Clemente Course in the Humanities

We Need Your Help

We have been given the opportunity to raise matching funds up to $75k
The catch: only private funds count
(get more info below)

If you can help, please contact us at this email address:


Checks can be made payable to:
Jefferson County Education Foundation
and sent to:
Washington State University LC-NOP
c/o Clemente Course
201 W. Patison
Port Hadlock, WA 98339

for phone inquiries
360-379.5610 ext. 301

The Clemente Course is a sponsored project of the Jefferson County Education Foundation, a 501(c)(3) organization. All contributions to the Clemente Course are tax-deductible.

NEWS

Funds Restored

Last year our course saw the loss of $10,000 formerly allocated to our already stretched budget. Due to an article that ran in the Port Townsend Leader, the public was made aware of this.

That in conjunction with the efforts of one of our strongest supporters, Matt Lyons of the Jefferson Education Center, has effected the return of the funds to our coffers for the 2008 session.

While this helps greatly, it is only a portion of our year's expenses assisting community members. It also does not meet eligibility requirements for our 3:1 matching grant opportunity (see entry below).

Thanks to Matt and the JEC for helping us to help our community gain access to higher education.

Matching Grant Opportunity

We have been offered a tremendous opportunity to help ourselves help our community. This boon comes from an anonymous donor who has offered to match any funds we can raise 3-to-1. Any contributions from individuals, businesses or foundations (excepting governement institutions), up to $25k from our efforts will be matched up to $75,000 on behalf of our benefactor. All donations must be received by September 15th in order to qualify.

That's really soon! So any help you or your organization can give will allow the Clemente Course to continue in Jefferson County. We are already very close to our goal, but your contribution may mean the difference between helping 1 student or 4. Please send an email to or use the address to the left to send a check today.

A Note from Earl Shorris
founder of the Clemente Course

To the Jefferson County Clemente Course:

For the past few days I have been working the man in Khartoum who will be starting our Clemente Course in Sudan. We will begin by teaching the refugees from Darfur who have fled to environs of Khartoum, then trying to set up a distance learning system for Darfur until we can find a way to move our professors through the janjaweed territory to and from Darfur. Meanwhile, one of the objects of genocide we want to thwart is the obliteration of culture, which we will attempt to do with the bilingual Fur; i.e. those who can speak Arabic as well as their own native language. It is complicated and difficult, because I don't know at the moment how we can set up distance learning without computers and electricity.

The materials you sent to Dr. Yousif and the manual you wrote for rural courses will be enormously helpful to the people both around Khartoum and in Darfur when we get set up there. I will send you a long e-mail after I return from Ghana, where he will work with us as we set up the course in Accra with the University of Ghana. Africa will be the fifth continent for us. The experience you've gained in Port Hadlock and the methods you've developed will make a difference there.

Given the way poverty and lack of education are distributed in this world, especially in the Americas and Africa, I expect to be asking for your help again and again. Next year in rural Argentina in the northernmost state near Bolivia. Before that, however, I hope we can begin to think about how to spread the course to more rural areas in the U.S.

Your manual has also been sent on to UNDP (United Nation Development Programme), where my friend Dr. JosŽ Romero has been using the methods we have developed in the U.S. as a basis for the UNDP programs in leadership for indigenous people in Asia and the Americas, mainly Bolivia.

I know that it has been difficult to finance the course in Port Hadlock and I admire everything that you have done to keep it in operation. Now that you have an opportunity for funding that will give you some breathing room, I am glad to offer any support that I can give. When I started the course 13 years ago, I had no idea that it would ever leave one poor neighborhood in New York City and turn into more than 60 courses worldwide. Nor did I ever dream that someone like you would build upon what began there and develop a variation for rural students that will stand as an example to be followed in many places over many years.

When I get back from Africa, let's talk again. I hope you still plan to meet with Jean Cheney this summer. Amy Thomas Elder and Kristin O'Connell and I all thought that you were the fourth vital innovator. Between the four of you I think you have a dozen courses you direct or manage, with more coming every year. The future of the course in this country is surely in your hands.

Thank you.
Your friend,

Earl Shorris
Founder
The Clemente Course in the Humanities