30 interesting facts about Sara Minkara

Today is our Founder and CEO Sara Minkara’s 30th birthday. We wanted to share 30 interesting facts about her. Join us in wishing her a happy birthday!

In this photo: Sara smiles directly at the camera. She is wearing a black dress suit and tan hijab.

In this photo: Sara and a friend walk on a rocky path. Sara holds a white cane and is smiling.

1. I love to eat chicken

2. I love the breeze when I put my head outside the window when I'm in the car, especially in the mountains in Lebanon!

3. My favorite color is green, and I used to eat anything green as a kid

In this photo: Sara smiles at the camera, wearing a silver helmet and straps holding her to a paraglider! The background is a beautiful valley.

4. I love being in nature

5. I have gone paragliding in Lebanon

6. I slid down a volcano in Nicaragua

7. I swam with and touched sharks in Belize

8. I went tandem bicycling through a jungle in Bali

9. I love numbers and math, and do math problems in my head to relax

In this photo: Sara and two friends stand in front of a sign that reads “ETI”. All three are smiling brightly, and Sara holds a bright bouquet of flowers.

10. I love horses

11. I love swinging

12. I love being near the water

13. I love mountains

14. I love my work, and am a workaholic

15. I love reading, some of my favorite books are: All the Light We Cannot See, Man's Search For Meaning

16. I'm very close to my family

17. I love meeting new people

In this photo: Sara looks out over a rocky valley. She wears a colorful blue jacket with pink and blue flowers.

18. I love hugs!

19. I love coffee

20. I'm an introvert

21. I grew up on the South Shore of MA

22. I have been to 33 countries

23. I love amusement parks

24. I have a passion for learning geography

25. I have no spleen

26. I listen to my phone voiceover at the highest speed

27. I had many nicknames growing up: Susu, Sarsura, Sasa, Sasu, Fasfous

28. I meet a lot of people when I accidentally hit them with my cane

29. I believe that everyone has something beautiful to offer and contribute in the world

30. I never planned to start a nonprofit, but it has given me so much purpose in my life. I have made so many connections that have taught me infinite lessons. I have had new experiences and opportunities to explore the world; all of which exposed me to new communities and cultures.

Make Sara’s birthday wish come true and donate to ETI today!

In this photo: Sara and a group of volunteers stand facing the camera, smiling and holding balloons that spell “ETI”

Authentic Inclusion

At ETI, we believe that everyone has the right to actively participate in their community. We strive to ensure that every child feels like they belong and can bring their full selves forward, without fear of judgment. If a child feels that they have to change their behavior to fit in, we have not done our job to the best of our ability.

In this photo: Shown from the back, two girls hold hands during a team activity in ETI's summer Life Skills Intensive Program

We believe in authentic inclusion; going a step above the human rights approach, establishing confidence in participants while breaking down barriers to inclusion.

What is the Human Rights-Based approach?

According to the United Nations Population Fund, the human rights-based approach focuses on the relationship between individuals and decision-makers.

How we disrupt the narrative

At ETI, we go a step above the human rights-based approach. We believe that everyone has basic human rights as an established right. With this understanding, we are able to focus on breaking down barriers to inclusion through our five empowerment and integration training programs.

Volunteer Spotlight: Remi Hamzeh

Remi Hamzeh, who volunteers as a life skills trainer, social literacy trainer, and paramedic, is our Volunteer Spotlight!

Outside of ETI, she is a clinical pathologist/psychologist.

In this photo: Remi Hamzeh

How did you learn about ETI? 
Our doctor at uni, Dr. Chartouni, told us about it as a chance to have an internship. Then, the country director Anna Barbosa told us more about it.

Why did you decide to volunteer? 
It was a chance for me to discover something new. I'm already volunteering with special abilities since childhood but I haven't worked with blind kids before separately.

What has surprised you most about working with ETI? 
How real it is and how close you'd become while working with these kids, especially in the home visits. As well as the observation and the new things you'd see and analyze then.

