Summer Round of Project Smile Grants Awarded

IREX is pleased to announce the Summer 2009 Project Smile grantees. Project Smile is a community development program for alumni of select Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) sponsored programs. Grants are awarded to alumni to implement community service activities that will benefit an underprivileged group in their local community such as children at an orphanage, the disabled or the elderly.

Summer 2009

Armenia

Meri Dallakyan, Armenia, UGRAD 07-08 alumna
Dallakyan will bring a group of 30 disabled children on a historical field trip to an ancient monastery near Kapan Syuink, Armenia to learn about Armenian culture and heritage.

Lilit Matsakyan, Armenia, UGRAD 05-06 alumna
Matsakyan will collaborate with the Vanadzor Community Justice Center to establish a peer mentor program between seven teenagers from Vanadzor School #3 and seven at-risk youth (ages 13-15).One of the primary goals of the project will be to provide vulnerable youth with positive peer-to-peer relationships and adult structured guidance as well as to help integrate them into society.

Susanna Safaryan, Armenia, UGRAD 08-09 alumna
Safaryan’s project will involve celebrating the Armenian holiday "Vardavar" (Water Day) with youth and the elderly in the small village of Koti. During the celebration, Safaryan will give a cultural presentation about her UGRAD fellowship in the U.S. and will discuss American holiday celebrations and culture.

Azerbaijan

Anar Babayev, Azerbaijan, UGRAD 08-09 alumnus
Babayev will organize a field trip for 30 children (ages 3-7) from an orphanage in Baku to the Doll Theatre and then to a local park for a picnic. The goal of the project is to provide the orphans with an opportunity to integrate into society.

Georgia

Maka Aliogli, Georgia, UGRAD 05-06 alumna
Aliogli will organize a one-day cultural event for ethnically Azerbaijani and Georgian high school students in Georgia. During the event, the teenagers from the Kvemo Kartli and Shida Kartli regions will come together in Tbilisi to learn about and discuss the importance and benefits of living in a multilingual and multiethnic environment, overcoming cultural stereotypes, and celebrating cultural diversity. Participants will share information about their cultures and UGRAD alumna Maka Aligioli will discuss American culture and her experiences in the US as a UGRAD fellow.

Russia

Ekaterina Babintseva, Russia, UGRAD 08-09 alumna
Babintseva will organize a presentation at the American Center in Yekaterinburg, Russia about the current challenges and risks that journalists face when reporting abroad. The presentation will include video interviews with a few of Babintseva's American professors from Concordia College.

Ekaterina Dyakonova, Russia, UGRAD 03-04 alumna
Dyakonova will organize a field trip to Moscow for 10 children from low-income families living in the rural village of Dyakonovo. The trip will provide the children with the opportunity to visit local museums and to learn more about the capital city of Russia and the Kremlin.

Polina Ermoshkina, Russia, UGRAD 06-07 alumna
Ermonshkina’s project will involve planting apple and cherry trees at the Linguistic School #91 with the goal of improving the ecological system in the city of Ufa.  Following the tree planting, Ermoshkina will organize an ecological conference for 50 local school children on issues of global warming and pollution. Leaflets and booklets about global warming and environmental protection will be distributed throughout the city prior to the conference in order to raise awareness of these issues.

Anna Malinovskaya, Russia, UGRAD 08-09 alumna
Malinovskaya will organize a series of three workshops on gender and equality issues for 30 high school students in Khabarovsk.

Timur Zyapparov, Russia, UGRAD 00-01 alumnus
Zyapparov’s project will involve creating and organizing a reenactment of the popular children's television show "Happy Hippo" for orphans at the Almetyevsk orphanage. The reenactment will engage children in discussions about characters who are acting in various real-life scenarios having to do with drugs and crime. Children will have the opportunity to share their ideas and thoughts about the best outcomes for each scenario. Following the television reenactment, children will participate in a barbecue and dance lessons.

Ukraine

Kostiantyn Iakovliev, Ukraine, UGRAD 07-08 alumnus
Iakovliev will organize elementary English language lessons for children with disabilities at Horlivka Boarding School.  The lessons will be taught through a series of games and theatre performances.

Anton Krasun, Ukraine, UGRAD 08-09 alumnus
Krasun will organize a seminar for students at the Rava-Ruska school in Lviv that will teach them about human rights, social protection, and diplomacy.

Andriy Syrotenko, Ukraine, UGRAD 01-02 alumnus
Syrotenko will organize a field trip to Kyiv for nine school children from orphanages and single parent families in the Poltavska oblast. During the field trip, the children will learn about Ukrainian cultural heritage and history.