This is the first in a series of how contributions to The Japan Times Readers' Fund last year — the 53rd since the campaign started — are being put to use. The ¥940,595 readers donated in 2007 has gone to six organizations to finance humanitarian projects for needy people across Asia.

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In an impoverished area in the Philippine city of Muntinlupa, south of Manila, young May Lacerna attends Itaas Elementary School. Now in the fourth grade, she is one of seven siblings. Her father is a welder, earning 2,000 pesos (about ¥3,800) a month.

May is one of 48 underprivileged schoolchildren supported by The Japan Times Readers' Fund, which donated money to PAG-ASA Group Japan, a charity that has been raising funds to help educate street children and youths in poor areas since its foundation in 1989.