Cornell students, combining their educational opportunity with altruism, are fundraising for a school thousands of miles away. They are seeking to prevent children in a remote village in China from dropping out of primary school due to poverty.

Project Hope, a Cornell student organization that has raised $5,000 since its founding in 2005, just delivered 26 scholarships -- worth close to $1,200 -- and school supplies to students in a small village in Gansu Province. It's enough to get them through one year of school.

Many Cornell students have never seen or been affected by the poverty in rural China, says the group's faculty adviser, Frances Yufen Lee Mehta, a senior lecturer in the Department of Asian Studies.

"But it's good that they see the changes they can make in the lives of struggling students elsewhere," said Mehta, who delivered the scholarships in May to children in a village called Wanhe, where many children come from impoverished families, some with single parents or ill family members. Project Hope's goal is to get more people involved in helping these underprivileged children. "You can organize a single event that lasts one night and may impact a few people, but it takes a whole community effort to make a sizeable impact," Mehta said.

She said that Project Hope gives the village more than money: "Most importantly, we give them hope." Rural China has many deprived villages suffering from illiteracy, underdeveloped farmland and lack of clean water. According to UNESCO, approximately 7 percent of China remains illiterate -- that is 92.5 million people -- almost one-third the U.S. population.

"The Chinese government is also, of course, looking into this issue. However, China is a huge country," Mehta said. "In the meantime, we cannot make these poor students and families wait. So here we are doing our part and contributing from our side to help these students have a future."

The group sponsors two fundraisers a year, Hope Fest in the fall (this year Nov. 1, 1 to 4 p.m. in Memorial Room, Willard Straight Hall) and Hope Night in the spring. Both events celebrate Chinese culture with dance performances, cultural food and competitions, and every penny raised goes to the scholarships with no overhead, said co-president Gary Peng '11.

Most of the students in the organization are first-generation Chinese Americans, said Peng, who grew up in Beijing and rarely traveled outside the city.

Hope Fest
Come one, come all to this year's Hope Fest, Nov. 1, 1 to 4 p.m., Memorial Room, Willard Straight Hall. Have fun playing games, watching dances and eating Chinese food, all the while raising money to help poor children in rural China stay in primary school. Full-year tuition for one child costs only $44.

"There is a huge distinction between the people who live in the city and the rural areas," said Peng. "The opening ceremony of the Olympics was amazing, but that's not representative of China as a whole."

Mehta saw the poverty firsthand when handing out the scholarships in Wanhe. "The experience was very emotional," she said. "We knew they were poor, but it wasn't what we expected, and it was touching.

"Knowing that we were coming from U.S., the students at first seemed a bit overwhelmed. I had to crack some jokes so they would feel more comfortable," she added.

Each child received an envelope containing the scholarship money for tuition and a note from Mehta saying: "Study well, and always try your best! Be a happy child! Do not forget, you are our hope hopes for the future!"

For more information, see http://rso.cornell.edu/ProjectHope/.

Brandon Chiazza '09 is a writer intern with the Cornell Chronicle.