FullThankYou from Turkish Philanthropy Funds on Vimeo.

With your donation of $500, not only will you send a girl to school for one year, you will also receive a copy of this moving documentary, Girls of Hope, and a stunning photo book.

We can ship directly to your friend or loved one. $500 includes shipping cost.

About the DVD: In the Eastern and Southeastern regions of Turkey, the illiteracy rate among women is near 45 percent. For years, the government, NGOs and individual effort have worked to improve the situation. However, economic hardship and strict traditions still prevent many girls from access to education. Filmed in Van by Aysegul Selenga Taskent, the documentary portrays a few girls who struggle for their education and, despite all the difficulties, try to hold on to their hope for a better future. Watch a trailer of the film here.

About the book: The photo book, called “Annem Sayesinde”, shot by Delizia Flaccavento, is a photo journey through the lives of girls who’ve received scholarships from Çağdaş Yaşamı Destekleme Derneği and the stories behind their educational struggle.

About the Scholarship: Scholarships will be made through Çağdaş Yaşamı Destekleme Derneği (CYDD). CYDD aims to address this education gap between girls and boys. The organization supports the modernization of society through working to ensure equal opportunity in public education.

Get Started Now! 

“I didn’t know men could be Secretary of State,” said the 8-year old daughter of Fred Turner, a senior official at the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe when he told his daughter that John Kerry was the new Secretary of State. It’s amazing how role models can change the perspective of a new generation.  That and more are what’s needed in Turkey. Having rules and regulations to provide equality for women is not enough. Pressing questions that have repeatedly come up in recent years are: “Can Turkey’s economic growth be mirrored in the advancement of gender equality? And, can the growth of the economy continue without including women in every aspect of the social, political and economic life.” Answering these questions with a “Yes,” requires addressing the implementation of laws protecting women and girls at the local level and strengthening the capacity of organizations that work to empower them. The State Department can help.

“Gender is an integral component of daily life,” my former professor Marilyn Gittell would say, “It should be systematically included in every political, social and economic decision.” Studies prove that gender equality and women’s empowerment is a driver, and beneficiary of sustainable development. Adopting this understanding into foreign policy is the next step.

Women empowerment is not an area that was traditionally considered part of foreign policy discussions. That has changed. A series of female secretaries of state have shed light on the importance of women’s issues in resolving international challenges. Most recently, Hilary Clinton made advancing the status of women and girls worldwide an official requirement of every U.S. diplomat’s job description. Melanne Verveer, the first ambassador at large for global women’s issues says: “promoting the status of women is not just a moral imperative but a strategic one; it’s essential to economic prosperity and to global peace and security. It is, in other words, a strategy for a smarter foreign policy.” This year, on the International Women’s Day, the Secretary of State, John Kerry issued an Op-Ed piece which discusses why women are central to US foreign policy.

Through their communication with foreign governments US diplomats emphasize the truer participation in gender-responsive planning and budgeting and work with ministries to make sure that priorities are given and targeted measures are taken for locating sufficient resources for women and girls’ empowerment. Yet, policy making is just one aspect of empowering women. The most important piece of impacting gender gap lies in the implementation.

Sharon Anderholm Wiener, acting Ambassador for the Office of Global Women’s Issues, at a meeting addressing Turkish-Americans in April 2013 noted that the rules and regulations protecting women’s rights in Turkey are in place. In 1985 Turkey signed the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Turkey also approved the European Social Charters that protects women’s right for equal pay and employment during maternity and various ILO Conventions that regulate the right of women in the workforce. In 2008, a National Action Plan on Gender Equality was prepared with the goal of incorporating gender perspective into all main plans and programs of the government. However, having the legal system in place and implementing it is two different things.

Male-female disparity is seen in every aspect of life in Turkey from economic participation to educational opportunities. As I noted in an earlier article, Turkey needs both cultural and institutional change dealing with social issues facing girls and women. Women organizations understand the multiple actions that are needed to be taken to empower women. They know that sustainable investment on education, affordable childcare, job opportunities, advocacy, changing cultural perceptions are needed to effectively address empowerment of girls and women.  Yet, funding is limited.

Turkey’s non-profit sector largely depends on funding from the European Union. The philanthropy sector hasn’t developed to catch up with the growth. There aren’t many grantmaking foundations –Sabanci Foundation, Vodafone Foundation and Acik Toplum Vakfi to name a few. This leaves NGOs with limited funding resources. In the international development area, Turkey is not seen as a traditional receiver country. Even though Turkey contributed more than $1bn in humanitarian aid last year, making it the fourth-largest government donor, the country’s non-profit sector is at a loss. These women organizations are doing great things. They have been very instrumental in the changes in the Constitution, and Turkish Civil and Criminal Codes concerning women. The State Department funding cannot only provide funding for programming but also for the building of the philanthropic capacity of these organizations.

Women and girls empowerment should also be addressed at the grassroots level. An organization TPF supports in the Eastern city of Van was a great example of how funding can grow the scale of these interventions at the local level. Kilim weaving workshops started  in Van by a local, Enver Ozkahraman, grew its numbers to eight when a businessman from Istanbul learned about them from this video. Since their paths merged, the number of girls impacted with the workshops increased. But, beyond the numbers when you listen to the stories of these girls, you see what kind of change these small interventions are making in a girls’ and eventually in her family’s lives. .

A recent U.N. report on the Post-2015 Development Agenda notes that social investments will only generate the biggest possible return if we make sure women and girls benefit from them equally. Women make up a half of potential human capital available in the global economy. The efficient use of this talent pool is important. We need more Hilary Clintons as Secretary of State to break cultural barriers on the global arena and change perceptions. But, we also need more people advocating for women in foreign policy and women’s issues. As Hilary Clinton once noted: “When women participate in the economy, everyone benefits. When women participate in peacemaking and peacekeeping, we are all safer and all secure. And, when women participate in politics, the effects ripple out across society.”

In light of the incidents taking place in Turkey right now the importance of our project as Van Art Project Team become much more evident: In July, we went back to Van, Turkey to plant the seeds for raising a generation that will have an alternative language to violence.

In 2012, The First Annual Van Art Project was designed to respond to the psychological needs of the local women and children after an earthquake hit the area hard. Working in close partnership with a local women’s organization, VAKAD (Van Woman’s Association), the Van Art Project offered daily directive based groups that focused on therapeutic art making and psycho-education throughout the week of July 2-6, 2012.

Although the earthquake’s life altering consequences were evident in the area, another ongoing issue quickly surfaced during the Van Art Project: interfamilial and domestic violence. It appeared that the prior trauma prominent in the area resurfaced and became more apparent with the subsequent trauma of the earthquake.

In July 2013, The Van Art Project returned to Van for a week full of training and workshops. We worked to promote resiliency, provide the participating women and children with sense of safety, self-efficacy, containment and stabilization to help them cope with their everyday lives.

This year, our project took place in Kevenli Kadın ve Çocuk Merkezi (Kevenli Woman and Children Center) in Kevenli, Van. This brand new center is owned by Kadın Emeğini Değerlendirme Vakfı (KEDV) and is being supported by VAKAD (Van Kadın DerneğI / Van Woman’s Association) staff as well in daily management and operations.

The Van Art Project Team began the week by facilitating a day-long training with local professionals in the area at the VAKAD’s (Van Woman Association) main office. The day consisted of an intro of basic art therapy theory as well as hands-on experiential therapeutic art activities. The main goals were to introduce the participants to art therapy, teach skills for working therapeutically with art, and to also offer self-care techniques as these professionals work on the field with traumatized clients and self-care is crucial to their work to prevent burn out.

Activities included wish boxes, a weave of wishes, and an envelope of inspiration. They were able to work individually, in group, and in dyads so they could experience all the ways in which therapeutic art making can be used. We also encouraged them to explore the importance of connection as caregivers in the community.

Overall the workshop was very well received and the participants all verbalized gaining a great deal both professionally and personally and hoped to have us back again for a longer training next year.

The four Van Art Project therapists facilitated five workshops a day -4 with children and 1 with women. Each team of therapists facilitated 2 groups with children and then we all came together to facilitate the women’s group together.

During the first day at the women and children community center, the idea of safety and a safe place was provided with the canvas bags activity. We explored what we carry with us literally and metaphorically. Some responses included “we carry memories of people who have died” and “we carry our emotions.”  Children were given canvas bags to decorate with fabric markers and felt.

For the women’s group in the afternoon, we also explored theme of safe space with bags and container for emotions as well as the group also being a safe space to hold emotions. They seemed to thoroughly enjoy process. They started out all covering their bags in a similar way but through the art process they individualized their bags in their own unique ways. We reflected on this later by discussing the common thread and similarities of being women, but also the individuality that each woman has.

Day 2’s theme in our week of compassion and connection workshop was about group strengths. Identifying individual strengths and bringing them together as a community.

The first activity was to identify a strength that the children and women had. Then to create a mandala(circle) puzzle piece inspired by that strength. The children’s groups included themes of care taking, cleaning, sports, dancing, singing, being a good helper at home, and being a good sibling .  The women’s group was furthering their bonding and trust building on the second day. They were committed to the group even though it was now Ramadan and they were tired from fasting and still were committed to attending.

The third day of the workshop consisted of a theme of self-expression, encouraging participants to extend compassion to themselves by creating a metaphoric object that could represent the “self” in some way and allow for caretaking and compassion through the art making for that object.

We facilitated two separate activities though for the women and children. For children we used the metaphor of animals and for the women we used the metaphor of wish dolls.

The final day of the VAP workshops went beautifully. Of course our theme was termination and we processed with each group our leaving and the meaning it held for them.

We introduced journals as a way to hold their thoughts feelings emotions and memories. They talked about memories actually first when we asked what the journals could hold and then we talked about them being in our memories and hearts and us in theirs. We explored idea that even though we may lose people or miss people or homes or groups that we never lose our imagination and our memories.

Women were encouraged to think of something they wanted to take from the group as well as what they would like to give. We invited them to trace each other’s hands and then decorate each as one to give and one to take something from group.

They seemed to be getting much more comfortable with 2 dimensional materials and really put a lot of effort and creative symbolism into their hands. Then after they cut them out we had them place the one they are giving in a circle around a vase of pipe cleaner flowers with colorful construction paper hands as a base.

To summarize it all : “Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.”

-Pema Chodron

Yes they can!!!

Last week TPF and HADD took off some time to visit the Akdamar Island and Church. It is 20 minutes

from Gevash to the island by boat. The weather was perfect and no wind. Akdamar Island was a perfect sight.

As we board the boat to the Island, another group of about 20 Blind young people boarded with their friends who were helping them to get around. Together we landed on the Island and toured the Church.

I think they saw the beauty and the history that lies on the Island better than Ozlenen, Enver and me..

Yes they can see!

On the way back, there was Kurdish music playing on the loudspeakers of the boat and they danced.

They were beautiful.

Originally published in the Huffington Post.

Shocked by its beauty, as the plane landed into the city of Van, in the southeastern region of Turkey, we were engulfed by the bluest of blue water from the lake and snowcapped mountains. On our airplane, Dayle Haddon, UNICEF Ambassador and Founder of WomenOne, and I were accompanied by only two other women on the plane. Men surrounded us, wearing gray and black colored clothes. As we stopped to take pictures of the intense scenery, people stopped to stare at what they thought were two funny foreigners. We would soon learn that beauty was a theme in this city.

Dayle and I were visiting Hisar Anadolu Destekleme Dernegi‘s (HADD) workshops where young girls weaved kilims and took home schooling courses. HADD builds their workshops in poor slums in the outskirts of the cities where the girls have the least opportunities. These slums were created when village residents in the southeast were forced to migrate to Van. Due to the large influx of migrants, job opportunities became scarce and poverty became a huge issue for these migrants. In the first slum we visited, the prefabricated building was surrounded by stone homes that seemed to be overflowing with children. Children were running on the side of the road, they were hanging out of windows, jumping out of cars and being downright mischievous. One thing was for sure, was that they were not in school. Mothers and fathers were nowhere in sight, as their girls and boys pranced around town.

