Dear CLACS faculty, students, and friends:
As the day has worn on, our awareness of the magnitude of the catastrophe in Haiti has grown. It is almost inconceivable: possibly “hundreds of thousands” dead in the area around Port-au-Prince, the city and most of its buildings destroyed. A proud and long-suffering people has been struck down once again.
We must help them survive and move forward. And we must also be sensitive to the needs of our own Haitian and Haitian-American student population here at IU. Some of them still do not have word about their family members in Haiti. Please lend a helping hand where possible.
From this moment, we have declared CLACS a collection site for Haiti relief items. During our normal business hours, in our Center at 1125 E. Atwater Ave, we will be receiving materials to be sent to Haiti. We are still working on identifying the best way to get such items to Haiti; if we can’t partner with an organization working out of Indianapolis or another nearby city, we will use limited CLACS funds to mail boxes to organizations in Miami or D.C., where relief flights will be ongoing.
I spoke with a relief worker this afternoon, and she informed me of these priority items: Wound dressings and bandages; rehydration packets; Chloroquine (anti-malarial); non-perishable foods (Peanut butter, crackers, canned items, for instance). Obviously, most of us do not have these medical supplies on hand, but we do have food. And if some of you could make calls to Bloomington Hospital or the IU Wellness Center, perhaps we could get some of these medical items donated as well.
As the days and weeks pass, these immediate needs may shift. We will keep you informed of priority items. We see this as a long-term effort; we cannot allow the immediacies of the moment to obscure the broader reconstruction effort as well.
In the meantime, for those of you who prefer to make monetary donations to organizations with operations already on the ground in Haiti, we have compiled a list of links, from which you may choose. Just as soon as we can, we will also create a link to these from our CLACS webpage.
Our Instructor of Haitian Creole, David Tezil, particularly recommends the International Firefighter Association, at www.ifarelief.org.
Also, within two hours of Tuesday's 7.0 magnitude earthquake, musician Wyclef Jean and his organization Yéle mobilized on social networking sites to raise funds for disaster relief. Jean is encouraging people to text "Yéle" to 501501, which will automatically donate $5 to the Yéle Haiti Earthquake Fund, or to visit http://www.yele.org/.
Here are some other options:
Oxfam International
https://www.oxfam.org.uk/donate/haiti-earthquake/index.php
American Red Cross
https://american.redcross.org/site/Donation2?3916.donation=form1&idb=1389596928&df_id=3916&JServSessionIdr004=4wqoapocd1.app234a
Mercy Corps
https://donate.mercycorps.org/donation.htm?DonorIntent=Haiti+Earthquake
United Methodist Comittee on Relief
http://secure.gbgm-umc.org/donations/umcor/donate.cfm?code=418325&id=3018760
The Salvation Army
https://secure.salvationarmy.org/donations.nsf/donate?openform&projectid=USN-HaitiDisaster
In solidarity:
Bradley A.U. Levinson
Director, Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CLACS) (http://www.iub.edu/~clacs)
Lead Editor, Inter-American Journal of Education for Democracy (www.ried-ijed.org)
Associate Professor of Education (http://profile.educ.indiana.edu/brlevins)
Adjunct Associate Professor of Anthropology and Latino Studies
Indiana University
