Dear Friend,

Thanks to your generous support Sophia is growing beyond our original expectations! The lives of 68 brilliant students along with their families are being changed permanently! That is what your Gift of Education (Vidhyaa Dhaan) is accomplishing. Time will bring the fruits of these budding movers and shakers to our society and the world!

For your benefit and for those we are striving to add to the list of Sophia Donors, we have provided information on Sophia, the progress achieved, list of the Scholars, list of the Donors and answers to some commonly asked questions.

Please take the time to review these. If you have any questions, please contact us by phone or e-mail. We will make sure that your questions are answered expeditiously.

One hundred percent of your donations reach the Sophia Scholars! The Board of Directors and Advisory Committee members bear all the expenses.

We are appealing for your generous help again so that we can continue our mission of helping the needy and deserving.

In addition to giving you great personal satisfaction, your donation will be acknowledged in Sophia’s communications to the community.

May we count on your support by August 1 as the next school year will begin in September and the selection of next year's Scholars will have to be finalized by then?

We are pleased to announce that your donations to Sophia is approved for employee gift matching by Bechtel, HP, CISCO and Kaiser Permanante. If you are employee any of these companies please enquire and follow the process for “matching grant” donations. Your donations will be doubled for Sophia.

We have made arrangements to accept Stocks. Please contact us if you would like to donate Stocks.

Very Truly Yours,

Geetha & Muthu Iyer
Mallika & Ravi Srinivasan
Shyamala & K. Venkateswaran

 

“There is no compound interest with returns greater than those reaped by educating young people!"

"Just as a parent, caregiver teacher or mentor nurtured you, now you can make a difference in someone's life! Establish a scholarship or contribute any amount and invest in the next generation.”

- Quotes from Harvard Magazine

How are your charitable action influencing the lives of so many and many more to come, future movers and shakers?

You, as an accomplished individual with a charitable outlook can help in several ways Sophia’s mission of enabling talented youngsters to attain their full potential by:

• Sponsoring a Scholar for a quarter ($300), a semester ($400) or a year ($700), or donating any other amount that you can toward this noble cause. If you donate the cost of a Scholar’s entire study duration ($2600), Sophia will be pleased to name that scholarship after some one of your choosing

• Providing your suggestions and comments on the Response Form and/or

• Encouraging your close friends or relatives to extend their support to Sophia

From letters we have received:

• Me born in a family below poverty line with my family members doing the job of weaving (handloom workers), view this letter as an opportunity to show my gratefulness to you.
• I have got your scholarship at very right time. You have changed the sorrow of whole family. My parents also feel very thankful to you.
• I assure you once again that I will make you proud in the future for helping me.
• Personally I would like to thank you for giving me this opportunity. In future we all are going to benefited by me, those people will also thank you through me.
• My father is a laborer in a grocery shop and my mother is a housewife. Your Charity should grow more and more and ignite plenty of students to come up with their own career.
• This is not only help for individual…It’s a help for the Society. It’s a help for the country. In future, I will promise my Service to the Society, especially those who are needy.
• I never thought that I would complete my graduation because of my financial problems pertained. Now I can stand on my feet, within few months I will be able to earn money.
• I will strongly donate some part of my earnings to the poor and help them to lighten their life.
• One candle helped to lighten the other candles. You are that one candle and I will be the now other candle lightened by you and now I keep lighting the candles like me
  

During a get-together we invited the Sophia scholarship holders (hereinafter called the Sophia Scholars) to share their feelings and outlook with us. While everyone’s account was moving and clearly depicted their struggles in life, the following are worth passing on to you.

Miss. G., a medical Scholar, stated that her father had no stable job and had no way of supporting her medical college expenses. Her mother passed away recently. Before she died she called Miss. G. and said, “Please call Sophia and convey our family’s gratitude. Always remember Sophia’s help. Help patients in need”. Miss. G. says that had her mother been alive, she would be the happiest person to see me become a doctor.

Mr. V., an engineering Scholar, said: To say that Sophia’s help to me and my family were timely will be an understatement. It is much more than that. It relieved the emotional stranglehold that existed throughout my school days. Before I spend every Rupee that Sophia is giving, I think twice whether it is really essential, because it is not money to be squandered”.

Mr. V., another engineering Scholar stated “I finished high school from Chinmaya Vidhyalaya with a score of 482/500, eight marks short of the highest. I was admitted to the engineering college. I was totally down the entire first semester because of financial pressure and kept remembering a few words that were inscribed on the quest of the first shift that went to the South Pole: Just hold on, even if you don’t have anything to hold on to.’ That is what I did until news came of Sophia scholarship”.

How does your donation to Sophia help you? Here are a few feelings that some of you have expressed which ring out so powerfully!

• “We need to live our lives by observing our duty to others, to relieve their pain, enlarge their opportunities or brighten their lives”.

• “There are lots of people who need help and there are a lot of people who want to help. It is a matter of tying the two. Sophia is giving me the opportunity to share the benefit of the success that life has brought to me”.

• “There are various ways of helping the needy – food, clothes, money and so forth. Of all these, the Gift of Education (Vidhya Dhaan) is the lasting way to change the life of a needy and deserving individual”.
  

You can download the Donation Form by clicking HERE: