Written by Austin Zimmerman, CCF Co-Founder and Board Member

In 2012 I made my first trip to Nepal. CCF didn’t exist, but the thirty year old relationships that are the heart of CCF did. Following the lead of Ric and Denise (founders of CCF and Ganesh Himal Trading), I navigated my way through Kathmandu. I remember the taste and smells of dal bhat and milk tea permeating as I met the numerous individuals whose heart and soul make our work in Nepal, work. I also met two young female recipients of the Association of Craft Producers’ (ACP) Girl Child Education Fund. 

Our business, Ganesh Himal Trading, had contributed to ACP’s scholarship fund since its inception in 1986. As donors, we asked to do a follow up interview with a couple of recipients to get their feedback and ask them about school. We hoped to get a few photos and quotes to take back with us and provide to the few interested donors. What we got was entirely different.

We met with sisters Heema and Heena, ages 16 and 12 respectively. Denise had first met Heema at the age of 8. Her mother was a weaver for ACP and the main income generator for her family.  

When we asked the girls what they wanted to be when they grew up, young Heena shrugged and said “I don’t know because I don’t think I’ll be able to finish school”. We failed to realize prior to this interview that the Girl Child Education Fund was extremely short on funding, so short in fact that they could only offer stipends to 80 students a month and only for three years.  

Heema and Heena’s three years were coming to an end and Heema had begun looking for work in anticipation of her schooling ending. Speechless, I started to cry. I offered to pay for the girls' schooling, but Meera Bhatteri, the founder of ACP, swiftly rejected the idea. She explained that 180 other children were in the same situation and special assistance wouldn’t be fair.  We also learned that at that time, the stipend was a simple $5 a month. We left that interview determined.

Upon returning to the US, Denise woke in the middle of the night with the idea to fundraise around “The Power of 5.” Ask for $5 from 5 friends who in turn would ask five others. Each new person who agreed meant one more month of school for a girl.

Ganesh Himal Trading employees each donated the first round of $5 and we decided to host a party for our local Spokane community to explain the situation and ask for further donations. Within a few months we raised over $40,000. Flushed with our success, we returned to Nepal in 2013 with several donors and interviewed a larger group of students (again to get photos for further fundraising).

We expected to hear that this amount of money meant ACP had increased the number of recipients and told each that they would receive assistance for their full 10 years of education. It did not. Because we were the only major donors, they felt insecure extending the length of assistance. When we asked what it would take for them to feel confident to do this, they said an endowment of $150,000.  With interest rates in Nepal near 10%, this amount would ensure enough funds each year even if something happened to us. This felt like a lot of money, especially when we were asking for $5 at a time. But we told them we would try.

We returned to the states with a clear goal. The first step to reaching this goal was to create an official non-profit. Cameron Conner (former Vice Chair of CCF and current Treasurer) filed our application in the summer of 2014 and we received our official letter that fall, just in time for our third fundraiser.  

It’s now ten years later and  CCF has provided 1300 years of schooling for primary education, an average of 110 children per year. Heema completed  primary school with assistance from the Power of 5, became the first Joy Attwood scholar and went on to earn her Bachelor’s degree in Business Management. And, we have officially reached our goal of funding an endowment, a feat impossible without the support of donors like you! 

We’re so grateful for the generosity of individuals and businesses around the world who have donated; for the countless volunteers who helped host our numerous fundraisers; for every person who ran, biked, jumped out of planes or dedicated their birthdays to the Power of 5; for every Lovebird sewn by Lily and Maizy; and every penny drive and jar next to a cash register. We’re proud that this is the dream of our partners in Nepal and that each step of this has been dictated by them, not us. But we’re mostly proud of the incredible girls who are seizing the opportunities presented to them and dreaming big. 

The Girl Child Education Fund has become the most popular program at ACP. The security of a monthly stipend to cover school fees continues to be a huge relief to families and so, we continue to raise funds annually to expand the program.  There is so much work still to be done. In the meantime, we’re so excited to celebrate how far we’ve come and the milestone that is this endowment. Thank you for helping us to make this happen! 

"We believe in the power of education. We want to see  every child, especially girl children,  go to school and complete at least  grade 10....However, we always had concerns about the viability of this effort... For a long time we wished we could set up the Endowment Fund. Thanks to CCF our dream materialized. The support from CCF has given us the confidence to extend the allowance. We feel relieved this program would continue irrespective of our sales performance. We would like to express our heartfelt gratitude to  CCF Team and all the donors for their generous support in our endeavor to eradicate lack of education  from  amidst the children of our  artisans."

-Revita & Meera, Directors of ACP