Founded in 2000 by Fr. Thuan and two friends based in San Francisco, CA, the Blind Vietnamese Children Foundation assisted The Lover of the Holy Cross Sisters who had just established Nhat Hong Thi Nghe Home for the Blind in Ho Chi Minh City (1995).

Up to the present time with the Foundation’s support, the Sisters expanded to nine homes and schools with a total of almost 400 students. The Foundation has also provided funding to maintain the homes, schools, and healthcare centers for visually impaired children administered by other lay or religious groups.

 Rev. Thuan Van Hoang was born on October 16, 1956, in Saigon (known today as Ho Chi Minh City), Vietnam. His seminary education began at the age of 12. After studies and service at St. Joseph Major Seminary and earning a living as a tricycle driver, Thuan escaped by boat from Vietnam to Indonesia in 1987. For over 15 months he resided in two refugee camps in Indonesia and the Philippines before immigrating to the U.S.

Thuan attended Evergreen College and San Jose State University while working in Silicon Valley’s tech industry. In 1995 he became a U.S. citizen and on May 31, 1997, he was ordained to the priesthood for the Archdiocese of San Francisco. He earned a Bachelor’s degree in Pontifical Sacred Theology and a Master Divinity degree. In 2003 he earned the Licentiate of Canon Law (J.C.L.)

Fr. Thuan ministered as parochial vicar at Saint Cecilia Church, Saint Philip Church, Most Holy Redeemer Church and Church of the Visitacion in San Francisco. He currently serves as pastor at the Church of the Visitacion. As a canonist, Fr. Thuan also ministers to the metropolitan tribunal of Archdiocese of San Francisco as the defender of the bond.

After ordination, he went back to Vietnam and visited a longtime friend, Sr. Anna Nhuong Thi Nguyen, a Sister of the Lover of the Holy Cross of Thu Duc Congregation, who had just established Nhat Hong Thi Nghe Home for the Blind in Ho Chi Minh City. Inspired by the blind children and Sr. Anne Nhuong, on returning to the United States, Fr. Thuan founded the Blind Vietnamese Children Foundation in 2000. He has since served as President of the Executive Board to raise funds for the support and development of educational and vocational programs for visually-challenged children. The Foundation successfully opened and continues to fund several homes and centers in Vietnam.

If you are interested in donating visit Blind Vietnamese Children’s Foundation.

 

 

In cooperation with Vietnamese officials and with the support of corporations and individuals around the world, the Vietnam Children’s Fund has been building schools for fifteen years. Working closely with each community, calling upon local artisans and using readily available materials, Vietnam Children’s Fund constructs schools that are sturdy, safe, and clean. Because a school may be the only well-built structure in a community, it serves as not only a gathering place for the community but often the only safe haven from the elements during a natural disaster.

Vietnam Children’s Fund accepts no Government funds. Their funding is all private and comes from individuals, foundation, corporations and the Combined Federal Campaign.

 

The Vietnam Children’s Fund was founded in 1993 by Kieu Chinh, an actress, lecturer, and philanthropist, Terry Anderson, journalist, and the late Lewis B. Puller. The Vietnam Children’s Fund was the dream of Lewis B.Puller, Jr. His personal experience led him to believe that in war no one goes unscathed and that children, the most vulnerable of all, suffer the greatest hardships.
           
In the year before his death, Lewis Puller returned to Vietnam seeking ideas for the living memorial he and several friends had decided to build to honor the Vietnamese men, women, and children who died in that country’s long wars. He decided that the most appropriate monument to the past and the greatest hope for the future would be schools for Vietnam’s children.

After more than 20 years and 51 elementary schools, the Vietnam Children’s Fund (VCF) is the trusted expert when it comes to building schools in the most difficult, remote and disparate locations in Vietnam.
The purpose of the Vietnam Children’s Fund is to remember the families and children lost in Vietnam’s many long wars. The goal of the Fund is to close the past and look to the future by building schools.

Vietnam Children’s Funds signature design is a modern two-story facility that serves 350 children (or as many as 700 attending in shifts) and provides eight classrooms, a library, electricity, and bathrooms. As the schools are often the newest and most structurally sound buildings in these communities they are also used for town gatherings, meetings, and celebrations. In areas prone to flooding, the Vietnam Children’s Funds school may be the only two-story building in a region where villagers can go to escape disaster. Quality control, accountability for funds, sound engineering, and sound design are keystones of Vietnam Childre’s Funds activity in Vietnam.

If you are interested in donating visit Vietnam Children’s Fund.

 

Children’s Education Foundation – Vietnam works to break the poverty cycle by helping girls from impoverished communities to complete school or receive further education, helping not just young women, but also succeeding generations and their communities to have the possibility of a better life with more choice.

