"A School for Iqbal"

February was an intense month. Fundraising continued at a pace of $1000 received each week. The 1600th donation was received. The students in the campaign have written a personal thank you to every single donor. We write those thank you's before school every morning. We are exhausted sometimes, but the letters we read are so inspiring. Those letters lift our spirits. Keep sending them !

One of the largest donations was from the rock band R.E.M. who donated $1000. Thanks guys ! We crossed the $85,000 mark in February.

In addition to raising funds, the campaign was successful in raising awareness. The February 9, 1996 issue of Scholastic Scope has a three page article on this campaign. Your high school or junior high school probably has a copy you can borrow. We have copies if you are interested.

The student leaders of the campaign spent a day of their February vacation sending out by FAX or by U.S. mail requests for proposals to build the school. We stuffed over 240 envelopes with the request for proposals. We FAXed over 40 requests. We sent them out to organizations around the world who build schools in developing countries. We have our fingers crossed and we're hoping some organization answers our request and sends in to us a proposal spelling out exactly how much school for how many Pakistani children they can build with our money. The deadline for submitting proposals is March 22, 1996. We're getting nervous. We hope to have raised $100,000 before the campaign ends.

March - The first three weeks in March have been $2000 weeks thanks to a very nice short article about our campaign in the March issue of SEVENTEEN magazine. Many readers have been contributing. Thanks ! The new total in the bank is $91,000.

The March 18th issue of ReAct magazine (published weekly by PARADE publications) has an update on the campaign also.

As this update is being prepared, we have received 12 proposals from non-governmental organizations who all have submitted very detailed proposals to build the school for Iqbal. We are going to have a school built ! This is so cool ! Thanks to everyone who is helping. We have received donations from students and others in all 50 states and from 12 countries. This has become an international kids human rights campaign.

We hope to have the three finalists for building the school named by April 2, 1996. We hope to announce the builder on April 12th.

The April issue of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC WORLD has a small write up about our campaign and a very cool color photo of student leaders Amanda Loos and Amy Papile (wearing construction helmets and leaning over blueprints of a school). We think the April issue of Harper's Bazaar will have a story on child bonded labor. The story includes our campaign !

Thanks and keep spreading the word. We'll keep accepting donations through the end of April . The more we raise, the more children we can help to get an education.

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