Karen ’26, collaborates with a humanitarian organization in hopes to empower youth in her community to chase their dreams.
Over a year ago, our family began donating to Compassion International, an organization aimed to provide humanitarian aid to children in poverty. We have been supporting three specific children belonging to separate households by providing monthly donations. In return, through the organization’s implemented system, we would receive monthly updates in the form of handwritten notes and drawings by the children. Seeing their holiday greetings and birthday notes through the distant yet intimate communication tool established a bond between our family and the children.
With my grown appreciation for the formed relationship, I was inspired to share the importance of not generalizing these children as being simply those of poverty but seeing them for who they are as individuals with their unique backgrounds, cultures, personalities, and lastly, their dreams. I decided to use art, a powerful instrument, as the bridge to connect the greater society with these children’s’ hidden voices. Utilizing the grant, I will hold an art exhibit called “Their Dreams—Our Vision,” in August, displaying a diverse collection of art pieces I collect from children sponsored by Compassion International with a fundraising purpose for the organization. However, the greater value of this project lies upon my mission of empowering the children in the chase for their dreams. I will achieve this in ways like gathering the reactions and encouraging messages written by the viewers in the exhibit and sending the notes to the children to show our support in envisioning their “dreams” with them.
In order to increase my impact on my own community in Korea, I’ve decided to take a step further by collecting art pieces from children in local orphanages in addition to my collaboration with Compassion International. So far, I’ve found younger volunteers to work with in completing this project, and besides receiving various art pieces from the organization, I’ve reached out to several orphanages in Korea and have begun the collection process among the local orphanages. I will finish gathering the art pieces by the end of the month and plan to hold the exhibit in mid August.
