The Foreign Service Journal, December 2004

T he J. Kirby Simon Foreign Service Trust is a chari- table fund established in the memory of Kirby Simon, a Foreign Service Officer who died in 1995 while serving in Taiwan. The Trust is committed to expanding the opportunities for community service and professional fulfillment of active Foreign Service Officers and Specialists and their families. The principal activity of the Trust is to support projects that are initiated and carried out, not in an official capacity and not on official time, by Foreign Service personnel or members of their families, wherever located. The Trust, however, will also consider proposals from other U.S. Government employees or members of their families, regardless of nationality, who are located at American diplomatic posts abroad. In 2004 the Trust made its eighth round of grant awards, 35 in all, ranging from $500 to $4500, for a total of $78,520. These grants support the involvement of Foreign Service personnel in the projects briefly listed below (further described in a Trust announcement entitled Grants Awarded in 2004 and available at www.kirbysimontrust.org). T he grants defray a wide range of project expenses, including books, food, toys, furniture, computers, sanitary facilities, sports and kitchen equipment, medicines, medical instruments and testing, TV/DVD monitor, fitness equipment, job training machinery and staff costs, excursion costs, supplies for building renovation and for a security wall. • Educational Projects: Bangladesh – school for street children; Belarus – school sports facilities; Caracas – public school for blind children; Ghana – small rural school; Guatemala – before-and-after-school library; Kosovo – multi-ethnic school; Kosovo – school for minority and displaced children; Mauritius – computer training center for poor youths; Mongolia – school for street children; Peru – village children’s library; South Africa – youth employment training school; Zambia – school for orphans. • Other Projects for Children: Honduras – home for street children; Lithuania – cultural/recreational excursion for residents of a children’s home; Mexico – program to obtain birth certificates for poor rural children; Uruguay – child care center near a squatter’s village; Zimbabwe – income-generating program for AIDS orphans; and projects at orphanages in Colombia, El Salvador, Kyrgyzstan, South Africa and Turkey. • Health-related Projects: Bolivia – program to obtain birth certificates for recovering substance abusers; Bosnia-Herzegovina – disease prevention for women; Guatemala – sexually-transmitted disease treatment for women; Madagascar – nutrition program for undernourished nursing mothers; Morocco – neonatal center; Zimbabwe – AIDS palliative care unit. • Facilities for the Homeless: Armenia – refugee center; Democratic Republic of the Congo – group home for street children; Greece – refugee center. • Projects for Victims of Abuse: Albania – handicraft program for trafficking victims; Lithuania – support center for trafficking victims. • Project for Animal Care: Armenia – animal shelter. The Trust now invites the submission of proposals for support in 2005. It is anticipated that most of the new grants will fall within the same funding range as the 2004 awards, and that projects assisted by the Trust will reflect a variety of interests and approaches, some of which are illustrated by the 2004 grants. Grants provided by the Trust can be used to support several categories of project expenses; the third paragraph of this announcement provides examples. Grant funds from the Trust, however, cannot be used to pay salaries or other compensation to U.S. Government employees or their family members. Because of the limited resources available to the Trust, it is not in a position to support projects that have reasonable prospects of obtaining full funding from other sources. Nor does the Trust support projects that require more resources than the Trust and other funders can provide. The Trustees wish to emphasize that the Trust will provide support for a project operated by a charitable or educational organization only where the Foreign Service- related applicant(s) play an active part in initiating and carrying out the project, apart from fundraising. A proposal should include a description of the project, what it is intended to achieve, and the role to be played by the applicant(s); a preliminary plan for disseminating the results of the project; a budget; other available funding, if any; and a brief biography of the applicant(s). Proposals should be no longer than five double-spaced pages (exclusive of budget and biographical material). Applicants should follow the application format that is available at www.kirbysimontrust.org o r that can be obtained by communicating with the Trust (see below). Proposals for projects to be funded during calendar year 2005 must be received by the Trust no later than March 1, 2005. Proposals and inquiries can be sent by mail, fax or e-mail to: J. Kirby Simon Foreign Service Trust 82 Edgehill Road, New Haven, CT 06511 FAX: 203-432-0063 info@kirbysimontrust.org Further information about the Trust can be found on the Web at www.kirbysimontrust.org J. KIRBY SIMON FOREIGN SERVICE TRUST AN INVITATION TO PROPOSE PROJECTS FOR FUNDING BY THE J. KIRBY SIMON FOREIGN SERVICE TRUST IN 2005