Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association

Kids Without Borders' website (under construction) is at www.kidswithnoborders.org

Kids Without Borders     

A project in partnership with the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Detlef Schrempf Foundation, the Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association, Kids In Distressed Situations, Rotary Clubs of District 5030, and Shurgard Storage for Hope

The primary mission of KIDS WITHOUT BORDERS is to involve and inspire youth helping other youth. KWB connects children of all ethnic and social-economic backgrounds, ages, and religions. We engage them in opportunities to give of themselves unconditionally through service that will benefit other children within their communities and in other parts of the world. Founded in 2001, KWB is a 100% volunteer organization.

Our Donors:
Through Kids In Distressed Situations (KIDS), we received new apparel, shoes, toys, juvenile products and other items that benefit children in need. The donations come from manufacturers, retailers, vendors and suppliers of children’s products.

Our Partners:
        Annie E. Casey Foundation · Detlef Schrempf Foundation · Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association · Rotary Club of the University District Seattle · District 5030 Rotary Clubs · Shurgard Storage for Hope

Our Recipients:

Æ  In Our Communities …

Bailey-Gatzert Elementary (Rotary Club of the International District-Seattle) · Beacon Avenue Food Bank · Bow Lake Elementary ESL Students (Seatac) · Boyer Children’s Clinic · Childhaven · Christa McAuliff Elementary · Clothes for Kids of Snohomish (Detlef Schrempf Foundation) · Denise Louie Education Center · ECEAP (Puget Sound Educational Service District) · Eastside Domestic Violence Program (Rotary Club of Bellevue) · Ephrata Schools · Eugene (Oregon) Domestic Violence Center (Rotary Clubs of District 5030) · Evergreen Children’s Association - Adams Kids' Company · Families, Friends and Community · Family Services – Baby Boutique (Detlef Schrempf Foundation) · Gregory Heights Elementary ESL Students (Highline School District) · Head Start (Puget Sound Educational Service District) · Healthy Start Shoreline/Lake Forest Park · Helping And Loving Orphans (HALO) · Latino Summer Camp for ESL Kids (Powerful Partners for Powerful Youth in White Center, Seattle) · Louisa May Alcott Elementary · Mona Foundation · Northshore School District (Rotary Club of Northshore) · Project LOOK · Ronald McDonald’s House – Seattle (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Ronald McDonald’s House – Spokane · Samantha Smith Elementary · Seattle Mental Health (Rotary Club of Overlake-Bellevue) · Shriners Hospitals for Children Spokane · Soap Lake Schools (Mother Teresa-McKay Youth Outreach & Wellness Center) · Treehouse (Detlef Schrempf Foundation · University District YMCA (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Van Lang Vietnamese Cultural Association in White Center · Vietnamese Catholic Community Church of Seattle · Vietnamese Buddhist Temple of Seattle ·

Æ  In Our Extended Communities (orphanages, street children program, developing countries, …)

Bolivia (Habitat for Humanity) · Cambodia (Rotary Club of Bain Bridge Island) · China (China Tomorrow Education Foundation) · Columbia (H.A.L.O) · Ecuador (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · El Salvador (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Ethiopia (Rotary Clubs District 5030) · Fiji (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Guatemala (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Kyrzikstan (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Mexico (ARAS Foundation, Healing the Children) · Nepal (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Republic of Georgia (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Russia (Rotary Club of Lynwood) · Seychelles (Rotary Club of Federal Way) · South Africa (Habitat for Humanity) · Viet Nam (Rotary Club of the University District-Seattle) · Uganda (Rotary Club of University District-Seattle) ·

Contact Us:
Son Michael Pham (206) 484-4830 or (425) 836-5354
Our email: info@kidswithnoborders.org

Contributions to Kids Without Borders, a project of the Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association, are tax-deductible.

KIDS WITHOUT BORDERS JOINED OTHERS IN
SAVING CHILDREN’S LIVES IN VIETNAM ONE HELMET AT A TIME

I travel to Vietnam regularly doing humanitarian work as part of my involvement as volunteer in several nonprofit organizations: Kids Without Borders, the Rotary Club of the University District Seattle, and the Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association. In November 2001, I led a small group of friends on the HumaniTour 2001, which combines tourism and humanitarian opportunities. During our trip, I had the pleasure of meeting Greig Craft, President and Founder of Asia Injury Prevention Foundation and Executive Director Do Tu Anh and learning more about the work they are doing to save the lives of children at risk from one of the most deadly killers in Southeast Asia – road accidents.

As income levels rise in this part of the world, more and more families are trading in their bicycles for motorbikes and often carry multiple riders. Due to poor road conditions, untrained drivers, overcrowded roadways and unprotected drivers and passengers, the number of fatalities and head injuries from crashes in Southeast Asia has risen to epidemic levels.

It is no wonder that in 2001, 10 to 15 million people under the age of 15 were injured or disabled in traffic accidents worldwide. On the streets of Vietnam an estimated 40 people a day die in crashes, the majority of them children; another 100 each day suffer serious injury. This adds up to more than 15,000 crashes each year in the country, creating an epidemic of brain damage and death, especially among children – the most vulnerable passengers of motorbikes.

Asia Injury Prevention Foundation, founded in 1999, is an innovative non-profit organization that is working to save the lives of those at-risk children.

Greig Craft, the president and founder of Asia Injury, is an American who came to Vietnam in the early 1990s on a business venture. By the end of the decade, he had fallen in love with the country and along with Do Tu Anh decided enough children had died in the streets of his adopted country. They decided they could to do something about it.

