From Cambodia to College: Support Ranue!
Donation protected
Every morning at 5:30 AM, an 8-year-old boy climbed the tree in front of his modest Cambodian village home to stare intently across the dirt road to see if I was awake yet. As soon as he saw the front door of my hut open, he rushed down from the tree and ran across the road. "Good morning, teacher!" This was little Ranue, my star student in the art and English program I started there in 2014. A decade later, I'm asking for support to fulfill my promise to him - a chance at an American education.
Ranue lived across the road from me with his father, a survivor of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge genocide of the 1970s and former front-line soldier. He has three older sisters and one older brother, all of whom worked long hours in the garment factory along the border between Cambodia and Vietnam. They would get picked up each morning in a stock truck, packed in like sardines and covered head-to-toe to avoid sun exposure and dust on the long ride to the factories.
This is a very difficult life, with low pay, dangerous working environments, and a rigorous 6-day work week of 12 hour days. Many such workers use fake IDs to begin working before they turn 18. Ranue believes he would have certainly met the same fate if he was not afforded the opportunity to study at a private international school under my sponsorship since grade 7.
When he first left his remote village and only home he had ever known, he marveled at the wonders of running water, air conditioning, and discovered his extreme disdain for cheese. He always took the challenges of his new life in stride, always polite and hard-working with a great sense of humor he certainly inherited from his father, Pu Naan.
Ranue quickly became a top student in his middle school and by high school was consistently in the top two students with the highest grades in his class. As a high school senior, he was elected class vice principal and named class valedictorian. His national test scores (akin to SAT in the US) were so high that he was invited to a special ceremony by the Prime Minister of Cambodia and other regional governmental officials. His scores were record-breaking for high school graduates from his home district.
Ranue is also an accomplished artist who loves drawing and printmaking. As a member of Open Studio Cambodia, the artist collective I founded in 2018, Ranue learned how to create, speak about, and sell his own artwork. His work has been included in exhibitions throughout Cambodia and Washington state, and has been collected all over the world.
He excels at math and chemistry and has recently applied to Tacoma Community College where he will pursue an Associate of Science - Chemical Engineering with the hope to be able to transfer to a 4-year university as a transfer student. Ranue wants to study chemical engineering so that he can help his country advance in areas of medicine and healthcare. If I reach my $15,000 goal, I will be able to provide one year of tuition for him at Tacoma Community College.
Over the many years of living with me in Cambodia, Ranue made many friends with visitors from my hometown of Seattle. He has a built-in community here in the Pacific Northwest of supportive friends who will welcome him with open arms. Thanks to their help, he already has secured a place to live rent-free which is a short walk from Tacoma Community College. Now, I am asking my community to contribute to his tuition.
Thank you for your generosity. In this time of polarizing politics and conflict, I am channeling my energy into fulfilling a promise I made to a child many years ago in a remote Cambodian village, to pursue a quality education in the United States of America. Thank you for joining me on this journey, and let's get Ranue here!
Please copy this link and share widely with your own community, especially those who share a love of Cambodia.
Organizer
Lauren Iida
Organizer
Bothell, WA