The workshop housed about twenty girls, who each weaved on her own kilim. Some girls were beginners, and would make multiple small kilims to practice. Some girls were advanced and were making kilims for international orders. Their ages ranged from about 14-18 in this room. Dayle’s first question was “Do you ever get bored weaving all day?” They answered, “never”. Smart and resourceful, they are using henna on their hands to keep their fingers from hurting, as the constant rubbing against the strings can cause callouses. Each kilim was like a musical instrument with its hundreds of strings and the girls mastered the art of tossing the wool through the machine thousands of times, looping and twisting, then pounding the wool down to tighten the weave. The sounds echoed in the room as the hard workers barely stopped to greet their foreign guests. All of the girls concentrated deeply on their work. A rhythmic flow of movement set a very calm tone to the room. The kilims were stunning. The most beautiful pieces of art were being handmade here in Van by young girls, struggling to give themselves and their family’s better lives.

Initially, I walked up to each girl, one by one, asking their name, age and how long they had been working in the workshop. As Turkish Philanthropy Funds had just finished building this particular building, they were mostly relatively fresh to the trade. Although, after just five or six months, these girls were selling kilims internationally and showing work in well-known galleries in Istanbul and abroad. The girls were quick to share with me how many siblings they had in their families and how many people lived in their home. An average home seemed to consist of about 20 people living under one roof. Some of the girls were already married, but most of them were not. Their message to me was clear, if they were not weaving and attending school, they would be married with at least two children by now. But the exact opposite has happened; they are working and educating themselves. Most of the girls weaving in this workshop are the sole breadwinners in their family. That means one 16-year-old girl, could be working to support up to twenty mouths. Dayle and I were eager as ever to see these homes first hand.

The girls eventually left their looms and gathered around Dayle and I, as we showed pictures of New York, our families and my dog. After we finished our meeting of us asking questions and the girls asking twice as many more, we said our long goodbyes and were escorted by a 19-year-old girl named Sermine. She was willing to walk us to her nearby home and show us what it was like living in her village. We walked behind the building, over a make-shift bridge (made of one wooden board) and past a few stray chickens. Around a few more stone buildings, we arrived to a two-story home that Sermine called her own. We were welcomed by her mother, who only spoke Kurdish, followed by three other children, into the main living, eating and sleeping area. There was a baby rocking in a bassinet, under a thick blanket. In this room (probably 12’x15′) Serife, her Husband, their baby, Serife’s brother and his wife and child all sleep.

There were no beds, just piled up mattresses. There was no kitchen table, just a rug in the center of the room. There was no TV, just a radio in the corner. The rest of the house was inhabited by her mother and father and extended family. It was in that moment, I realized why Serife was working so hard to finish weaving her rug. With the money she could earn, and the education she could obtain, she could build a better life for her family. Her eyes had been opened to greater possibilities, as had all the other girls in the workshop. Their lives no longer just meant living to survive, but living to succeed. Serife translated to me that her mother said she was very proud of her for working hard and studying. Her mother said it was an opportunity that she was never given and is ecstatic that Serife can make a better life for herself.

As we walked out of her home, I was struck with awe of her living conditions. Refreshingly, at the end of the day these girls, even though they are acting mature beyond their years, are overcoming profound obstacles and are setting the path for girls in their communities for years to come, they are still young girls at heart. When we asked the first thing the girls want to buy with their hard earned money, their answer was phone credit.

Next stop, Diyarbakir. Read here.

This update comes to you with great happiness and pride to prove small moves make huge changes. KEDV (Foundation for the Support of Women’s Work) has recently submitted their final project report. In October of 2011, we at TPF were quick to grant KEDV $25,000 to build a Women and Children’s Center in Van. During the 1-year anniversary remembrance, we spoke with KEDV and they were having a very hard time obtaining land. Location of the center was key, in that the people who needed it most, could not travel far. On top of that, once the land was chosen, finding local organizers to help with the project was proving very difficult. After the earthquake, NGO workers were worked to their limits to rebuild the city.