In this photo: a quote from the text featuring Remi Hamzeh

What have you learned by volunteering with ETI? 
That the correct terminology is Persons with Disabilities and every need they have they improve an ability that makes them unique their own way. And that anyone can make something, we (humans) just need to support each other.

What is your biggest takeaway? 
That if we were the ones we needed when we were kids...everything will change around the globe.

What is the most memorable accomplishment of your volunteer experience? 
Making one of our participants fight for her dreams and keep going with her (hard conditions in university) although everyone else was telling her to quit.

What might someone be surprised to know about you? 
That I'm visually impaired too, and I wanted to know more about this world (blindness) for that I still have some light in my path and I want to make it wider - (especially that my visual impairment isn't diagnosed yet accurately).

What do you do when you aren't volunteering for ETI?

Volunteer with other organizations, work, and study (finishing my thesis).

Volunteer Spotlight: Tim Mauro

In this photo: Tim Mauro explains a science experiment to observers at Life Skills Camp, 2018

Occupation: 

I developed an automated system that trades stocks, and the "automated" part frees me up for my great love of travel and volunteering with groups like ETI.

What has surprised you most about working with ETI? 

I found myself having preconceived notions about what being visually impaired was all about, and needed to readjust when I got to know some of these folks.  My picture of blindness didn't match with reality, and I am improved as a person having learned the real deal.  This is the whole point of ETI: overturning misconceptions and "opening eyes".

What have you learned by volunteering with ETI? 

I have come to fully appreciate the capabilities and extraordinary gifts possessed by the folks that ETI serves.  I've been honored to travel to Lebanon as a volunteer and immerse in a new culture and way of life.  My biggest takeaway is never-never-never assume about someone you don't know because of a label - in this case the label called "blind".  Get to know them first and they will invariably teach you something big and new.

What is the most memorable accomplishment of your volunteer experience? 

Twice serving at the annual Life Skills Camp in Beirut.  I mostly worked in the science room helping construct neato experiments, and saw the kids have that "AHA" moment where they built something with their own hands, learned the science behind it, and observed the result - a bubbling volcano, or a compass that points North every time, or a record player that actually plays the sounds.  I envision them going home aware of a bigger world than they knew coming in.

What do you do when you aren't volunteering for ETI?

I volunteer with some other groups and travel to places like Cambodia and Kenya doing similar work. For hobbies - amateur astronomer, pretend race car driver, baseball nut, exploring new places, and learning, always learning.

Camp Rafiqi: Cultivating Confidence

In this photo: a group of volunteers gather plastic items to be recycled using trash bags in a wooded area.

Okay, so ETI’s participants with visual impairment learn new skills, gain confidence, and feel hope for the first time during the month they participate in the Life Skill Program and Camp Rafiqi. Where do they go next? ETI has designed a community service-based program model that allows for its participants to demonstrate their value to society.

The Social Project Program exists to do just that. A three-to-six-month program that builds on the philosophy created in the Life Skills Program and at Camp Rafiqi, both blind and sighted youth carry out community service projects through collaborations with local organizations. This is monumental because, for many children with visual impairment, their participation serves as their first time going out in society without being helped by family members or guardians. This experience also serves as their first time on the giving instead of the receiving end. Witnessing these children performing acts of community service allows fellow citizens to realize that they are like anyone else, and are not a charity to be pitied and patronized. This helps to break the stigma of disability for both groups.

Cerine, a past participant in our Social Project Program, informed us that she never thought she’d be able to help other people herself. Other people would often help her, even though she was fully capable of living independently. Completing a simple recycling project with kids her own age made her realize that she had the power to do anything she wanted.

Past Social Project Program facilitators have reported that the involvement has changed not only the youth with visual impairment, but also the sighted participants. They have noted that the sighted participants began to accept the visually impaired kids as part of the group, learning to regularly ask for their opinions and to engage in conversation with them about their personal lives. This may seem like a regular occurrence among peers, but it is revolutionary and critical for those with and without disability in a setting where the two groups have traditionally been segregated.

