Author Archives: SD USA

Growing a Life: Teen Gardeners Harvest Food, Health, and Joy

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Illène Pevec is the founder of A Child’s Garden of Peace. Read her book and learn about the philosophy and experience behind this wonderful Susila Dharma Projectfullsizeoutput_bdcb-1000

Find Growing a Life on Amazon.comPart engaging conversation, part comprehensive fieldwork, Growing a Life demonstrates just how influential school and community gardening programs can be for adolescents. Readers follow author Illène Pevec as she travels from rural Colorado to inner New York City, and from agrarian New Mexico to urban Oakland, California, to study remarkable youth gardening programs for at-risk teens. Expressive candid interviews with more than eighty students, substantiated by relevant neuroscience research and a framework of positive psychology, explain the life-altering physical and emotional benefits of gardening.

fullsizeoutput_bdc6As students share their experiences tending the soil and the plants, feeding their families and their communities, and guiding younger children, readers are given the opportunity to examine the largely unexplored topic of mentored urban gardening. Growing a Life will inspire educators, community leaders, and youth to team up and establish community gardens where they do not already exist and to involve youth in existing gardens.

Gardening has changed my perspective in a whole lot of ways. . . . I have applied that to my family, and I taught them. And they were proud of me. Not only was I not on the streets, I was doing something positive for my community. – Julio, 18, gardenign since age thirteen with Oakland Leaf

Illène Pevec, PhD, initiated her first award-winning gardening program in 1998 at an elementary school in Vancouver, Canada. Since then, she has gained national and international recognition for her work in the United States, Canada, and Brazil reconnecting children to nature. Growing a Life is her first book.

Read more about Illène’s book on Facebook.

Mother-Child Hospital Center of Kwilu Ngongo

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Good News!

SD DRCongo has been so successful in their long range sustainable funding for The Mother and Child Hospital at Kwilu Ngongo that this year they did not feel it necessary to apply to SD USA for a grant. We are kind of sad to lose our connection to the project, but delighted at this sign of success.

In the DRC, one in six children dies before the age of five years old, due to highly preventable illnesses, including malaria and infections, so providing communities access to sound treatment and prevention can mean the difference between life and death. On Saturday, June 25, 2016 a ceremony was organised by SD Congo for laying the first stone of the Mother-Child Hospital Center of Kwilu Ngongo, effectively launching the construction phase of the project.

Kwilu Ngongo big existing CSCOM - mother and child has malaria - 30.1.2016

Kwilu Ngongo—A mother with her child who has malaria

This three-year initiative to bring quality, accessible healthcare services to Kwilu Ngongo and its surrounding population of about 42,000 is a joint initiative supported by many members of our network: SD Congo in the lead, but also SD USA, SD Britain, SD Canada, SD France, and SD Germany (with funds from the German Government BMZ) with technical and management support provided by the Susila Dharma International Association (SDIA).

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Visting the construction site at Kwilu Ngongo

Learn more about local Susila Dharma work in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

 

SD in the Democratic Republic of Congo

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With an average income of less than $200 (USD) a year, the Democratic Republic of Congo is one of the poorest countries in the world. Corruption is rife and the government provides less than a minimum of public services. Transportation presents a terrible problem for any endeavor, with few roads maintained sufficiently for any but the most rugged vehicles. Public education is nonexistent and healthcare is unavailable for those without money.

25083370606_7d13083226_oFor many years Susila Dharma Projects in the DRC in education and healthcare have been struggling with this very difficult situation, trying to find ways to create schools and healthcare centers that can meet the needs of the people in an affordable way without going bankrupt. There have been failures, but the overall progress thas been astonishing. Continue reading →

Clean Water at CEDERI Madimba

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Water-borne disease is one of the main causes of illness and death in death in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Susila Dharma DRC has established three community health centers (CSCOMs) and is working on a fourth; but better than curing disease is preventing infection in the first place.

The new well at CEDERI Madimba will bring 5000 liters of water to the village.

The new well at CEDERI Madimba will bring 5,000 liters (1321 gallons) of water a day to the village.

Clean drinking water can prevent illness and infection. The CSCOM, CEDERI-Madimba has addressed this reality by digging a well and piping potable water to the health center and the village. This project brings a vital supply of clean drinking water to a population of almost 5,000 who live in the village of Kimbobolo in Madimba Territory of the D.R. Congo and to CEDERI Madimba, a 30-bed medical centre that serves over 8,000 people in the rural area.

The population of Kimbololo is higher now than when SD-DRC first established this project, as babies are born and people move into this area in the hope of a better life in a community with access to clean water, electricity, healthcare and education. Bringing 5,000 liters of water a day to the village considerably lightens the work of water-collection for women and young girls in Kimbololo where the water point is being installed and clean water will improve the health of the community. Many generous donors have supported SDIA, SD Congo and CEDERI-Madimba to bring clean water to the hospital center in Kongo Centrale province as well as to a nearby village.

You can see the process of digging the well and bringing water to the village in the three videos below. In these videos you can see the work that was going on in June, what conditions are like there, and what local community members think of the initiative.

Since these films were made, the well has been dug, a shelter for the pump has been built and the conduit taking the water to the village and the hospital is in place. The only work that remains is to build the structures that will hold the tanks. We’re nearly there!

Part I: Well Construction

Part II: Bringing Water to the Village

Part III: An Interview with Villagers