Charity Dinner 2012

The annual charity dinner for the Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund was held at Namaste Kathmandu on November 9.  Starting this year, it has become a much more casual and intimate affair than it has ever been.  A few of our loyal donors, volunteers and friends, who have selflessly given us their time and resources over the decades, congregated at this Nepalese restaurant in Kichijoji, Tokyo.

The evening was full of good food, song, dance and warm conversation.

A night to remember...

The Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund would like to thank everyone who has tirelessly and generously helped open new opportunities for children from economically challenged families. A special thanks to Patricia McGahan for providing us with the photos in this post.

New Email Address for The Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund

The email address for making inquiries and sending in applications to The Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund has changed.   Please send all inquiries to Ms. Anilyn Maningas at amaningas@irri.org or irritraining@irri.org.

We will do our best to spread this information to sites we do not control, but as you can understand this can be difficult sometimes.  If you see the previous email address posted somewhere, please help us pass on the new email address.

Thank you again, for all your help!

Merry Christmas

Photograph Courtesy of Atelier Petillant

Merry Christmas & A Happy New Year!

Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund: Manuel Esguerra - IRRI

It gives us special pleasure that one of our former scholars now works for the International Rice Research Institute. We hope that his inspiring story will inspire you to pursue higher education in agriculture. Please go here to see if you qualify for the scholarship.

Samuel N. Anay - Department of Agriculture

Samuel N. Anay is a former Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund scholar. He finished his undergraduate studies in April 1998 and was hired by San Miguel Foods Incorporated, where he worked as a Farm Technician (poultry). He has also worked for Tricom Dynamics Incorporated (Toshiba Davao) as a Sales Executive, but moved on to his current post at the Department of Agriculture.

We, at the Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund, wish Samuel N. Anay all the best and hope that he will continue making valuable contributions in the field of agricultural science. We'd also like to thank him for taking the time to write us this letter, and hope that it will encourage other students to never give-up and never stop believing in themselves. We like to think that in some small way, we can all make a small contribution in making the world a better place.

For more information on how to apply for this scholarship, please go here.

PREP (Promoting Rural Education in the Philippines)

Today, I’d like to talk a bit about a group called PREP (Promoting Rural Education in the Philippines). This group was founded by a much loved former guidance counselor of the International School of Manila (ISM).

In 1992, a group called PREP was formed for the purpose of promoting education in the rural areas of the Philippines, and Vicky Herrera and ISM students have been working with public schools in Tagaytay ever since.

"We've been volunteering at different schools, and the ISM kids come-up with all sorts of lessons!" - Vicky Herrera

In addition to lessons on ecosystems, solar systems, continents and health, PREP has been donating books, shelves and other materials to the schools in Tagaytay. The unique thing about PREP is that instead of pretending to know what each school needs, it donates funds to schools so that they can decide what they need most, and the schools submit PREP with the receipts so that things can be kept above the board and transparent.

The donations have been used for anything from fixing leaking roofs to bringing electricity to the classrooms.

"In 1996, we went to Sungay School, and when ISM kids wanted to do a dance, we realized the school had no electricity so we couldn't plug the tape recorder in. " - Vicky Herrera

PREP raised 10,000 pesos to electrify the school, and it has made all the difference in the world. The classrooms that had been previously so dark that the children had difficulty seeing what was written on the blackboards were illuminated with light, and fans were installed to provide ventilation.

In 2011, the mayor built a new building for Sungay School. Although the facility is new, the school library has nothing except for worn out work books and an encyclopedia set that PREP donated to them previously. Currently donations are being collected from the alumni of the International School of Manila to make this space into a bilingual reading center.

"It will take a lot of work, as besides books, we need furniture and shelves, etc. But it's all starting to come together beautifully, thanks to wonderful alumni out there who want to help!! My ISM PREP group and I will be going to the Sungay School on October 26th, and they are busy making lesson plans and are thinking of all sorts of games..." - Vicky Herrera

Although it's impossible to solve all the problems of the world, we like to believe that helping a little bit will make a big difference for someone.

We, at the Shouichi Yoshida Memorial Fund, hope that some of these students will pursue a career in agriculture at any of the excellent universities of the Philippines and look forward to supporting them. For more information please go here.

Messages for UN Women in Pictures

These photographs were featured in The Guardian. The first photograph is of a woman holding a handwritten sign that says: 'Let me spell it out: Literacy is the key to gender equality'. The last photograph is a handwritten sign that says: 'Education is the ultimate weapon'.

Although these photographs are part of a campaign related to the launch of UN Women, it should be noted that these two quotes hold true for both men and women. The Shouichi Memorial Fund believes that higher education is the real key to opening-up opportunities for those who come from economically challenged families.

We believe this to be true, especially in view of the recent increases in tuition for universities, in a world where salaries especially in lower income households have remained frozen or have even decreased. There was rioting in the streets of London in December 2010, and more than 150 people were arrested. Sweden declared that starting in autumn of this 2011, non-EU citizens must pay tuition to attend university in Sweden. The sum went from nothing to 100,000 Kronor ($15,625).