Category Archives: News

SD USA Grants for 2018

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Here are the grants the SD USA Board of Directors made this year (2018) at our recent granting meeting in Sacramento.

(Specifics about the grants coming soon)

A Child’s Garden of Peace (USA)
AGP works to develop gardens where children can work with nature to learn, grow. These gardens produce food for both body and soul.		 $1,835
Camp Badger (USA)
Camp Badger is a summer camp for low-income children and teens in Central California.		 $2,294
Elderberry (USA)
Elderberry helps Subud elders who need help getting to Subud congresses, gatherings, or just to do their latihan with others.		 $500
Inner City (USA)
The Inner City Schools project provides art supplies and books that are not normally available to children in low income schools. It also provides some meal assistance.		 $3,000
Quest Center for Integrative Health (USA)
Quest Center for Integrative Health is a wellness-focused, nonprofit healthcare clinic striving to strengthen those diagnosed with chronic or life challenging illness.		 $2,000
The Women Worldwide Initiative (USA)
Inspires and educates young women in low-income communities in New York City and in the developing world. TWWI have initiated an after-school leadership, educational and personal development program called Young Women Rock!, for high school girls in local communities.		 $4,588
Fundación de Beneficiencia Privada, Casa Cuna (Mexico)
Casa Cuna is a free of charge nursery/day care facility for children that are in a vulnerable condition since they come from dysfunctional families, with a very low income, many of them from of single mothers families.		 $1,000
International Child Development Programme (ICDP, International) $1,835
Tijuana family outreach (USA)
Run by Subud San Diego, the Tijuana Family Outreach Project supports children and their families in the outskirts of Tijuana, Mexico, where there are very few resources for them. The project provides community integration for many families who would otherwise be isolated, and offers opportunities for families to receive resources to improve their lives and build relationships with neighbors.		 $1,743
Usaha Mulia Abadi (UMA, Mexico)
UMA a Nutritional Program that has served about 1000 children eight years and under since 2008 in San Miguel Atlautla, a marginalized community in Mexico. It has now been expanded to Puebla.		 $2,753
Venezuela Food Connection (USA)

This is an effort to send food to hungry families (including many Subud families) who are victims of the current economic chaos in Venezuela.

 $1,652
Wawa Illari (Peru, formerly, Saving Brains)
Nurses in Peru are the frontline health workers, yet their studies do not cover the specific psychosocial or nutritional needs of the developing brain in children under the age of three. This project combines enhanced caregiver-child interactions, improvements in nutrition, and creating community gardens, this project reshapes the care context for poor families.		 $4,000
Anisha (India)
an effort create a sustainable economic and environmental model for villagers and to slow the flight of families from impoverished areas in the countryside into the hugely overcrowded urban areas.		 $5,190
Anisha Travel $1,500
Yayasan Usaha Mulia (YUM, Cipanas, Kalimantan, Indonesia)
For over 30 years the projects of the Foundation for Noble Work (YUM) have helped thousands of Indonesians, from the tiniest babies to elderly people struggling to survive the trauma of disease, malnutrition, abandonment, economic difficulties, lack of education or training, and natural disasters. This grant goes to YUM’s Cipanas project in Kalimantan.		 $4,588
I Protect Me (South Africa)
I Protect Me has worked since 2013 in schools in Cape Town to teach children how to protect themselves from sexual and gender-based violence.		 $4,588
Susila Dharma International Association (SDIA, International) $7,340
Funding Project Directors travel to the World Congress $2,250
Bina Cita Utama (BCU, Kalimantan, Indonesia)
…an innovative educational community in the Palangka Raya district of Central Kalimantan, offering challenging programs of study and a high-quality environment for learning. BCU seeks to nurture individuality, self-worth, a sense of humanity, and to educate children to become adults who will make a positive contribution to the development of their communities and the world. Our grant to BCU is going to purchase computers for the kids.		 $4,588
Borneo International Football Foundation (BIFF, Kalimantan, Indonesia)
…provides a healthy environment and quality assistance to children and youth in football training, health promotion and nutrition, school support and basic English education. Our grant this year is going to support BIFF’s nutrition program.		 $4,300
Yayasan Permakultur Kalimantan (YPK), Kalimantan, Indonesia
Permakultur Kalimantan Foundation (YPK) provides permaculture education and training in Central Kalimantan to improve land management, increase community resilience and food security, support sustainable livelihoods and help to conserve the natural environment in the region.		 $3,670
Yayasan Tambuhak Sinta (YTS, Kalimantan, Indonesia)
Using participatory rural appraisal techniques, YTS assisted communities in Palangka Rya district to make village development plans; and started providing an annual village development fund to support local livelihoods. The project is helping villagers to develop successful micro-enterprises—raising poultry and fish. SD USA’s grant this year is going to help develop a market for the fish being raised by village farmers.		 $4,588
SD DRCongo, Mother and Child Hospital at Kwilu Ngongo (DRCongo)

The Mother and Child Hospital at Kwilu Ngongo focuses on the health of mothers and children under the age of three—a group that has a mortality rate that can be drastically reduced with application of basic hygene and early diagnosis and intervention. The project has so successfully worked toward sustainability that this year they ddi not apply to us for a grant from SD USA. But this is a very important project for the SD Network and we will continue to report on it.

