Celebrating a young philanthropist

We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give. 

Unnati is proud of so many donors, who are such great people and donate with passion year after year!  It is this group of donors who power the core team at Unnati to perform above par.

This is the story of one of such donor, a very young one at that. Sumit Sohani is a 11th grade Junior, studying in Atlanta, Georgia. He had heard of Unnati through his father. He has raised a sum of $425 (US) till date, which is a huge sum, considering that he is a student.

How he raised the money is very touching & inspiring to all of us. In Sumit’s own words,

“My name is Sumit Sohani, and I’m a junior (11th grade) at Northview High School in Atlanta, Georgia. Right now, my school is on summer break but throughout the school year I pursue many clubs such as Science Olympiad (a team based activity) and HOSA (dealing with health issues). Outside of school, one of my favorite hobbies is playing chess. 

I started playing chess about ten years ago, near the start of 1st grade. At that point, I was voraciously pursuing the game, constantly wanting to play and best my parents. To hone in my energy, I began to take coaching and soon began climbing up in rating points (the chess ranking system) and tournament finishes.

I began to enjoy teaching chess as well and started an initiative called Knights at Heart a summer ago. The aim was to raise money to donate to a charity by teaching local kids chess- one on one, hour long sessions. This summer, I’m continuing that initiative by stepping it up a little: by hosting a camp in St. Louis for 12 kids. The camp will be much more intensive and will be my first test at seeing how efficiently and how well I can coach many people. The money thus earned  will go towards charity.

When I read about Unnati, I thought, “What better place for the money to go?” As someone once said, “Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; show him how to catch fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” By investing money in people, Unnati is improving the lives of many, for years to come, something I want to do with my chess coaching. I am humbled to be able to donate to such an empowering organization, and I thank you for giving me the opportunity to do so.”

Team Unnati is extremely grateful to Sumit for  this wonderful gesture. We hope and pray that as with everything in the teens, this attitude of giving and the philanthropy also spreads virally.

Thank you, Sumit! Unnati celebrates YOU!!

Team Unnati