Why Donate?

The Harvard Community Education Foundation (HCEF) is a Community sponsored program.  No tax dollars go into funding this program . . . all the assets of the HCEF have come from the generous contributions of private individuals who believe in our mission:

To encourage the Harvard community to support quality education of its children by enriching and expanding learning opportunities

The HCEF was created to allow the academic community to fund projects that aren't typically covered in the District 50 budget.  It gives our teachers the means to explore new avenues of learning to augment the regular classroom experience.  Our vision is that the children of our community utilize these opportunities to enhance their personal and academic futures.

When the program was started, over 20 years ago, it was decided that a portion of the contributions made to the HCEF would be placed into an Endowment.  The money generated by the investments of the Endowment are what fund these extra-curricular learning experiences.  The principal of the Endowment is never utilized, so every dollar donated to the Endowment will be there for perpetuity.

The HCEF functions like a family, and as such, we like to believe we possess family values and ethics.  One of the most important jobs of a family is to educate our children and instill, in them, the same values and ethics.  After all, our children are the future, and they need to be prepared to handle the complexities of life in that future with a strong moral compass.  The HCEF promotes programs that enrich and expand learning opportunities . . . programs that foster life skills like problem solving, confidence building, cooperative planning . . . skills that are just as important as the basic educational tenets we usually associate with the educational system.

The HCEF is made up of local volunteers.  We are people who are familiar with the problems and the opportunities of our community.  People who have a vested interest in building a future with strong societal values and ethics.  Proud and giving people who have benefitted from our community and want to share the rewards of our hard work to ensure that our children have the tools they need by paying forward for their future.