Why
You Can Trust This Site
Well,
because we've been working in conjunction with the top- rated charitable
organization, Children International since February 2003. 100% of proceeds have gone
to the Hernandez family of Guatemala and current donations will go to the Rojas family of Honduras via Children International who oversees and implements
the house building process. Check out the breakdown of costs and timetable for construction for the original Guatemala Project.
All donations are tax deductible. You can temporarily print out
your Paypal receipt as proof of your donation. If you gave your mailing
address to Paypal when donating, your official tax deduction receipt
from Aura's House c/o Children International will be mailed to you within
a few weeks. You can also sign our Donors List after donating. If
you have any problems using it you may email us
here.
We pledge to update donors on our progress with daily updates to the
website and via our guestbook/database system.
About the Site's Author
Kristen Palana is an Assistant Professor of Digital Media at William Paterson University in Wayne, New Jersey. She is Aura's sponsor through Children International. She is currently working with Aura's House Partner, Anastasia Yecke of Miami, Florida as well as other interested volunteers, donors, William Paterson students and faculty on the site.
Kristen has a proven record of volunteering in developing countries. Feel free to check out photos from her volunteer experiences in India (2000) and Tanzania (2005) through Cross Cultural Solutions.
This Site's History
This site originally began in February 2003 when Kristen was learning PHP programming and adding dynamic content to websites. She decided to create this site that combined her two biggest interests; art/multimedia and helping people in developing countries. The site has changed a lot since then, both in design and function. After waiting over a year for all the required permissions, finally on June 30, 2004 the site was ready to launch. The recent Honduras Project launched on March 28, 2005. Our newest projects in India and Zambia launched in September of 2005.
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"How
far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good
deed in a weary world."
-Shakespeare
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Aura's
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Credits
All house pictures on the home page were created by William
Paterson University Art student, Maggie Fridman. She created
over 80 digital images of a house building up brick by brick.
Thanks also to Nancy Fischer for creating the well images for the upcoming India project.
Other William Paterson contributors in design
and promotion are recent WPUNJ graduates, Christina Sidoti, Ozzie Rodriguez
and Dorota Migdal, and students Diego Alvarenga, Carly
Minardo, Daniel Abruzzesi, Mike Felber, and Sam Abdallah. Thanks
to Professor Tom Uhlein for help with our logo. Thanks to Professor Maria Villar of Anthropology for getting her students involved and Tina Girladi of the Art Department for fundraising. Thanks to
student Susan Aviner for putting together the database and
recent graduate Josephine Kukla for running the website when
Kristen is away.
Thanks to Pete Easton of Pratt
Institute for helping out with database, guestbook, and
PHP programming.
Special
thanks to Michael Hemling for his ideas, suggestions, and
enthusiasm. He's also the one that gets us listed in the search
engines.
Thanks to Anastasia Yecke for her amazing enthusiasm and her help with running the site and spearheading the fundrasing for the Honduras Project.
And
finally, thanks to Dolores Kitchen, Vickie Wiedenmann, Greg
Jones, and especially the amazing Kerry Duvall of Children
International for making this site a reality.
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Read
Our Privacy
Statement
© Kristen Palana 2003-2008.
This website is for nonprofit, charitable purposes only.
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