International Projects
Elephant Thoughts began as an international development organization. Our fundamental goal was breaking the cycle of poverty by supplying excellent quality education to those in need.
Our philosophy on international development is to:
- Provide resources, not solutions. The people living in the developing areas we assist know what they need far better than we do.
- Celebrate and preserve indigenous cultures and languages.
- Have sensitivity in everything we do for the well being of the planet.
- Hire locally whenever possible to do necessary work.
- Partner with other NGO’s rather than initiate projects in new countries on our own.
- Make sure that decisions of how to use our resources are made by the local people themselves, with the proper checks and balances in place.
- Make sure the community is a full partner in all of our initiatives.
In the course of our development work, we:
- Train teachers and send graduates to teachers college
- Sponsor children to go to school
- Provide schools with resources and infrastructure
- Build schools in areas that don’t have any
- Create programs for long term professional development at the schools we work in
- Provide curriculum consultation and help schools develop their own curriculum and learning materials
Presently, we work in or support projects in India, Nepal, Nicaragua, Tanzania, China.
