Education and elevation

Laura K.G. Mossakowski, CFP, was only 2 years old. But she can still picture the first time she walked into Encompass Early Education and Care, an organization that would have immense importance in her family’s life and one of the recipients of the MDRT Foundation’s top two global grants, each awarded $50,000 in honor of the sponsoring members’ volunteerism.

“A bunch of kids were learning and having fun doing sensory tables and puzzles, and there were more toys than I had ever seen. A huge Pink Panther stuffed animal looked like it went to the ceiling. I remember curling up with it and not wanting to leave,” remembered the 18-year MDRT member from Green Bay, Wisconsin, USA. “They brought out a spread of food with veggies and fruits I had never experienced or even knew what they were. I remember thinking, How do they have so much food? The people were so warm and welcoming, and all the food and warmth was not something I’d experienced at that point in life.”

Mossakowski’s mom had recently moved Laura, her two older sisters (then 4 and 5) and 1-year-old brother from Milwaukee to Green Bay — a little more than 100 miles away — to leave an abusive marriage for a more supportive environment where grandparents, aunts and uncles lived. At Encompass, Mossakowski and her brother quickly began attending day care full time. She recalls the massive mental, physical and developmental difference that occurred thanks to receiving newfound care, nourishment (she discovered she loved beets) and resources, like sensory games to learn how to process emotions.

“I was 2 and hadn’t said a word yet,” said Mossakowski, who attended until going to kindergarten at age 5 and then some after-school care until she was 8. “After a month or two, I was talking in complete sentences.”

That enormous impact — including Encompass staff encouraging Mossakowski’s mom to go to college and get a job, two things she’d never done before — are why Mossakowski started volunteering when she was 10 years old. As an adult, she accepted Encompass’ invitation to join their board, where she has been since 2015 and served as president from 2017 to 2020, helping drive a big fundraising campaign, opening an additional center in the neighboring community of Pulaski, and celebrating the organization’s 100th anniversary.

Expanded reach

Today, Encompass serves more than 1,200 kids — ages 6 weeks to 13 years — across seven child care facilities, with an eighth opening in 2024. More than one-third of attending families receive financial help through their employer, the state or Encompass’ scholarship program. The money from the MDRT Foundation grant will fund and expand Encompass’ weekend food packs program, which provides healthy, cost-effective food for kids who eat little to nothing throughout the weekend. The backpacks have a huge impact in helping kids feel healthy and energized to learn and have fun when they return to Encompass on Monday.

Kamal N. Daya, CLU, ChFC, certainly understands the personal imperative to bring education and resources to those in need. In 2008, the 44-year MDRT member from Dallas, Texas, USA, founded the Worldwide Education Fund (WEF) — the other recipient of the MDRT Foundation’s $50,000 global grant — to enhance English-language fluency in central and southern Asia. The goal dates to when Daya, who was born in India and moved with his family as refugees to Bangladesh, came to the U.S. at 18 to attend college at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and realized that even though he could speak English, he didn’t really understand others who spoke it.

“When I talk to many people that came to America about what would have helped, it was English-language skills,” Daya said. “If you can master English-language skills, you can do anything you wish to do, and we can break the silence of generational poverty.”

Yet, a childhood promise to help his native region after finding success as an adult wasn’t fulfilled until Daya went to India with his wife, Connie, in 2006 to assist insurance companies in training advisors and managers. They went to an orphanage they’d been supporting with a few hundred dollars per year. “You’ve been talking about doing something for a very, very long time, and I haven’t seen you do anything yet except send a few dollars,” Connie said. “When are you going to do something?”

What resulted was a lab, co-founded by the couple, where kids could learn English, the language Daya says is important for anyone wanting to join the worlds of business, science and technology, and the billions of English speakers worldwide. In 2015, a $25,000 MDRT Foundation grant helped the program expand across India and then more broadly across Asia in countries like Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Tajikistan. Educational cassettes became MP3 players, and now Zoom, which has massively changed how students can learn digitally.

Global classroom

Today, WEF works with about 10,000 kids and hundreds more adults in nine different countries (including remote areas with minimal electricity or internet) with programs like English as a second language education for kids ages 12 to 16 taught live by Americans via Zoom; a high-school-level, advanced English curriculum touching on business, travel and tourism with the intent to make students employable for a white-collar job at 18; and empowerment projects for people in their mid-20s to early 30s.

The 2023 MDRT Foundation grant will help support the high school program of WEF’s Global Virtual School (GVS), a hybrid learning environment in which teachers from their homes in primarily English-speaking countries such as the U.S., Canada and Australia teach students gathered in physical schools, with in-person teachers to help with the lessons.

Other WEF outreaches are the following programs:

• Operating a physical location in Northern Pakistan, teaching English in two schools with two more coming in 2023 and as many as six more by 2025.
• Expanding the reach of GVS in partnership with the American Embassy’s American Spaces program with scholarship programs bringing 20 students from Pakistan, India and Tajikistan to pursue their MBA at a partner school in Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
• Taking care of refugees from Afghanistan and Tajikistan through the American embassy.
• Exploring opportunities to provide English-language skills for Ukrainian refugees in Moldova, Romania and Poland.

“There’s so much going on. My wife and I said we are busier than we were with a big staff of people doing generational planning for high-net-worth clients,” Daya said. “The MDRT Foundation is an amazing partner in understanding who we are, how we work, and how involved and engaged we are together.” 

Endorse a charity

You — yes, you! — can endorse a charity to receive grant funding. The deadline to apply is September 1, and the application process is available in nine languages. Visit mdrtfoundation.org to learn more. Have questions? Contact grants@mdrt.org.