GlobalGiving Project of the Month Club

Dear Project of the Month Club,

We are thrilled to let you know that last month, you and 157 other Project of the Month Club members raised an amazing $5,953 for "Empowering Women Through Design in Rural Peru," providing women economic stablility while still encouraging creativity and education.

Annie Millican, Project Leader, shared with us their plans for spending your donations:

"With [these funds] we will give our three seamstresses training in computer and administrative skills so they can increasingly manage their own orders and sales. We will also provide further trainings in pattern-making so they can truly take the lead in designing quality, fashion-forward items. We will provide hard-skills training to our new spinning cooperative, a group of 11 young women, to teach them to create felt out of leftover fleece; we will teach the seamstress-designers to use this felt as another raw material that supports local women.

Finally, we will invest in sales and marketing to enable all our cooperatives to access a wider market and immediately improve their income. This will allows us to increase the skills, autonomy, responsibility and income of all the 95 women with whom Awamaki works, so that they may continue to invest in their communities and create a better life for themselves and their families."

For January's Project of the Month, we're glad to tell you about a project called "I Am A JewelGirl. What Kind Of Girl Are You?" led by one of our partners, FAIR Girls. This project empowers orphaned and formerly trafficked Russian girls aged 11 to 18 with the skills, knowledge, and community networks they need to overcome their own exploitation and lead other girls toward freedom and independence.

Their Project Leader, Andrea Powell, wanted to share with you her message of thanks upon learning that they were selected to participate in the Project of the Month Club:

"FAIR Girls is excited and honored to be a part of the Project of the Month Club!  Every day, we empower girl victims of sex trafficking and labor exploitation to become strong survivors.  In our JewelGirls program, we  provide 100 girls in Moscow and St. Petersburg with the opportunity to empower themselves through job preparedness workshops, knowledge on how to stay safe from sexual violence and exploitation, art therapy, and access to professional counselors and a support network of peers.

What's more, the money they earn through the sale of jewelry created in art therapy, together with the skills they learn, give them the self confidence and income generation they need to become strong survivors."

Thank you so much for your support and kindness this holiday season, and we hope that you are proud to know that you are empowering girls rescued from sex slavery to achieve their goals. Your support is having an earth-changing impact around the world.

Warm regards,
Mari and the GlobalGiving Team