SHDF 2023 Accomplishments and 2024 Vision.
Dear Friend,
Sat Sri Akal. I hope you and your family are doing well.
On behalf of the SHDF Board, I would like to express our warmest wishes for the holidays and for a Happy New Year. May Guru Ji’s blessings be on all of you. We are profoundly grateful for your invaluable support throughout the year.
As 2023 draws to a close, I want to share with you a summary of the accomplishments of SHDF this year and our plans for 2024. I should emphasize that we will be providing 1800 scholarships next year, a significant increase from this year. These will help transform thousands of lives (please see the alumni testimonials below). Your additional support is critical at this juncture. Please donate generously.
Your contributions have been crucial to the following achievements this year:
- SHDF continued its upward trajectory of helping a larger number of students pursue their dream of obtaining a college education that will prepare them for professional careers. We awarded 1460 scholarships, well- exceeding our goal, and surpassing the 1276 granted in 2022.
- We prioritized helping the most deserving and vulnerable youth –70% of our applicants had a family income of less than $100 a month. Three-fourths of our recipients were women, and two-thirds were from rural areas. Since its inception in 1999, SHDF has granted over 11,000 scholarships.
- As part of our ongoing support of scholarship recipients, we have organized multiple workshops, attended by several hundred scholarship recipients, imparting training in soft-skills essential for obtaining well-paid jobs and for career growth.
- Several new programs were started, leveraging technology: A new initiative with an online, one-on-one mentoring program, connecting students from the graduating class with highly experienced and accomplished professionals from their field has been set in motion; we have embarked on the development of the Alumni Network to facilitate interaction between Alumni, as well as between them and current scholarships recipients; and a further enhancement of our website is underway, to make it more user-friendly and current.
- Our pilot initiative for the merit-cum-need USA Scholarships, funded separately by committed donors, has continued.
- SHDF Canada has been successfully registered as a tax-exempt charitable organization. As our close partner, it is already undertaking invaluable Seva helping implement the SHDF mandate. We have also initiated the setting up of Chapters in California and Chicago, complementing the existing Chapters in Richmond and Cleveland which are doing exemplary work.
- SHDF’s donor base is becoming more geographically diverse. In addition to the continuing crucial support from the Washington Metropolitan Area, donors from California, in particular, have been providing a larger share of funding, with some donors making exceptionally generous contributions. Our annual fundraiser in November was a success with enthusiastic support from our donors throughout USA.
In recognition of its transparency and accountability, SHDF was awarded the platinum seal of transparency in 2023 by GuideStar/Candid—the largest and leading source of information on non-profits in the world. This is a great honor: the award is attained by less than 1% non-profits nationally.
Our goals and plans for 2024 are as follows:
- Given the markedly higher demand, we plan to significantly increase the number of scholarships awarded. Due to the losses caused by heavy rains and flooding in northern India this summer, and the ensuing worsening of the economic situation, a record number of applications have been received. We are expecting to provide up to 1,800 scholarships, which will bring the total number of SHDF scholarships since inception to well over 12,500.
- The volunteers at our ten centers—eight in Punjab, and one each in New Delhi and Haryana – as well as the SHDF staff and our partners at Nishkam Sikh Welfare Council in New Delhi, will maintain close contact with the scholarship recipients to help them meet any ongoing challenges.
- We plan to broaden the scope of our soft-skills workshops with training in leadership, networking and resourcefulness. The inputs obtained from our center coordinators will be integrated into broadening the one-on-one mentoring program as well as to the expansion of the Alumni Network. The website will be further enhanced.
- We are working with dedicated volunteers to expand our donor base further in California, Chicago, New York and New Jersey, as we develop our program.
- We will be exploring the provision of coaching assistance and related support to SHDF Scholarship recipients who are high-performers and are motivated to take part in civil service and foreign service exams.
- After the success in Canada, we will explore registration as a tax-exempt charitable organization in the UK, Australia and Singapore.
- We hope to have an in-person fundraising annual event next year, following the successful Virtual events over the last three years.
Your generous support is critical for the scholarship program, making all our activities possible. There are still many, many more young women and men with dreams of higher education but meager means who need your help. As you make your year-end charitable contributions, we urge you to please consider giving the gift that keeps on giving – the gift of education via SHDF scholarship.
Thank you so much for your invaluable Seva which is truly transformative and for generations to come.
May Waheguru Ji’s blessings be with you and your family throughout the new year.
With warm regards,
Manmohan Singh Kumar, Ph. D. (Cambridge)
Chairman, SHDF
As the year ends, we are deeply grateful to you for your invaluable support that has helped us provide over 1600 scholarships...
Dear Student, Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa, Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh, Thank you very much for participating in our recent essaycompetition...
Dear Friend, Sat Sri Akal. I hope you and your family are well and in good spirits. In this Newsletter, I provide an update...
The Sikh Human Development Foundation is dedicated to catalyzing transformative change by offering scholarships to underserved yet ambitious students across Punjab and nearby regions. Through donor support, the Foundation has helped empower students to pursue advanced education and professional opportunities in diverse fields, awarding over 13,000 scholarships over the past two decades.