Columbia River Peace Corps Association

Columbia River Peace Corps Association Grant Application

Statement of Non-Discrimination

It is the general policy of CRPCA to operate without discrimination as to age, race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or national origin in the overall administration of the Organization and in the consideration of grant requests from agencies and organizations.

Grant applications are accepted three times a year: in January, May, and September. Please refer to the CRPCA website (www.crpca.org) for specific information about preparing and submitting a Grant Application. Submit this application to CRPCA Grants Coordinator Richard Rystrom @ [email protected].

Name of Applicant (please print or type) Name of Applicant Julie Romberg Title of Grant French Books for Village Children Legal Name of Organization United States Peace Corps Organization Address PMB 9097, Port Vila, Republic of Vanuatu Name of Director or President Eddie Stice, Country Director Phone Director/President Email [email protected] Fax Contact Person Jane Strong, PCV Phone Contact Address PMB 9097, Port Vila, Republic of Vanuatu Contact Email [email protected] Fax

Pledge Information Date Organization or Event was Established: 1989______# of paid staff: 24 ; # of volunteers: 93 Are you an IRS 501(c)(3) not-for-profit? X Yes ____ No Are you a governmental agency? X Yes No

Provide a letter of support from the organization you are working with. I will supply this from the Country Director in Vanuatu if what I have already provided is not adequate; though I have his support, I did not have a litter in time to submit with this application. Please let me know if you need it.

General Purpose of the Organization: As indicated in the first of the Peace Corps’ goals, to help people of interested countries in meeting their needs.

Name of Project French Books for Village Children Grant Amount Requested Postage for four flat-rate Match Amount I plan to donate fifty international US Post Office French children’s books boxes @ $58.50=$234.00; from my personal 75-100 used French children’s collection, valued at books @$5.00-$10.00=$500.00 $350 Total Project Budget Total requested: $734.00; total project including my match donation: $1,084.00

Please answer the following questions. You may use additional sheets of paper as needed.

1. Exactly how will the funds being requested from CRPCA be spent? Please include a project budget.

As stated above, the budget is simple: I am requesting $234.00 for the shipping of four flat-rate US Post Office international boxes @ $58.50 each. In addition, I am requesting $500.00 to purchase approximately 75-100 used children’s French books which would be shipped in the boxes to Vanuatu along with the fifty French children’s books from my personal collection that I am donating to Ifira Bilingual School and Mangalilui School, two schools where the children attend school in the French language.

2. What is the timeframe in which the project will be administered?

Upon receiving the requested funds, I will purchase the used children’s French books from Powell’s Books and from several sources that I have located online, depending on what is available at the time. I will be selecting books for two schools; one, Ifira Bilingual School, is where I developed an English school library last year, and other, Mangalilui School, a PC training village, is just starting a library for their French school as a result of discussions I had with the headmistress there and my promises of assistance; therefore the selection of books will not be difficult as I am well-aware of the contents of both collections. I would also select appropriate books from my personal collection of children’s French books. After receiving and then packaging all the books in Post Office international flat- rate boxes, I would mail them, expecting the delivery to take three weeks. The current PCV, my replacement, Jane Strong, would receive the books; she would incorporate the books for Ifira Bilingual School into the library that I previously developed at her site and arrange for the rest of the books to be delivered to Madame Zora, Headmistress of Mangalilui School, a small village an hour’s drive from the PC Office.

3. How do you intend to measure outcomes of the project?

As with my previous experience in Vanuatu developing the English section of the Ifira Bilingual School Library, the success is evident in the use of the library and in the increased reading levels and interest in books exhibited by the students as well as the increased level of fluency in the language of instruction. Ifira Bilingual School’s Library, when I departed in December, contained over 2000 books in its collection; hundreds of books were checked out/returned each day. I was also able to conduct small reading groups during the school day to further help with literacy. My frustration at the time was the lack of French books for the Francophone students to borrow; my final promise to the school during the grand opening of the library was to send books to add to the very small collection of French books.

4. What will happen to this project if your proposal is only partially funded by a grant from CRPCA? Whatever funding is granted will be greatly appreciated and used to purchase whatever amount of books are possible with the money received. This will be a start of an on-going project for me, one that I hope to continue to assist with in the years to come.

5. Are you a PCV or RPCV from Oregon or Southwest Washington or is this area your home base?

I returned from serving as a PCV in the Republic of Vanuatu in the Pacific Islands in December of 2010. After having lived and taught school in Ashland for over 20 years, I relocated to Portland shortly before leaving for the Peace Corps and now am very pleased to call Portland my home!

Please evaluate how well your project meets the following priorities of CRPCA’s members:

How is your project similar to those experienced by Peace Corps Volunteers?

Since it is basically a continuation of my major PC project while serving in Vanuatu during the last two years, it is extremely similar; although I was able to collect a large amount of English books and establish a library at my site, Ifira Bilingual School, and able, through the funding of my Peace Corps Partnership Grant, renovate the library space, I was not able to provide a collection of French books for the Francophone students at the school, hence this grant application.