      A better life for young women can mean many things. A girl who completes her schooling grows into a woman who is better able to look after her health and that of her children. By finishing schooling herself, she will care more that her children finish theirs and be better able to support them while they are in school. As a result of the skills and competencies she has gained during her schooling, she will be better equipped to earn a living and so have greater independence and dignity. An educated young woman is also at considerably less risk of becoming a victim of the sex trade or ending up an imprisoned worker in a sweatshop.

The sense of self-esteem and confidence that completing school gives, can contribute significantly to the positive development not only of the individual but also to that of their families, their community and society as a whole.

In order to keep young girls in school and safe, Children’s Education Foundation provides scholarships to help high school girls from a mountainous area near the Vietnam-Laos border. Most trafficking in Vietnam takes place along its borders. Photos and an annual report on the project are sent to each person who takes on a scholarship.

Children’s Education Foundation frequently receives requests for educational support for children who are orphaned or from poor or challenging circumstances. The best help for these children is a long-term commitment to their education. Providing sponsors with annual photos, a letter or drawing from the child and a report on them including their school results.

If you are interested in donating visit Children’s Education Foundation.

 

Children of Vietnam began with two friends, one an American and the other a Vietnamese, who simply saw the needs of many children and decided to take action. Mr. Ben Wilson and Ms. Luong Thi Huong would ride a scooter through the streets of Danang and into the countryside, bringing aid to children and their families—food, shelter, medicine, clothing—anything and everything a child might need. Brightening a child’s future with all that he or she needs to grow, be happy, and develop to his or her potential remains their focus today.

Back in 1998 when Children of Vietnam was founded, word of Ben and Huong’s life-changing scooter deliveries traveled fast. Families with children who needed help sought them out, while Ben and Huong furiously worked on both sides of the ocean to meet the needs of the children.

From the beginning, Ben and Huong believed in creating partnership relationships with the communities, finding the greatest needs, delivering aid quickly, and working to provide support that sustained growth in the community. These principles are alive and well and still guiding Children of Vietnam in the daily operations.

Today, Ben is still President and Huong is still in Vietnam as Country Director. And, while the staff and volunteers have grown, they all continue to work to transform the lives of vulnerable children to brighten their futures.

Since 1998, Children of Vietnam has been serving the children in Vietnam whose futures are stifled by poverty: educating minds, mending bodies, sheltering families and nurturing their development. Children of Vietnam is guided by its commitment to be effective, efficient and transparent. They build relationships, find the greatest needs, deliver aid, give hope to families and establish futures for poor, orphaned, disabled and vulnerable children. Children of Vietnam overarching goals are: to break the cycle of poverty, illness, and homelessness; and to provide immediate aid to children and families in crisis. They do this one child, one family, one community at a time.

Children of Vietnam believes that children with disabilities have the right to grow to their fullest potential.  They also believe that community involvement is essential to make this happen. Working in partnership with local authorities, Hope System of Care for Children with Disabilities (HSC) provides families with access to a full range of services. This partnership improves local capacity and also provides children with disabilities assistance in five major areas:

• Healthcare, rehabilitation, and nutrition
• Education and vocational training
• Livelihood/Micro-loans
• Sound and reliable housing, accessible to handicapped residents
  
• Introducing families and children to community activities and resources

 

Agent Orange (dioxin) is suspected to be the cause for many of the disabilities these children suffer, as well as those of many other Vietnamese.

Investing in children and equipping them with a sound education is fundamental to ending the cycle of poverty.  Children of Vietnam provides education for poor and handicapped children in Vietnam.  Children of Vietnam helps children become proud, self-sufficient adults by making a solid education a reality for children who could not otherwise afford one.

• awards bicycles to poor children so they have transportation to school
• builds kindergartens to meet the educational news of small children in rural areas
• facilitates after-school tutoring programs to keep street children and orphans in school
• awards scholarships for children in primary and secondary school, as well as those in university and vocational schools.
  Children of Vietnam believes that every child deserves excellent medical care, regardless of family income.  Often, a simple surgery can save a child’s life, drastically improve his or her quality of life, or be the difference between complete social rejection and a chance to be accepted.Children of Vietnam makes modern medical care a reality for children who need it most by
• ensuring that children are healthy and parasite free with preventative parasite treatments to school children
• arranging life-saving surgeries and other medical assistance for poor children who cannot afford it
• and coordinating with other agencies, organizations, and nonprofits to bring training, supplies, and equipment to Vietnam to help expand health care resources for children who need it most.
• Twice a year (usually March and September), Children of Vietnam welcomes guests to travel to Vietnam with us to experience their life-changing work. Visit many of the children they serve, learn about their needs and see their programs at work. You will quickly see how a little care and support for these children blossoms into new hope for a brighter future!If you are interested in traveling with them, email info@childrenofvietnam.org

  If you are interested in donating you can visit Children of Vietnam.