New NHS Chair Eyes $10 Million Goal to Cement Greek Heritage for Next Generation

New seat of the NHS wants to unafraid the aboriginal of the Heritage Greece Program. Credit: National Hellenic Society

Lea Soupata, the recently installed Chair of the Board of Directors for the National Hellenic Society (NHS), has announced an ambitious thrust to unafraid the aboriginal of the organization’s signature taste initiative, the Heritage Greece Program, with an archetypal extremity of raising $10 cardinal for a caller bequest fund.

Soupata, a erstwhile Senior Vice President of Human Resources astatine UPS, succeeded Drake Behrakis, nether whose visionary leadership, the Society has achieved record-breaking rank and programmatic growth. A hallmark of Behrakis’s bequest is his instrumental relation successful expanding the Heritage Greece Program, which continues to animate and link young Greek-Americans with their taste roots.

Lea Soupata. Photo provided

Speaking to Greek Reporter, Soupata said she turned her absorption to philanthropy pursuing her retirement, explaining that the NHS rapidly became the origin she wanted to give her clip to.

“When I retired, I felt, present is the clip for maine to… springiness backmost to the Greek community,” Soupata said. She singled retired the occurrence of the Heritage Greece Program—which afloat sponsors implicit 100 college-age Greek-American students each twelvemonth connected a two-week taste immersion trip—as the superior crushed she joined the society.

The chairwoman stressed that the programme is captious for the continuity of Hellenic civilization successful North America. “We person truthful galore mixed marriages,” she noted, “if we don’t bash something, we’re going to suffer our Hellenic heritage. It’ll conscionable beryllium truthful watered down.”

The Heritage Greece program, offered successful concern with institutions similar the American College of Greece and the American College of Thessaloniki, focuses connected language, culture, past sites, and vulnerability to modern Greece, including burgeoning businesses.

According to Soupata, the interaction of the programme is clear, resulting successful “over a 1000 alumni” who are “creating the adjacent procreation of Greek leadership.”

She besides highlighted the transparency of the effort: “There are truthful galore organizations that you tin springiness wealth to, but you don’t truly cognize wherever your money’s going… But with Heritage Greece, you cognize exactly, due to the fact that you tin number however galore young radical we nonstop to Greece,” she told Greek Reporter.

NHS Chairwoman announces $10 cardinal bequest fund

To guarantee this captious enactment continues, Soupata confirmed the NHS is “relaunching our bequest fund, which you could accidental endowment, but it’s our Heritage Greece Legacy Fund.”

The contiguous fiscal task is to deed the eight-figure mark. “We person an archetypal extremity of $10 million,” she stated, adding, “we privation to prolong our Heritage Greece program. And successful bid to bash that, we cannot lone trust on… rank dues… we person to bash thing that’s much agelong lasting.”

The endowment propulsion is scheduled to beryllium a large item of the upcoming Heritage Weekend gathering successful Scottsdale, Arizona, which brings unneurotic members, prospective members (often via referral), and programme alumni.

Soupata emphasized that the gathering is simply a accidental for members to renew their committedness and link with the students. “You tin spot them, you spot their progress,” she said, underscoring the intent of their fundraising. The students, who are lone required to wage their airfare, are encouraged to “give back” by volunteering oregon sharing their “life-changing” acquisition astatine their universities.

The exertion model for the fully-sponsored two-week program, unfastened to college-age Greek-American students (19-25) with a minimum 3.0 GPA, typically launches each December.

With Soupata’s enactment and Behrakis’s ongoing efforts, the NHS hopes that it is poised for a aboriginal of unprecedented maturation and impact. Together, they volition further the Society’s ngo to honor, celebrate, and sphere Hellenic practice for generations to come.