Luce Leader Awards Reception Celebrates Two Decades Of Helping Humanity

The James Jay Dudley Luce Foundation has in just five years made an incredible impact in developing our greatest resource – our young future global leaders. This year, The Foundation in conjunction Orphans International Worldwide will bestow honors on both the leaders of tomorrow and a unique group of humanitarians of today at a special awards reception at the Permanent Mission of Sri Lanka to the United Nations on Thursday February 26, 2015 from 6 to 9 p.m.

Honorees Alana Galloway and Mitzi Perdue. (Photo: TheHerbertCollection.com)

The 2014 J. Luce Foundation Young Global Leaders Award Recipients are Seal Bin-Han and Jamil Patacon Fuller, and the 2015 recipients are Alana Galloway and Eugenie Carys De Silva. Leadership Gifts to these four will include Poetry: “The Sufi’s Garland” by Manav Sachdeva Maasoom, our Poet Laureate; Biography: Frank Perdue: “Tough Man, Tender Chicken” by Mitzi Perdue, and Management: “Fearless Leadership in a Social World” by Alison Fine.

The 2015 Humanitarians of the Year include Meera Gandhi, The Giving Back Foundation; Dr. Kazuko Tatsumura Hillyer, GAIA Foundation; Kevin McGovern, The Water Initiative; and author and journalist The Honorable Mitzi Perdue. Past Awards from OIWW and the Foundation were presented to H.S.H. Albert II of Monaco, H.E. Amb. Dr. Palitha Kohona (Sri Lanka), H.E. Hon. Li Baodong (China), H.E. Haya Rashed Al Khalifa (Bahrain), Peter Yarrow, and Hon. Carolyn Maloney.

The James Jay Dudley Luce Foundation was inspired by college professor Stanford Livingston Luce, Jr., who passed away in 2007. The Foundation’s mission is to support Young Global Leadership, often in Haiti, Indonesia or Sri Lanka, frequently focused on education, the arts, and orphan care. The Foundation publishes The Stewardship Report on Connecting Goodness.

Orphans International Worldwide began in 1999 with the support of child psychologist and civil rights activist Frances Dudley Alleman-Luce, who passed away in 2001. It built facilities for children after the Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004 in Indonesia and Sri Lanka, and after hurricanes and the earthquake in Haiti, beginning in 2002. During this period, it was affiliated with the United Nations. Today, it serves to fund preexisting institutions such as the Dalai Lama’s home for Tibetan orphans in India or Ebola orphanages in West Africa (2015). Jim Luce, the son of Stanford Livingston Luce, Jr. and Frances Dudley Alleman-Luce, founded both organizations.

“The needs of the world are vast, but so too are our many resources. One of humanity’s most valuable resources is young global leadership impacting positive social change, which this foundation endeavors to support,” notes Jim Luce. “The Luce and Dudley families have had a long and historical commitment to youth, education, and social improvement in the United States and around the world. I aspire to continue this family tradition through the grants, awards, and publications of The James Jay Dudley Luce Foundation – playing a role, however humble, in bettering humanity. My goal is uplifting the worst of humanity while celebrating the best of humanity – especially the arts.”

Additionally, the Foundation expects to award micro grants for leadership development, education and/or the Arts in 2015 to non-profit organizations in the U.S., including: Battery Dance Company (Jonathan Hollander, Director); The Child School-Legacy High School NYC (Vishu Grover, Director); The Children’s Institute-Center for Independence of N.J. (Benjamin M. Imbrogno, Memorial Fund); College of Wooster (Gran Cornwall, President); Habitat for Humanity (Stan Luce Fund); Humanist Association of Harvard (Greg Epstein, Director); Indo-American Arts Council (Aroon Shivdasani, Director); Marietta College (McDonough Leadership Program); Osborne Association (Elizabeth Gaines, Director); Project Reach NYC (Summer Social Justice Bootcamp); University of California Berkeley (Center for Nonprofit & Public Leadership), among other organizations uplifting of humanity.

For more information, visit www.lucefoundation.org.