars are carried piecemeal by villagers up miles of rough terrain. A
committee of village elders guides each selected project. In this way, long term
success is made more probable.
Residents of Lafayette, Calif., have made
a similar fundraising commitment. Their school will be built this spring.
"It’s our wish that the Wood River Valley
and its four municipalities will be the second community to do so," said Liz
Schwerdtle, who, with her sister, Amy Bingham, are the community organizers of
the drive.
Kate DeClerk of CAI will be in the valley
7 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 4, at the Distance Learning room in the Wood River High
School in Hailey. She will also make an address at the Clarion Inn in Ketchum on
Thursday, Feb. 5, at 7 p.m.
DeClerk visited CAI schools last November
and took many photographs while compiling data regarding the progress of the 34
schools.
At present, local school clubs such as the
Blaine County Teen Advisory Council and some church groups have committed to
raising money for the project.
For more information on the Central Asia
Institute go to www.ikat.org.
Locally, call Schwerdtle at 788-4058.