Is your project education-based?

Yes, the project involves providing books for two libraries in French-speaking schools.

Is your project objective-based and does it have measurable results?

The objective is to provide books and therefore opportunities for at-home reading as well as additional in-school reading to students at two French schools; the results are very measurable in the number of books being checked in and out of the libraries, the increased level of reading fluency and French language fluency as reported by the teachers and the obvious enthusiasm for reading as observed in the students.

Is your project self-sustainable after the end of the grant period?

Yes, the present PCV, Jane Strong, is continuing to run the library at Ifira Bilingual School and will spend her second year of service training several community members to take over when her service is completed. Money is being set aside to offer a small stipend. At Mangalilui School, the Headmistress Madame Zola, assures me that her soon-to-be developing library is her personal project which she plans to be involved in for years to come.

How does your project benefit women and children?

Females, old and young, have been benefiting from the Ifira Bilingual School Library during these last several years since the library was started. The female school popu- lation as well as the female school staff and the female community members appreciate the books available to them and enthusiastically borrow books on a regular basis.

How does your project empower the recipients? As a primary school teacher for over twenty five years, always with a focus on teaching literacy, I feel that there is nothing in life more empowering than reading. In this culture of Vanuatu, where the literacy rate is extremely low, I feel that everything that can be done to provide opportunities to read, whether learning to read and improving fluency levels, to reading for research and information, to just reading for pleasure, is extremely important; providing books to borrow in a library is a great and empowering gift to these people who typically have no books in their homes.

How does your project improve people's lives?

By supporting these school’s libraries with books, both the students and their community have their lives improved by the opportunity to read and enjoy and learn from the experience of having a library available to them.

How does your project meet community need(s)?

Both the communities, Ifira Island and Mangalilui Village, are extremely supportive of this project; community members, often with their children, are able to use the Ifira Bi- lingual School library after school hours and the same will be true when the Mangalilui School Library is developed. It is very important for the community members to also read along with their children; they are able to borrow books from the library as they wish, selecting books either for themselves or to share with family members.

Any additional comments you may wish to address:

I hope that I have responded to this grant application appropriately and within your guidelines; it was a little confusing as I am no longer at the site and do not have the signatures of the country director or the contact person; they are both thrilled that I am continuing with my service by this grant and hopefully it will be acceptable to you in its form. I am a bit “in the middle” here in Portland writing as if I am thousands and thousands of miles away in the Pacific Islands! I am not sure if I am representing myself or the Peace Corps or, hopefully, both!! I have not had the time to receive a “letter of support” from the Country Director and I also did not know if that was necessary as I am not sure if I am officially representing an organization; please let me know if you would like me to Eddie Stice for this letter.

As I mentioned above, after receiving the funding for my Peace Corps Partnership Grant in July 2010, I was able to renovate the Ifira Bilingual School library space, building a veranda for additional space, installing ten new windows, lighting, a ceiling fan, paint and an incredible map on one wall of the library, painted by the students at the school as part of the World Map Project. And of course, your help in the early stages with a grant from the CRPCA to ship books was instrumental in beginning the library collection. At our library’s “grand opening” on November 16, 2010, I spoke large crowd assembled, thanking so many, including your group, for their contributions, and I also made a promise, bravely in French, to the Francophone students, that upon my arrival in the United States, I would send the children’s books from my personal collection but also try to locate additional sources to enable me to help with the building of the French collection, extremely small at the moment, in the library so that they, too, could have wonderful and extensive choices of books to borrow like their Anglophone peers, hence this grant.

Lastly, I would like to again thank you for the grant that I received in 2009 and apologize for never completing a follow-up report which I will be happy to do now that I am home. I have wonderful photo graphs that my son took while visiting Vanuatu when some of the boxes of book funded by your previous grant arrived; they show students excitedly carrying the cartons up from the boat and through the school’s field when I brought them to our island. I plan to share them and others when I present about the grant at the April CRPCV meeting. ENDORSEMENT To the best of my knowledge and belief, the statements in this grant application are true and correct; the governing body of the applicant has duly authorized the document; and the applicant organization will comply with applicable laws, regulations, terms and conditions in effect at the time of grant. I understand that CRPCA, in evaluating this grant application, may, if it deems appropriate, review any and all of the information submitted as part of this request with advisors of CRPCA’s choosing. If this grant is awarded the Grantee shall provide public acknowledgment of this grant by using regular procedures, which may include, but are not limited to, news releases, announcements, certificates, plaques, markers or banners. The Grantee shall submit all public acknowledgements to CRPCA and obtain pre-approval when appropriate (such as with permanent markers, plaques, etc.)

Julie Romberg January 27, 2011 Date Jane Strong January 27, 2011 Signature of Contact Person

All applications are considered final and no revisions will be accepted without prior approval.