This Saturday, faculty and staff from the School of Public Health will unveil a partnership with an international aid organization with the goal to expand basic necessities to developing nations and incorporate service-learning into the academic curriculum.
The event at the Neuroscience Research Building at UCLA will formally launch the partnership between UCLA and an organization called Gawad Kalinga, which works to aid communities in developing nations, said Charmaine Jamias, a Pilipinos for Community Health member.
Gawad Kalinga was started 14 years ago in the Philippines and has worked to sponsor communities by providing medical care and shelter, while members of Pilipinos for Community Health have helped bring the partnership between the school and organization together, Jamias said.
The fourth-year molecular cell and developmental biology student added that Gawad Kalinga has built 900 villages in the Philippines and other developing countries, and plans to construct 7,000 new communities by 2010.
Josie Castro, the chief financial officer from the School of Public Health, said Gawad Kalinga appealed to her because it has developed a model for community development that breaks the poverty cycle.
Castro added that the goal for the organization now is to expand its reach to developing countries across the world.
“Though Gawad Kalinga is homegrown in the Philippines, the model has been successful enough where we want to expand it to other nations such as Indonesia and Papua New Guinea,” she said.
Melanie Kappadakunnel, a member of Pilipinos for Community Health, said she hopes Saturday’s event brings out students from a diversity of disciplines.
“At UCLA we have students working on specialties from improving literacy to establishing better medical care,” said Kappadakunnel, a fourth-year psychobiology student.
“Through Gawad Kalinga they can help no matter what their interests are.”
After the promotional event, Kappadakunnel said the Gawad Kalinga chapter will become officially established as a UCLA student group and reach out to other organizations.
“Our first project is to send a delegation of UCLA students to the Gawad Kalinga summit in Boston and also provide support for students working abroad,” she said.
The partnership may also expand to the academic department at the UCLA School of Public Health, Castro said.
“Several of our faculty members have expressed interest in sending students abroad to work with Gawad Kalinga as part of the curriculum,” Castro said.
In addition to the School of Public Health, Castro said administrators from the School of Nursing have also expressed interest in Gawad Kalinga and may consider working with the organization as part of their curriculum.
Saturday’s launch is the first formal partnership between a school in the University of California system and Gawad Kalinga, Jamias said.
Castro added that having an institutional backer behind Gawad Kalinga is important because it brings in a large amount of resources to work with the organization.
Kappadakunnel said that despite the Gawad Kalinga’s Pilipino roots, all students should feel welcome participating and supporting the organization.
“Gawad Kalinga focuses on more than just the Philippines, it is now expanding globally and dealing with issues that are relevant in many nations,” she said.