The Rebuild Nepal Education Foundation is gearing up to fly to Nepal to support recovery efforts following a devastating avalanche and flash flooding in late August.
The trip had originally been planned to assist students in the country’s remote regions. That goal has now changed. Ernest Schiller, the chair and founder, told WVIK on Friday, “Every dime that we've raised has gone to humanitarian efforts. So we— the funds that we're raising going to humanitarian relief which we are going to directly take ourselves to the holding centers and to the flood victims." Volunteer efforts will be focused in the mountainous regions of the country which, according to Schiller, have historically taken longer to recover from natural disasters.
“We are taking the money directly to the victims themselves, or we are buying the material in Kathmandu. The pots and pans, the food, the tents, the burners, the propane tanks, everything that got washed away. Even we're taking a lot of clothing as much as we can, but we're buying things with the money and we're taking it directly to the victims. So there's a direct connect.”
Volunteers pay their own way for the trip, so every dollar raised will go directly to relief efforts. Since the flooding, there have been more than 900 confirmed deaths in the region, with over 4,000 still missing.
Schiller, a retired teacher from Donellson, Iowa, started this foundation after a volunteer trip to help students following an earthquake in 2015. He says the organization has two main goals: “Our first mission was to draw awareness to the poor Nepalese because it's a third-world country. And the second one, and the most important, was based on my educational background. Is to find the poorest children, find them, and if they're not in school, we put them in school and we pay their fees”.
They’re raising $25,000 for recovery efforts; donations can be made on their website. The trip will depart for Nepal on Monday, October 12.
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