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Matching Grant Update
Our summer matching grant is underway and we have been receiving donations slowly but surely! We have received permission to extend the matching grant window to September 30th and all donations and pledges made before September 30th will be matched. This is our only matching grant for 2021 and, as many of you know, meeting the full amount is imperative for the continuation of our projects in Nicaragua.
Pledges, including monthly donations and
memorial contributions, will be matched.
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We are registered as Hester J. Hodgdon Libraries for All. Please donate today with the PayPal or JustGiving buttons above OR by check made payable to:
HJH Programs
1716 Del Norte Ave.
Loveland, CO 80538 |
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The library gets a new 3D printer!3D Printer Program Update:
In April, Jane brought one of our 3D printers back to Colorado that was not functioning in Nicaragua. Preston Tobery, University of Maryland Makerspace Director and 3D printing expert, joined Jane in Colorado to assess the machine. He determined it would be best to replace this printer with a new one that would better withstand the hot and humid climate of Nicaragua.
The new printer was packed into a suitcase and brought to Nicaragua in June by longtime volunteers Jhossy Quiroz and Whitney Knutson as part of our June Adventure plan. Jhossy, former IT specialist for the library, helped Wiston, Denis, and Edwin set up the new printer and tested it out! The library team has begun printing out bookmarks for our 21st birthday celebration in November 2021! Several other new projects including room keys for hotels and fins for surfboards are underway. The timing is excellent and will fit well with our recently awarded IRRT Mission Enhancement Grant Program. |
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| To get library staff excited about the possibilities of using the 3D printers as a business, we asked them to create a 20th anniversary celebratory bookmark. We are selling the bookmarks for $5 US dollars a mark or five for $20. They just completed their first order for 25 bookmarks and have been working on a few more orders. Jane will bring the bookmarks back with her to Colorado and distribute them as needed. To place an order for bookmarks, please email [email protected] with the number of bookmarks you would like. We hope that by supplying them with these small orders, it inspires them to find an item that is needed in the community, price it, and market it to the SJDS community. |
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 | 3D printed bookmarks |
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HJH awarded IRRT Grant
HJH awarded the American Library Association’s International Relations Round Table (IRRT) Mission Enhancement Grant
The Executive Board has been hard at work submitting various grant proposals for the last 12 months. We are excited to announce our 3D printing program proposal has been awarded the 2021 IRRT Mission Enhancement Grant. The grant will support 3D printer training for current library staff and allow partnerships with local high schools to offer students an educational opportunity in this cutting-edge technology. Investing in youth education will promote innovation and entrepreneurship for the community and provide the library with a potential pool of future technologists to help build and manage the 3D printing center and operations. |
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Long awaited books are finally delivered to the satellite libraries:
Our Summer adventures included the June trip to bring not only the new printer but also twelve suitcases of books for the satellite libraries that had been ready and waiting since March of 2020. Everything had to be trekked across the Costa Rican border and brought through the Nicaragua border up to San Juan del Sur. Thank you Jhossey, Whitney and Whitney’s mom, Holi Knutson for your trek across the no man’s land between Costa Rica and Nicaragua with seven suitcases. Luckily, Jhossey was recognized by one of the border officials and helped through customs. Our staff and volunteers began distributing the books to schools to reinvigorate their collections. With no new books moving into the collections in 2020, the standing book collections were getting a little repetitive for students. Now they have access to a new variety of books and the excitement surrounding this definitely shows through!
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| The Satellite Library Project, located in 13 rural schools, has been a co-sponsored project with Opportunity Tree International (an educational nonprofit organization in Boulder, CO) for several years. Since 2010, it has grown the number of schools it provides with standing book collections and lending supplies. Children attending these schools do not have to wait for the monthly mobile project visit and can check out books whenever they like. As funds become available, we hope to provide each of our 35 community schools with a “Satellite Library.” |
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Summer 2021 Student Intern Kaitlyn McPhee
The HJH Board would like to extend our deepest appreciation and gratitude to our summer intern, Kaityln McPhee. Kaitlyn is majoring in Business Management at the University of Central Florida and worked closely with the Executive Board to improve the online presence of the foundation for eight weeks this summer. Her internship focused on strengthening our board’s human resources policies and completing the necessary steps for the foundation to gain higher-level standing on platforms like Guidestar and GreatNonprofits. Kaitie joined Jane and the other volunteers on the June trip to Nicaragua to help her strengthen the connection between what the foundation does in the US and the work that is done on the ground in Nicaragua.
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Honestly, this entire internship has been a learning experience. This is the first time I have really been able to get a look behind the curtain of a nonprofit in this capacity. I was able to work closely with the board and go through their entire decision-making process for nearly every decision they have made over the last two months. I have also been very fortunate to be able to see the impact that my work with the organization has directly had on the communities that we serve during my trip to Nicaragua. I have learned about why our mission is so personal and important to all of our members. It has really strengthened my belief in everything that I have done and will continue to do through to the end of my internship.”
– Kaitlyn McPhee
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Share Your Experience!
