The Harpswell Foundation is a 501c3 tax-exempt organization created in 1999, with a mission to provide educational opportunities for disadvantaged children and young people. We are especially concerned with empowering a new generation of leaders in developing countries and have devoted our major efforts to providing housing, education, and leadership training to young women. In May of 2007, we became an officially registered Nongovernmental Organization (NGO) in Cambodia.

All major projects of the Foundation so far have taken place in Cambodia, a  country in desperate need after essentially all of its educated class was destroyed by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s. In June 2005, the Harpswell Foundation completed a four-room school building in the village of Tramung Chrum, about 50 miles from Phnom Penh. In July 2006 the foundation completed construction of a dormitory and leadership center for college women in Phnom Penh, one of the first student dormitories in Cambodia. This facility allows women from the provinces (90% of the population) to attend university by eliminating one of the major obstacles: not having a place to live in Phnom Penh. Colleges in Cambodia do not provide housing for their students. Male students can live in the Buddhist temples, but female students cannot. For this reason, many women from rural areas are prevented from receiving higher education. The dormitory and leadership center houses 36 women, who have been selected from a wide geographical distribution around the country on the basis of their "intelligence, ambition, and leadership potential."

In May 2008, the government of Cambodia awarded us the Gold Medal for humanitarian service to Cambodia. The medal was personally presented to Alan Lightman by Deputy Prime Minister Kong Sam Ol.

We are funded by the contributions of individuals. All contributions are tax deductible. Please help. CLICK HERE!

Administration

The founding director of the Foundation is Alan Lightman. Dr. Lightman is a physicist, novelist, essayist, and educator. He has held professorships at Harvard University and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and was the first person at MIT to have a joint faculty position in both the sciences and the humanities. His novel Einstein's Dreams was an international bestseller and has been translated into 30 languages, and his novel The Diagnosis was a finalist for the 2000 National Book Award. More information about Dr. Lightman can be found at his website: alanlightman.com.

The associate director of the Foundation in Cambodia is Veasna Chea. Overcoming great odds, Chea was the fourth woman in Cambodia to receive a law degree (from the Royal University of Law and Economics) and graduated first in her law-school class in 1997. In the late 1990s, she worked at the UN Commission on Human Rights in Cambodia. In 2001, she cofounded the Cambodia Arts and Scholarship Foundation. She has recently received a masters degree from the School for International Training. Chea has consulted for numerous NGOs in Cambodia. Since 2004, she has been working with the Harpswell Foundation.

The country director of the Foundation in Cambodia is Vanna Peou. Vanna is also the manager of the Harpswell Foundation Dormitory and Leadership Center for University Women in Phnom Penh (see New Projects). Vanna received a bachelor's and master's degree in Meteorology from the Institute of Hydro-Meteorology in Odessa, Ukraine. Subsequently, she was the leading woman in the Cambodia Ministry of Water Resources. From 2001 to 2005 she was the project manager of the Association of Nun and Lay Women of Cambodia (ANLWC) and, most recently, has served as the executive director of of the Working Group for Weapon Reduction (WGWRP). Vanna has experience with international NGOs as well as Cambodian government organizations, and she is dedicated to promoting the education, life skills, and leadership abilities of young women in Cambodia.