So, Have the Seeds of Confidence Been Planted?

“Yes, definitely, there have been interactions,” says Rania, Camp Rafiqi’s Art Director, on social and intellectual engagement during her art classes. “We started with basic things like fonts, font types and points and now we are working on more accurate projects such as drawing on aluminum and three-dimensional shapes like the cube.”

In this video: ETI's Founder and CEO Sara Minkara guides Fatima, a student with visual impairment, to her STEM class at Camp Rafiqi 2017.

Intellectual stimulation is one of the expected outcomes of Camp Rafiqi’s curriculum because learning and critical thinking allows individuals to expand their minds.

Besides learning, though, social engagement and personal accomplishment are also expected outcomes. Being in an environment in which opinions are wanted and creativity is encouraged can, quickly and simply, turn wallflowers into contributors. This is a major piece to the puzzle of inclusion in society—those who have been marginalized must, of course, learn new things every day and grow intellectually, but they must also become empowered to speak their minds and be themselves.  

“Today the children were excited and every day they share their increasing enthusiasm, express their opinions and suggest new things,” says Rania. “At first, they were scared and hesitant to do something new but now they have become more acclimated, and more enthusiastic to speak for themselves about their feelings and they have begun to express their feelings by drawing.”

In this photo: Rania, ETI art class trainer (left) poses with a camp participant, who is showing off his sculpture; she wraps her arms around his waist.

Art Group Leader Jana concurs. “Yes, they have definitely opened up, but on the first day, they were shy and uncomfortable with the blindfolds, especially in the science class because they work with their hands,” she says. “They have talked about this in the cogenerative dialogues that take place throughout the camp.”

As noted in previous blog posts, Identity classes have been an important component to Camp Rafiqi’s overall goals. The identity classes seek to cultivate independent thoughts of how we see ourselves within a community through a dialogue between peers, the creative process, literacy, and reflection. This curriculum is essential in empowering those who have been marginalized in that it teaches them to speak for themselves and to address their feelings.

“The children have enjoyed the class, we have witnessed many improvements with them, they know themselves better after venting out their inner feelings, and they say things they do not tell their parents about,” says Tala Badr, an identity trainer for Camp Rafiqi. “Yesterday we had someone who cried while talking. Identity class is very personal, the children tell private things about themselves to me. This is not easy, of course, because they don’t know me well, but venting to someone they don’t know makes them feel more comfortable.”

In the picture: a music teacher sits to the left of a participant with visual impairment at a piano and guides his hands on the keys.

Participants have also become more comfortable, and have realized their potential, during their STEM, soccer, music, and theater classes. To continue this momentum, we want the children to immerse themselves in work that further demonstrates that they are not a burden to society—and that they can contribute to the improvement of their communities.

Looking Ahead

“I felt that the tree planting project was effective, especially on youth with visual impairment,” says Yara Kobrossy, who formerly facilitated these projects. “They were very involved and excited. They wanted to do everything on their own—carrying the trees around, not afraid of falling down. They were the ones who taught the sighted participants. They planted around 60 trees, and filled a road that was empty. One of the visually impaired people was responsible for keeping tabs on the bus.”

Being on the receiving end of society is disempowering. As human beings, we are driven to seek out self-fulfillment, independence, and dignity. Being a fully-integrated member of society means contributing to society as well. According to twentieth century psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of basic human needs, the need to feel as if one belongs at the top of the list of what every person across the globe needs. This means that humans don’t just need the basics such as food and shelter—they also need self-fulfillment in order to be fully functioning members of society. This includes being on the giving end. Being on the giving end allows individuals to gain confidence, because they have been given power and autonomy—often for the first time in their lives.

Just ask Cerine. “I love to do my own chores without my mother’s help,” she reported to us after her involvement with the Social Project Program. This may seem like a small task, but for someone like Cerine, it’s life-changing—and it’s why ETI was created.