 $200

Help for the homeless: up close and personal

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Leonard Dixon

In December of 2013, long-time Subud member Leonard Dixon, was walking on the street in downtown Portland, OR. He saw people trying to sleep outside on the sidewalks in sub-freezing weather with no shelter. It was a life-changing moment for Leonard and he knew that he wanted to help in some way. Leonard started purchasing vital supplies with his own money and bringing these items to people living in extremely difficult situations in Portland and Vancouver, WA. He continues to make direct deliveries to individuals sleeping on the streets, or to groups gathered under bridges and living in tent cities, as well as people served by various shelters in these cities. Leonard estimates that he has directly served at least 1000 people over the years as he encounters them on the street. He continues to pass out food, sleeping bags, blankets, tarps, etc., to the homeless, as well advocating for the homeless with Portland city government.

Leonard sees a connection between the latihan and his humanitarian work. “Doing the latihan can strip away excess ‘junk’ from one’s being, and also broaden one’s sense of awareness, so that feelings of compassion can develop.” He believes that Susila Dharma has an important function to play in informing our membership about various social needs, and encouraging them to do what they can to help. Fundraising for projects is also a necessary part of Susila Dharma’s work. Leonard believes that helping others has definite spiritual rewards, leading to a strengthening of character and a broadening of one’s vision. Deepest thanks to Leonard for giving us an outstanding example of how to bring the latihan into the world.

Susila Dharma Network in Peru

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Did you know…

That during the first 1000 days of life the foundation for optimum health and brain development established for life. Children in poverty face a high level of adversity that can disrupt healthy brain development. In Pachacamac, Peru, where there are high rates of poverty, domestic violence, malnutrition, child abuse and neglect, many children will suffer their whole lives.

Newborn babies receive attention of nurses at Lima’s maternity hospital in Peru.

With support from the Canadian government, the Susila Dharma global network—including the International Child Development Programme (ICDP), Asociación Vivir, A Child’s Garden of Peace (AGP), SD Canada, Susila Dharma International (SDIA), and SD USA—has come together to bring expertise and fundraising assistance to address this problem.

Wawa Illari team visits with leaders in Tambo Inga

A new project called Wawa Illari will train teachers and students of nursing as well as other students at the Universidad Inca Garcilaso de la Vega (UIGV) in Lima, Peru, in a community approach to improve early childhood development.

“Nurses in Peru are the frontline health workers, yet their studies do not cover in depth the psycho-social or nutritional needs of the developing brain,” says Ana Sofia Mazzini, Director of ICDP Peru. This new approach will train nurses to enhance parent-child interaction as well as ways to help impoverished families improve nutrition—including growing and eating healthy food in combinations that are best for early brain development.

Nursing students and professors with Ana Sofia Mazzini, dean of faculty of Nursing, along with Illène Pevec (A Child's Garden of Peace) and Hamida Thomas (SDIA).

Nursing students and professors with Ana Sofia Mazzini, dean of faculty of Nursing, along with Illène Pevec (A Child’s Garden of Peace) and Hamida Thomas (SDIA).

By working together, our Susila Dharma organizations are able to achieve results that none of us could have achieved alone. This collaborative approach can be seen, not just in the Wawa Illari project, but also in the Susila Dharma health centers in the Democratic Republic of Congo, in the Anisha project in India, and in the synergy achieved by the interaction of SD projects in Kalimantan.

Donate Now!Please —
become part of the network!

The demands are great and our network needs to rise to meet them. There is no end to the good work that needs to be done. Give generously during our Fall fundraiser so that our network becomes even stronger in the coming year.

Thank you!

Read more about the Wawa Illari project here

Guru Krupa Foundation Renews Anisha Kitchen Garden Project

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Susila Dharma USA is proud and happy to report that Project Anisha has received the second year of funding for its Kitchen Garden Project from the Guru Krupa Foundation based in New York state. The Foundation has given another grant of $10,000 to Anisha this year to continue its four-year educational project to teach over 1400 middle school students to grow organic kitchen gardens at their homes.

The Kitchen Garden Project at Anisha teaches families to grow small-scale kitchen gardens, producing organic vegetables from native seeds. This can make a significant difference in their health and standard of living.

These students live in the Martalli Region of Karnataka State in Southern India. Their families, often single-parent, struggle every day with extreme poverty and everything that results from it. They live in a drought-prone area that is also hard-hit by the effects of climate change. Learning to grow small-scale kitchen gardens producing organic vegetables grown from native seeds (initially supplied by Anisha’s native seed bank) can make a significant difference in improving the standard of living in this area. It can help to stem the flow of farming families that are forced to abandon their homes in India’s countryside and move into the dumping grounds of India’s big city slums.

We are so appreciative of the support provided by the Guru Krupa Foundation to help Anisha do its vitally important work! Please visit their website to learn about their impressive work in both the United States and India – www.guru-krupa.org.

You can read more about Anisha on our web site and see a slide presentation about the Kitchen Garden Project below.