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This is Alexander and Elena Parkhomenko writing to you. We live in Lukoyanov, Russia. Alexander teaches graphic arts at the art school, and teaches drawing at a regular public school. Lena is a school psychologist and secretary, and works at the Pedagogical College. We have two children, a 10-year-old daughter Alexandra and a 6-year-old son Timofey (Timothy). At home in the evening we paint Russian crafts to sell. Thank you for offering to collect donations toward schools in our city. We can tell you briefly about the problems that educational institutions in our town are facing. For the past fifteen years, education in Russia has been in a state of crisis. For the most part, the only financing available to schools has been meager salaries for teachers and staff. (Teachers in Lukoyanov earn approximately $200/month.) For anything else needed (textbooks, furniture, sports equipment, methodological or pedagogical literature), there simply hasn’t been any money. The situation got so bad that at the largest school, with 600 students, there were only 2-3 balls to use in P.E. class. Skis were broken beyond repair. The textbooks are old and torn, from around 1990. For subjects like art and music, we have no books at all. In one school, the three blackboards are so old that they have become unusable (they are more than forty years old, and had been made of brown linoleum glued to the wall). These “blackboards” are simply falling apart due to their age. There are many other such examples. But the situation is slowly improving. We realize that it would take a lot of money to help everyone. But if members of the Cosmopolitan Club are able to help in even a few areas, the parents, teachers, and of children would be very grateful. To show our thanks, we would like to offer to put together an exhibit of Russian children’s art (paintings, matryoshkas, traditional Russian crafts), which we would send to you in America. Respectfully, The Parkhomenko family
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