Returned from the Philippines.

I have just arrived home from the Philippines scouting trip, it was a great success. There are so many great photo opportunities there, I'm really excited get down to the "nitty gritty" and pull it all together. Over the next few weeks I will be putting the final touches on an itinerary together and contacting the folks I met with while there, to hammer out the logistics and pricing for a 2011 tour!

It's sometimes funny how little coincidences seem to pop up. Like last night while going through some mail that had accumulated during my absence. Here I was, just returning from the Philippines, and on my desk I see Education Development Center's 2009 Annual Report. On the cover was an image I shot for them in Mindanao and on other pages, shots I took in Afghanistan and Guinea.

 Education Development Center (EDC), one of my NGO clients, is a global nonprofit organization that designs, delivers and evaluates innovative programs to address some of the world’s most urgent challenges in education, health, and economic opportunity. Working with public-sector and private partners, EDC harnesses the power of people and systems to improve education, health promotion and care, workforce preparation, communications technologies, and civic engagement. They have 350 projects in 35 countries around the world with programs and services which include research, training, educational materials and strategy, with activities ranging from seed projects to large-scale national and international initiatives.

So often in the news we only read about tragedy and conflict, so please, have a look at EDC's Annual Report and perhaps explore their website for a few moments. It's refreshing to see the wonderful and amazing things being done around the world by a committed group of individuals like those at EDC.