The Emaus Scholarship Foundation's
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The Emaus Scholarship Foundation's |
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Emaus FoundationPlease click on the links below for additional information about the Emaus Foundation
What is an Emaus?An emaus is not an exotic bird soaring above the beautiful Honduran countryside, nor is it a word derived from one of Honduras' important cultures, including the Maya and the Lenca. Instead, our name comes from Juan Ramón’s coffee, which he sells under the Café Emaus brand at organic fairs, coffee trade shows, and supermarkets throughout Honduras. The name Emaus itself is from the Biblical book of Luke, chapter 24, verses 13 - 35. Although our organization is non-religious, we felt it would be appropriate to use his coffee name for our organization. Who we are
Claudia, shown in the photo above in the back row at the far right, is the Emaus Foundation's only paid employee and is our Honduran Coordinator. She will meet weekly with the scholarship recipients to mentor them for academic excellence. She is also responsible for managing scholarship funds on-the-ground. Claudia is currently studying business at the Instituto Juan Garassino in La Libertad and would like to continue studying International Business. Kala lived in la Libertad during her Peace Corps service (2003- 2005) where she worked with Juan Ramón to found the Emaus Foundation. Peace Corps volunteers are taught that local initiative is one of the best assurances of sustainability in development, and she attached herself to this project immediately when Juan Ramón came to her with the idea She is originally from Chicago, but is presently living in Seattle where she is finishing an MPA in Nonprofit Management at the University of Washington. As the Executive Director, Kala is in this project for the long-haul. She feels a great connection to the people and the place where she served, and is committed to making this collective dream a reality. Dr. Straus is an action-anthropologist and educator at the University of Chicago with a lifelong commitment to community self-determination. She has worked for more than 30 years in Native American communities in the U.S. She feels that the Emaus Scholarship Foundation provides an excellent model of self-determined development community development. Dylan is a Peace Corps volunteer living in El Rosario, Comayagua, a town 2 hours from La Libertad. He became involved in the foundation when he agreed to help Kala develop an order entry database and assist with other business and technical areas. However, after meeting and interviewing the applicants, he decided to continue with the project. Before leaving Honduras, he will be assisting Juan Ramón with process and quality improvements, working with Claudia to help her organize her accounting information, and will meet with our scholarship recipients to complete a semi-annual evaluation of the Foundation’s progress toward our 2005 objectives. In developing this project, we also received valuable assistance from Zachary Job and Anne Knauff. HistoryThe Emaus Scholarship Foundation is a 501(c)3 organization registered in Illinois in 2004. The project started when Juan Ramón, a coffee producer in La Libertad, Honduras approached Kala, a Peace Corps volunteer, with a request for help on a project to improve access to educational opportunities in his community. They worked together to develop the project idea and decided to export his coffee to the United States and to use the profits to fund our scholarship program. In late 2004, the Emaus Foundation began exporting Juan Ramón’s coffee to family and friends, and distributed scholarship applications to qualified candidates. With your support, we raised enough money to offer 4 scholarships for the 2005 Honduran school We also interviewed and pre-selected six 5th grade students to receive the scholarship for the 2006 academic year, hoping the scholarship would motivate them to continue working hard this school year. Vision and missionThe Emaus Scholarship Foundation is dedicated to improving access to education in rural areas near La Libertad, in the state of Comayagua, Honduras. We provide full scholarships to academically motivated and community oriented female students entering 7th grade with limited financial resources. Our goal is to support scholarship recipients from 7th grade through their remaining 6 years of high school. The Emaus Scholarship Foundation is also dedicated to assisting small coffee producers within Honduras with process improvement, providing them with information and training to improve their coffee farm's quality and yield, and helping them enter the international specialty coffee market. One of our long term goals is that exporting coffee through our foundation will allow small coffee producers to grow their business. Once this happens for Juan Ramón, we will be able to contract with another small coffee farmer to continue the cycle of development. In selecting coffee producers, we focus on:
Strategic planOur long term strategic plan is under development by the board and will be available shortly. Financial informationAll board members of the Emaus Scholarship Foundation are unpaid. To make the most of your purchases, we only have one paid employee, Claudia, our Honduran liaison. For each pound of coffee you buy, $5 is put towards the foundation scholarship fund and our minimal operating costs, $5 is paid to Juan Ramón per pound of coffee, and $2 pays for packaging and shipping from Honduras. We are working very hard to minimize our overhead costs and to maintain a financially transparent institution. We will be expanding this section shortly. Organization valuesCommunity self-determination is a core value of this organization. We seek to strengthen community-based, community-determined, sustainable development by supporting both local educational opportunity and local coffee production. We are a low budget, grassroots organization with transparent financials and decision-making processes which encourage advice and input from customers or others who wish to contribute. SustainabilityHaving witnessed and implemented a variety of development initiatives, the board have experienced and understand the potential for failure of interventions that lack identified long term goals. We believe that targeted, short-term projects are valuable in specific situations, such as building a school or disaster relief efforts, but the nature of the rural education problem requires a long-term commitment. Thus we have promised to support our scholarship recipients throughout their educational careers. In turn, as they grow and mature, we expect our scholarship recipients to value education and prioritize this as they become community leaders. We have also encouraged our local coffee producers to maintain independence from our organization by continually increasing local contracts and pursuing other opportunities to develop their business. We partner with small producers to help them invest in their products and marketing in an effort to develop their long-term sustainability. Organic leadership and decision makingOur foundation promotes flexibility, creativity, and collaboration among our many partners. We consider our clients, our scholarship recipients, our coffee suppliers, and anyone viewing this web page as partners for our success, and we hope you feel you can make a difference with us beyond supporting us with coffee purchases and donations. Our board of directors is willing to implement any ideas that we believe will strengthen our foundation and help support our mission. We encourage you to send us comments to improve our marketing, our product, our web page, or our organization. Transparency and fiscal responsibilityWe believe that fiscal transparency is critical for our success as an organization because we want you to be confident that your support is providing educational opportunities in rural Honduras. To this end, we promise you the following:
In accordance with these values, we are always looking for ways to improve our organization. If you would like to assist us, please view our How You Can Help page or contact us. How to deduct your donationLike any charity, if you itemize deductions, you can write off the part of your coffee purchase that goes directly to the Foundation (5$ per bag). You can also deduct a donation of goods, clothing, or other property. You don't have to attach receipts to your return, but you do need to keep record of your purchases in case the IRS ever asks you to substantiate the deduction. For donations less than $250, a canceled check or credit card receipt is sufficient. For anything more, you'll need to keep a receipt or request a letter from us showing our name, the date and donation amount, which we will provide upon request. In the instance of a larger donation (above $500), you may also need an additional letter from us which states that the organization did not give you anything in return for your donation. If you make a large ($5,000+) non-cash (in-kind) donation, you might also need a professional appraisal of value and/or a photo of the gift with your tax return. These are IRS requirements, not ours. We will be happy to provide you with whatever documentation you request for donations of any size.
©2005 Emaus Foundation • Home • Contact Us |
Juan Ramón,
on the far left in the back row of this family portrait, was born and raised
in La Libertad, Honduras. He began producing and selling coffee under the Café
Emaus brand in 2000 after receiving training in coffee production from the Agriculture
School Of Zamorano, an agriculture school in Honduras. Understanding the importance
of protecting Honduras’ natural resources, Juan Ramón immediately
began the process to become a certified organic coffee producer. His coffee
is certified organic by Bio Latina (