However, against all odds, KEDV pushed through all obstacles and opened the Kevenli Women and Children’s Center. The Center tackles large, relevant issues that locals are in dire need of learning. KEDV verses locals on financial literacy, to help them understand simple economics and how to manage personal finances. Women also benefit from courses in human rights and teaching them violence against women is not acceptable. Additionally, classes on communication with children, productive health and nutrition are also available at the Center. Women attending the sessions are between the ages of 15-45.

To date, 498 women have taken advantage of these courses, and the Center has not even had its official opening ceremony yet.  We are in awe of the impact this center will have on the community. It is understood that even if a woman’s friend attends a training course, she will spread the word and influence her neighbors and family.

Lastly, KEDV is listening to their community. 600 door to door visits were made to speak with women in the area. They asked the women what are their needs and how can they help. We cannot wait to follow up with KEDV in the coming months to learn the results of this survey and how they will shape their program to help the women.

All the best,

Team TPF

Natural disasters do not only destroy buildings, roads and infrastructure, they upend human life; forcing many to suffer post-traumatic stress. That is what happened in Van last October. Our partners are making enormous strides in helping not only the physical well-being of the victims of the 2011 earthquake, but also the emotional.

During the month of July, The Van Art Project conducted workshops of art therapy to work with the community affected by the earthquake. The goal of the project was to provide tools and skills to the local women and children to help them cope with their trauma. “This is the first time I have ever shared with other women; now I know I am not alone” commented one participant of the project. A young, selectively mute girl, due to the trauma of the earthquake, began to sing by the end of the weeklong project. These examples confirm a successful project. The Van Art Project looks forward to a 2^nd Annual Event next summer.

Additionally, Anne Çocuk Eğitim Vakfı (AÇEV) has worked tirelessly through the winter months to complete the build of the Van Post-Trauma Family Counseling Center, where psychological rehabilitation services are now available to adults and children. Since its April 2012 opening, some 328 people have received services (202 adults/young adults and 128 children) and the center foresees thousands more. The center employs two adult therapists, child therapists and two field specialists. With a grant from TPF of $50,000, AÇEV will be able to make a long lasting effect on the people of Van.

Türkiye Eğitim Gönüllüleri Vakfı (TEGV) is also hard at work in Van. What students do after school is just as important as what they do in school. That is why TEGV has been working to build an extracurricular activity building in Muradiye, Van. They are proud to announce that they have completed their project and will hold an opening ceremony on October 18^th. The project aims to benefit 800 children per year with educational programs and extracurricular activities.

I was in Van for 3 days last week and returned back on Saturday. The situation in Van is worse than I expected. I did not realize that the problem was so large. Most of the buildings in the city are damaged and they are waiting for demolition. The people have either left Van or they are living in tents. The temperature was -6 degrees last week. The government has put up container villages, but the people prefer to live in make shift tents near their homes.

The people had been through a trauma which will last sometime for them to get over. I think the good weather in the spring will raise their morale and they will start returning to their normal lives.

Enver Bey has setup office in one of the containers that we have sent and he is organizing the relief efforts. He has formed groups of four girls in each ghetto that we work. These girls locate the families that needs support, make a list of what they need and report to Enver Bey. Next day the help is sent to the families. The number of families that are receiving help from us has reached 350. All the people that I have met asked me to relay their thanks to all the good people that are helping them.

We have started work in two of our workshops. The other three are damaged and the girls are reluctant to go in them. The girls in operating workshops are very happy to attend a workshop where they socialize in a warm environment, have decent lunch and make some money. We are trying to set up two prefabricated workshops instead of the ones that are damaged. We hope to have them up and running in March. The Governor of Van has congratulated us for organizing the operation of two workshops, and indicated that such success stories are necessary for uplifting of morale in the city.

We feel that we have and are helping these people and we could not have done this without the help of our friends.

On behalf of all the families and the girls in Van that we work with we wish to thank Turkish Philanthropy Funds for all they have done and hope that their support continues.