The AMY Foundation is pleased to announce that Alexander Jacob T. Yao, Founder of the Youth Volunteers initiative of the foundation, has brought in its newest partner beneficiary, GreenEarth Heritage Foundation, Inc. GreenEarth is a farming community located in San Miguel, Bulacan, which provides a U.S. curriculum homeschool program for the children of its farmers.
Aside from hoping to provide scholarship support for GreenEarth’s students, Jacob’s most ambitious passion project to date is the School House project for GreenEarth Heritage Foundation, Inc. He teamed up with a classmate, Ana Infante, at the International School Manila (ISM), to construct a one-room School House for the farmers’ children at GreenEarth. Asked why he decided to take this on with Ana, Jacob replied:
“The AMY Foundation’s mission has always been about giving scholarships to deserving students who otherwise may not have the opportunity to finish their education due to circumstances not in their control. I wanted the AMY Foundation to also help the children in our country’s poor rural areas. The pandemic has made me realize that our Filipino farmers and their families are the “poorest of the poor” among our marginalized countrymen. They live in off-grid areas, with no electricity nor running water. Even more sadly, a majority of them finish only up to grade 2. And their children will likely have the same fate if no one steps up to help change this vicious cycle of poverty. Giving these farmers’ children a dedicated space to learn is my and Ana’s small way of giving them the opportunity to change the narrative of their lives. An alumnus of our school, ISM, was one of the farmers’ children taught at GreenEarth’s U.S. curriculum homeschool program in their sole multipurpose room structure before he became one of ISM’s Filipino scholars. Romnick Blanco is now a full tuition scholar at Harvard who hopes to graduate next year. It is my and Ana’s fervent wish to do something of impact for the farmers’ children and we share Romnick’s dream that one day GreenEarth will be able to fulfill its promise of educating more farmers’ children and providing them the same opportunity he’s had to qualify for higher education in the Philippines and abroad”.
Asked if he still has time for other activities since taking on the stewardship of the AMY Foundation’s Youth Volunteer initiative, Jacob excitedly shared that he and his sister are presently working on the feeding program they’ve been long hoping to start since the height of the pandemic. Now that the Philippine government has mandated that all public and private schools must resume face-to-face classes by November 2, 2022, he shared that they are just finalizing the logistics for the first feeding program event that will be held in late September 2022.
In addition, Jacob mentioned that he and his sister, Clara, is preparing to launch her gotshoes? Donation Drive campaign, a spin-off of the foundation’s Balik Eskuwela Program. They realized that with public school students now required to return to face-to-face classes, they have likely outgrown the shoes they have had the past two and a half years during the pandemic and will be needing not only school supplies but also shoes to wear to school. It’s been often said that maturity and wisdom comes with age. But it’s easy to see that Jacob
Yao’s youthful idealism and young maturity have given him wisdom beyond his years. The AMY Foundation considers itself blessed that this intrepid young man will one day take the helm of its future.
