Letcher Family Fund

Kingston residents Stephen and Bettina (Tina) Letcher have philanthropic interests as close to home as the Kingston Chamber Music Festival and as far away as Chiapas, Mexico, where her church is sponsoring a shelter for indigenous street children. Their volunteer activities follow the same local/global pattern.

Stephen is a mentor and on the board of South Kingstown CARES, a group that helps the school system connect resources for students’ educational success. “It’s important because all these kids (in the program) are needy for one reason or another, usually because of family problems,” he explains.

He also is a founding board member and treasurer of the 20-year-old Kingston Chamber Music Festival. “It takes quite a bit of time, but it’s a valuable community resource,” he notes.

Tina is a volunteer tutor for the Washington County Adult Learning Center (WCALC), where she worked for more than a decade. “It was getting so sad. I felt I did as much social work as English language teaching,” she says, referring to the problems of immigrants in the population the Center serves.

Chair of the Mission Board of Kingston Congregational Church, Tina participated in a Habitat for Humanity in Mexico trip, and traveled to Russia during the cold war as a “peace emissary” through the Rhode Island Conference of the United Church of Christ. Stephen and Tina also journeyed to Belarus with the now-defunct Bridges for Peace, and more recently they visited Chiapas in Mexico through Elderhostel.

Born and raised in Illinois, Stephen taught physics at the University of Rhode Island for 40 years, retiring in 2003. Tina, born and raised in Rochester, NY, worked at the Providence Public Library, edited the Northeast Journal, earned a Ph.D. in English at the University of Rhode Island, and taught creative writing at URI and at the Adult Correctional Institute before joining WCALC. The Letchers have two grown children, Ben and Abby, and three grandchildren.

Through this donor advised fund, they will be able to support both their local interests and US-based nonprofits that address their international concerns.

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