“Vietnam is a country experiencing phenomenal growth right now,” said Craft. “But along with that growth comes an increase in motorbikes on the roads and an increase in road accidents. Something needed to be done to save the lives of the next generation.”

For Craft, it is a way to lend meaning to a long business career in Vietnam. For his Executive Director, Do Tu Anh, it is also personal. Four years ago, she lost three cousins to road accidents within two days.

”We are helping to save lives every day,” said Do Tu Anh. “And that means helping my country thrive and grow and creating a safer place for all of us.”

Asia Injury has been fortunate to have some high profile help getting their message across. In November of 2000, President Bill Clinton joined Asia Injury in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, to help christen their new “Helmets for Kids” program and to personally distribute the first of 50,000 helmets that have been donated to schoolchildren across the country.

On that special day, a ten-year-old Vietnamese boy named Nam Long promised President Clinton that he would always wear his helmet. Fortunately, Long kept that promise, because a year later it saved his life.

It was February 14, 2001 and Long, wearing his bright blue “Helmet for Kids” helmet, was riding to school on the back of his mother’s motorbike. It all happened quickly; another driver sped up from behind and tried to cut in the front of them, smashing into the handlebars and front wheel of the motorbike. Long’s mother managed to hold on, but Long -- who was only 4’3” at that time -- flew off and crashed to the ground, hitting his head. Although the helmet was crushed in several places, he only suffered a broken finger and bruises on his legs and arms. The damaged helmet was returned to Asia Injury, and Long received a new one.

Asia Injury has created a highly successful model of public-private partnership. They work with governments and corporations, as well as international aid and funding organizations. By using this effective model of cooperation Asia Injury has made enormous strides in educating children about road safety, changing the way the public thinks about wearing helmets and advocating for changes at the government level.

In just three short years, Asia Injury has accomplished the following:

· Asia Injury built and now operates the world's first non-profit helmet factory producing certified, inexpensive helmets
· Asia Injury has distributed 50,000 helmets free of charge through a corporate adopt-a-school program – many more will be donated this year
· A traffic safety education curriculum was developed for the country's 10 million primary school children to increase road safety awareness
· A public awareness campaign was launched to modify behavior toward helmet use and road safety using billboards, bus posters and newspaper ads
· New public policies on helmet standards, traffic laws and enforcement were endorsed.
· A revised and expanded national helmet standard was developed, including the world's first child motorbike helmet standard.

But most importantly, Asia Injury Prevention Foundation is saving lives. Asia Injury has begun to document the stories of dozens of children like Long who were wearing their helmets during a road accident, preventing serious injury.

I was so impressed with the effectiveness of the “Helmets for Kids” program that I have created partnerships between Kids Without Borders, the Rotary Club of the University District Seattle, the Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association and Asia Injury Prevention Foundation. The HumaniTour team in October 2002 participated in a scholarship ceremony at a primary school in Hanoi where 350 helmets funded by Kids Without Borders were distributed to first and second graders. This year, because of our experience in Vietnam, the Rotary Club of Seattle #4 and the Rotary Club of Burien joined our club to support the “Helmets for Kids” program, providing 350 additional helmets (with the Rotary logo prominently displayed on each helmet) at a ceremony in March 2003 in Hanoi attended by the Group Study Exchange team from our District. We are working with students from schools in our areas to sponsor helmets for school students in Viet Nam. At the cost of $8.00 per helmet, children in the U.S can make a difference in lives of other children thousands of miles away

Although Asia Injury’s “Helmets for Kids” project is a model of continuing success in Vietnam, the problem of death and injury among children from road accidents is growing worldwide. As development continues in Southeast Asia and the number of motorized vehicles increases, the number of children dying in road accidents is soaring. Although developing countries have just 40 percent of the world’s vehicles, they bear 86 percent of the world’s road death toll, the majority of them children.

Because of this rapidly growing problem throughout the region, Asia Injury is preparing to launch “Helmets for Kids” in three additional countries whose rates of road accidents are soaring – Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka -- in the hope of saving thousands of children’s lives.

Today Long is 12 years old, a few inches taller, and in sixth grade. He graduated from primary school last summer with excellent grades and now studies in a special school for gifted children, focusing on his love of math. He also has a brown-belt in Taekwondo and has represented his district in city tournaments. His parents still take him to school everyday on their motorbike, but next year he’ll be riding his own bicycle to school, which is about three miles away. The streets of Ho Chi Minh City are at their busiest in the morning. Fortunately, he never goes anywhere without his “Helmets for Kids” helmet. His little brother, now in third grade, wears one too.

For more information on how you and your Rotary club can support the “Helmets for Kids” program, please contact me.

Son Michael Pham
KIDS WITHOUT BORDERS
206-484-4830 - 425-836-5354 Fax 206-374-2944 info@kidswithnoborders.org

The primary mission of KIDS WITHOUT BORDERS is to involve and inspire youth helping other youth. KWB connects children of all ethnic and social-economic backgrounds, ages, and religions. We engage them in opportunities to give of themselves unconditionally through service that will benefit other children within their communities and in other parts of the world. Founded in 2001, KWB is a 100% volunteer organization.

Kids Without Borders (www.kidswithnoborders.org) is a project in partnership with the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Detlef Schrempf Foundation, the Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association, Rotary International Clubs of District 5030, and Shurgard Storage for Hope.

Kids Without Borders is a project of the Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association, a 501c3 non-profit organization. Contributions made to KWB are tax deductible to the extend allowed by the Internal Revenue Service.

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Greater Seattle Viet Nam Association
P.O.Box 23282;  Seattle, WA 98102 USA
206-322-1178    *    Fax 206-374-2944    *     Email info@seattlevietnam.org