Jakarta, October 14, 2008 – The UPS Foundation, remaining true to its commitment to economic and global literacy, is providing US$19,972 grant to the Sampoerna Foundation. The grant will fund scholarships for 124 state elementary schools students from 18 schools in the sub-districts of Pala and Halim in Jakarta.
 
The scholars are students from 16 state elementary schools in the Kebon Pala sub-district and two state elementary schools in Halim Perdana Kusuma sub-district. Only elementary school students in excellent academic standing and with demonstrated financial need are eligible for the scholarship.

“We aspire to see that all Indonesians receive equal opportunity to quality education. Hopefully, the scholarships will serve these students to hold on to their aspirations of success through education despite the gloomy economic conditions,” said Budi Setiadi, Finance Manager of PT UPS Cardig International.
       
“The educational aid provided by The UPS Foundation is truly a significant step since it shows that there is support from the private sector directed toward educational reform. The problems in the education sector in Indonesia are very complex and we cannot rely on the government alone to solve it.  Everyone in our society must become a catalyst in stimulating the rate of quality and access improvement in Indonesia’s education sector,” said Vira Soekardirman, Sales Director of Sampoerna Foundation.

Indonesia’s Ministry of National Education (Depdiknas) data reveals that during the 2006/2007 academic year over 1 million school-age students in Indonesia were forced to drop out of school. In addition to their inability to pay for education expenses, the condition these low-income students are facing has been further complicated by the many natural disasters occuring in Indonesia over the past several years. 

About The UPS Foundation
Established in 1951 and based in Atlanta, Georgia (USA), The UPS Foundation enables nonprofit organizations to serve communities more effectively around the world. One of The UPS Foundation’s focus is to improve economic literacy in communities through programming that teaches the fundamentals of free enterprise and the foundations of economic education are the focus of this initiative. The UPS Foundation also supports emerging entrepreneurs through grants to innovative micro enterprise organizations.

In 2007, The UPS Foundation distributed US$46.5 million worldwide through grants that benefit organizations or programs such as the non-profit effectiveness, economic & global literacy, encouraging diversity, community safety and environmental sustainability.
UPS, which recently just celebrated its 101st anniversary in 2008, is the world’s largest package delivery company and a global leader in supply chain services, offering an extensive range of options for synchronizing the movement of goods, information and funds. The company can be found on the Web at www.ups.com.

About Sampoerna Foundation
Sampoerna Foundation (SF) is a professional philanthropy organization dedicated to create competent leaders with good moral fiber through high value quality education. In the fourth quarter of 2007, Sampoerna Foundation received the ISO 9000 international certification for its quality management systems. To this date SF has awarded more than 30,000 scholarships to students in good academic standing with demonstrated financial need at elementary through to graduate school level.

The Foundation has also formulated several quality improvement programs, such as the United Schools Program (SF USP) to positively impact the lives of not only Indonesian students, but also teachers, principals, schools and the education system as a whole. Up until December 2007, SF USP has adopted seventeen schools and five madrasahs in Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi, and Bali. Also in 2006, SF launched the Sampoerna Foundation Teacher Institute and the Sampoerna School of Business and Management-ITB. To learn more, please visit the SF website at: www.sampoernafoundation.org.