Donation of Hope

International educational reformers and community leaders convened in Bloomington to celebrate a new facility donated by the Hope Foundation to various community youth organizations Saturday. The building is a warehouse located on the west side next to the General Electric plant and will be used by the Boys & Girls Club, Girls Inc., and the Bloomington Playwrights Project.\nIndiana State Senator Vi Simpson, IU Vice President of institutional development and student affairs Charlie Nelms, IU School of Education University Dean Gerardo Gonzalez and Monroe Bank President Mark Bradford welcomed and renewed relationships with invited guests at the open house ceremony.\nHope Foundation President Alan M. Blankstein led the ribbon cutting ceremony and presented keys for the city to community members for all three community organizations. Blankstein said he believes the Hope Foundation's mission involves developing and supporting educational leaders over time to create school cultures that sustain all students' achievement.\n"We are here to inaugurate our new space and open it the community, literally," Blankstein said to the key holders. "You have the support of the whole community behind you."\nThe Hope Foundation was founded in 1989 with the purpose of bridging the information gap between modern educational thinkers across the world and the real-life classroom. The foundation motto "Failure Is Not an Option" is the educational cornerstone and primary ideology of all the research, summits and institutes, long-term school improvement plans, keynote educational experts and consultants, professional development videos, print resources and leadership academies conducted throughout the nation to ensure no child is left behind in the classroom.\nThe highlight of the open house was an address by Kamele "Oupa" Seane, U.S. liaison to the Hope Foundation's Honorary Chair Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Seane shared various political points-of-view of world peace processes and discussed Tutu's spiritual and philosophical approaches to leadership and conflict resolution.\n"In a true democracy, you treat others how you want to be treated -- you subject others to the same treatment as you want from them," Seane said. "We should not give up on democracy because others are breaking the law. We are a sophisticated nation; we cannot act the terrorists. Everything has to be done with respect for law."\nSeane works as the Director of Intercultural Center for PEACE at the University of North Florida. His message compared the current U.S. political and educational environments with his professional experiences in South Africa. \n"In a true democracy, sometimes your ears and eyes are subjected to things you disagree with. You have to be opened minded to ideas different from our own, listen to what others have to say," Seane said. "The U.N. called our war on Iraq illegal. We need to fulfill our responsibility of making our world a better place to live. We need a new type of sober leadership."\nBlankstein believes the Hope Foundation can benefit the local community in addition to the international primary and secondary educational communities. The open house concluded with several theatrical performances by previous BPP mini-play contest winners. All actors, directors and stagehands were middle and high school students.\nBPP education director Breshaun Joyner appreciates the work space donated by the Hope Foundation, and she looks forward to the community partnership created between the two organizations.\n"We'd like to use the (warehouse) space for kindergarten through second grade theatre summer camps. We already have camps for third through tenth grades," Joyner said. "We want to teach the really young ones basic theatre: mask making, improvisation, character development, movement. The BPP is the place to go for new and original works of theater."\n-- Contact staff writer David A. Nosko at dnosko@indiana.edu.