Kaitlyn would love it if you would share your experience with our organization on GreatNonprofits! and join us on our new Linkedin page! |
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Memorial Fund in Memory of Michael Iacoboni |
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It was with deep sadness and a hole in my heart that I shared the news that Dr. Michael Angelo Iacoboni, DDS passed away suddenly of a cerebral cardiac event, at his home in San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua on Monday March 22, 2021 at the age of 73. Mike was a dear friend to many of us and to our programs in Nicaragua. We shared a full description of his life in the May newsletter if you would like to read more.
Since Mike’s passing, I have been delighted to work closely with Michael’s life partner of 12 years, Noelia Epinoza and his foster teens Sherin Durante and Keny Durante. His life here was full and rich with his Nica family. We have received a few stories of memories of Michael, including being served his famous pancakes and being offered the “usual suspects” (breakfast menu) and we would like to share them on our website. Many of you have visited the hotel on one or more volunteer or mission adventures and we would love it if you would share your recollections as well. Obituaries were sent to both the Loveland Reporter Herald in Colorado and the Long beach Press Telegram in California, since much of his younger life and early dental career took place there.
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Michael was very supportive of the HJH Foundation and helped us house volunteers, hold workshop events and other activities at the Villa Isabella. He truly understood the value of libraries. A donation fund in Michael’s memory has been arranged for those of you who knew him and would like to honor him this way. Donations made in his honor are included in our summer matching grant. Please indicate your wishes in the check memo or Paypal/JustGiving form.
Several supporters have asked if special items could be requested and so far these include book plates in his name and memory and a children’s room reading chair. These are being considered and we would love to entertain other ideas to remember and honor Michael.
We have been receiving memorial donations for Michael and recently in memory of Charlie Boss, the beloved father of Mary Glen and Erica Thorne-Keziah, Barb Thorne and Pat Keziah’s beloved daughter. I am thankful for the honor of these gifts in memory of these wonderful people. We will be initiating a new memorial section on our website to acknowledge and celebrate these memorials.
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COVID Update:Vaccine Deliveries Have Begun
Vaccines are arriving in Nicaragua as a result of international cooperative efforts. La Prensa reported on May 4 that 70,000 doses of the Sputnik V vaccine arrived from Russia.
GAVI, the Vaccine Alliance, reported on July 31 that 36,480 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine delivered to Nicaragua were made possible with donations from Norway and cooperative efforts of UNICEF and the Pan American Health Organisation. An additional 97,920 doses arrived in Nicaragua on August 6, made possible with donations from Spain. During the week of August 6,1000 AstraZeneca vaccines were administered in San Juan del Sur as a pilot to determine community interest, which was quite enthusiastic. According to NicaBiz on August 7, more are expected in upcoming weeks. Many of the elderly in San Juan have received their first vaccine at no cost. |
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Final note from Jane
It is late August and I am in Nicaragua again and will be here for a couple more weeks. I am still working on all of the probate needs for Michael’s passing and trying to get my residency renewed since its expiration last year when the pandemic stopped everything. We got a couple of steps closer this week.
Nicaragua has so many issues, but we are doing okay right now. There was a huge COVID outbreak directly after our June trip and the many events held in the park for Patronal’s days. Nearly everyone on our staff and their families contracted some level of COVID. We closed the library for July and part of August. Edwin had the worst case with severe respiratory symptoms and we feared for his life for an entire week while several friends succumbed to the same symptoms. It was truly a terrible time. Edwin is very much on the mend now and we are watching for lung complications and encouraging him to go slowly while recuperating. He had a six hour visit at the Vivian Pella Hospital ER in Managua after I arrived to look into his post-COVID condition which put our worst fears to rest.
Heidi is recovering from a mild case of COVID compared to others as well as her recent thyroid surgery. She is staying at the Rivas hospital with her daughter Gaby who is about to deliver her first baby early after a very difficult pregnancy.
Anyhow! We are doing better, our staff is recovering, the library is open and I was able to bring three more suitcases of books for the satellite libraries along with library materials for the library, the mobile and the satellite program. The Hotel Villa Isabella has also been closed and will reopen soon. We are working on refurbishing and also getting a new website and booking options in place. I’m still finding time to read!
It was a pleasure to travel and work with my 21 year old granddaughter, Kaitlyn McPhee. She received three credits for her internship with us through the University of Central Florida. (See the article above.) GRIP Program alumni Whitney Knutson, her husband Jhossey Quiroz, and her mom Holli Knutson were our summer volunteers who brought some of the long awaited suitcases of books for the Satellite programs. The success of our trips gives me encouragement and hope that, by early 2022, we can again continue the volunteer trips and find ways to uplift and encourage our family and friends and educators in Nicaragua.
Please participate in our Matching Grant campaign as you are able to help sustain us through the rest of 2021. The cupboards are again quite bare. Our Patron for this matching Grant is now allowing us to continue the Match until September 30, 2021. Please consider helping now to double the impact of your contribution. Take good care, Jane |
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