Explore GPM's Work Through Our New Website!

We are proud to announce the launch of our brand new website! Thanks to dedicated volunteers and professionals GPM has officially launched a new site, with special thanks to Jackie Lebwohl, our web designer.  Our new site has features which allow you to seamlessly explore our programming by topic, such as Nutrition, Education, Health, Community Development, and Women's Empowerment.

As GPM has expanded in the last several years so too have our projects. By organizing them by theme you are able to focus in on the areas of our work which interest you most. Additionally, our new site features a section for getting involved, ways to become a GPM ambassador, organize site visits, and of course ways to support our work!

Our site also has a special page dedicated to our Friends and Partners. It is thanks to our supporters that we are able to feed over 1,000 children each year and provide them with quality education, healthcare, and nutrition support as well as clean drinking water, soap, and hygiene supplies & education. We are enabled by your support to continue to expand our holistic development approach, promoting thriving communities and ending the cycle of poverty.

It is our hope to expand the new site to include an online store for purchasing products from our women's empowerment projects, such as hand-made soap, Masala Mama's cookbooks, recycled paper, hand-made sewn garments, and Warli art. While we are still building the infrastructure for this, if you are interested in purchasing any of these items please get in touch with us, the proceeds from the sale of these products support our women's empowerment projects!

We hope you will take a look at our new site and explore the ways in which GPM has grown and expanded, and ways in which you too can get involved with GPM's work!

India Trip Participants and Volunteers Raise $15,000 for GPM's Educational Programs

In May, Maura Koenig and Miranda Lapides, recent participants on JDC Entwine’s latest “Inside India” trip, organized a fundraiser for GPM. They hosted two Shabbat dinners, one in New York City and one in Washington, DC with a goal of raising $10,000 for GPM’s educational programs at the Joshua Jacob Greenberger Learning Center (JLC) in the slums of Kalwa, and the village of Ashte.

Between the Shabbat dinners, the sale of Masala Mama cookbooks and paintings by local artists from Ashte, and sharing the campaign link across social media, $15,000 was raised! These funds will support our local teachers for the year, monthly teacher trainings, teaching aid kits for classes and desks for children.

The May 3rd NYC Shabbat dinner hosted 70 people, and in DC 30 people attended. Both events provided a delicious Indian meal, a presentation on GPM’s initiatives and the work we do, and caring communities that came together to contribute to a cause that spoke to them. Attendees, whether they were from the Jewish community, the Indian community, friends of GPM, or participants of a JDC Entwine trip, all had one thing in common: they were passionate about the cause.

(Photo Credit: Becca Siegel)

Maura, a Jewish educator in New York, relates her trip experience to the Hebrew word “hineni,” meaning “here I am.” “Hineni means ‘I felt this, I saw this, I was there’,” Maura explained. “Our visit to the slums in and around Mumbai meant so much, with so much to be done, and I wanted to do something about it…and we did. It’s incredible how many people can care about something when you share your story.”

(Photo Credit: Elizabeth Leff)

Miranda, a communications professional in Washington, DC, knew from her first day in the slums that she wanted to help raise money for GPM. “I was inspired by GPM’s work the moment we set foot in the slums, seeing the smiles on the children’s faces in the JLC classrooms, the mothers receiving medical care at the Shravan Health Center, the daily nutritious meals being served and women’s collectives providing financial empowerment to women in the slums,” Miranda said. “I had to bring this experience back home with me and get others excited about it as well.”Maura and Miranda decided that hosting Shabbat dinners would be the most effective way to engage the community and to raise funds. “There’s a very low barrier to entry: come and eat good food and drink good wine (and whiskey!) with good people, and hear a message that is important to the world and the Jewish people,” Maura said.

Thank you so much to Maura and Miranda who conceived these events, and all the Entwine volunteers who helped turn them into a reality. Additionally, a special thank you to Michael Braun, for his generous matching grant. Lastly, many thanks to Greenberger and Cortese families.

A special thank you to all those who contributed as sponsors for the dinners:

Ayurveda Cafe

Breads Bakery

Bread Furst

Coffy Cafe

Indian Delight

JDC Entwine

Marlene Meyerson JCC Manhattan

Moishe House Without Walls

Nachman, Phulwani, Zimovcak (NPZ) Law Group, P.C.

Rasika West End

Trader Joe’s

WeWork

When an Israeli PhD in Neuroscience and a U.S. Fulbright Physics researcher teach science in the slums

Two international science professionals have been teaching creative science classes at the GPM school in the Kalwa slums. Hagar Grazya Yamin, a mother of 3, originally from Israel and currently based in Mumbai has a B.Sc in biomedical
engineering from the Technion and a PhD in brain sciences from Bar Ilan University while Yanky Landau is a Fulbright student researcher based at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai with a BSc in Math and Physics slotted to attend the California Institute of Technology where he hopes to get his PhD in physics.

Hagar in her class

Both Hagar and Yanky travel 90 minutes through the Mumbai traffic, and trek through the slums, to teach their weekly classes in science to the children attending the GPM Joshua Greenberger Learning Center (JLC). Hagar teaches children attending grades 3 and 4 while Yanky teaches middle school children at the JLC.

Yanky and his class

Hagar has taught creative classes on balance, coordination and the brain exposing the children to wondrous concepts in science while Yanky has opened the children’s eyes to the amazing world of physics. “It is such a great opportunity for the children to receive innovative classes from accomplished people with brilliant minds”, said GPM’s director Kenneth Dsouza, “we tend to think that we need to offer the bare minimum for those in greatest need and here we have experts in their fields teaching our children – that’s a powerful message!”

We are grateful for Hagar and Yanky’s commitment to the children’s education!

Needy Katkari tribal children helped by GPM

In the hamlet, Gawali Pada in the village of Raipur, 19 Katkari tribal children who are very poor and malnourished are faced with a lack of nutrition, education and accessible healthcare. GPM is stepping in to look after them.

Together with the local villagers of Raipur, GPM is taking care of the 19 children whose parents are landless and migrate for half the year in search of work and food. In many cases the children aged 6-14 migrate with them.

The Katkari are nomadic forest people who live throughout the village areas of Maharashtra where GPM works. The Katkari  are landless and are classified by the government as Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) - they are the most poor and needy of all the tribes where GPM works.

GPM is on a mission to keep the 19 children in school and well looked after. GPM teacher, Mr Suresh Gawali is a local teacher from the village who is very passionate about providing quality education to the ‘disadvantaged’ children of his village. Classes continue after parents migrate and GPM pays a small stipend to the children’s relatives and family friends that have agreed to host the children in their homes for 6 months a year. GPM now needs to supplement the children with physical items, like clothes, shoes, stationary kits, blankets, towels and hygiene products. The run-down classroom will receive teaching aids, new lighting, basic educational toys and mats to sit on. GPM has been providing a nutritious lunch and afternoon snack for the children but now we need to supply daily dosage of fruits every day – something they need very much.

And this is where GPM needs your help. Please help us give the 19 Katkari children a future by giving them access to quality education, good nutrition, clothing and healthcare. We simply need $2850 to achieve this for the 2018-19 academic year…that’s just $150 a child…for the year!

Please donate generously…We will update you every few months how the children are going in school, their challenges and successes:  https://rootfunding.com/campaigns/helping_katkari_tribal_children

If there is anyone out there who would like to sponsor a boarding home for these children so that GPM can look after the children 24/7 please contact us.