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"Glorifying God by equipping spiritual leaders to become disciple-makers."
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How you can help

Due to the struggling economy in all of Albania our students are able to pay only around 10% of the costs of their education.  A few other generous donors provide a good portion of the remainder, but we still have a budget deficit for the 2007-2008 school year of just about $37,000.  A monthly gift of $125 for 2 years would meet this deficit for 1 student, allowing him or her to be trained and equipped for ministry and effective leadership of the church in Albania.  Contributions can be sent to either Christar (by mailing a check) or East-West (by mailing a check or by online giving).  Thank you for your vital part in this ministry.

Specific Projects
Category Amount Description
Operational Expenses - Budget Deficit $37,500 This is the remaining need for our fiscal year 2007-2008.  By "operational expenses" we are talking about the basics - keeping the lights on!
Operational Expenses - Student Sponsorship $125/mo This is another way of looking at the remaining need for the 2007-2008 school year.   If each of our (prayed-for) 25 students were sponsored by an individual or group contributing $125 per month that would meet our budget deficit.  (25 students X 12 months X $125 = $37,500)
Development Project - Translating & Publishing $6,000 The church in Albania has an extremely small number of Christian books available in the Albanian language.  The CCL has been translating and publishing books since 1999, but the financial cost of translating and particularly printing has greatly limited what we can do.  A single book costs approximately $6000 from asking permission from the original publisher through until it is ready to be put into the hands of the Church in Albania.

The great thing about this project is that every dollar given will be used multiple times!  We sell our books roughly at cost and the proceeds from these sales is divided, some going back into publishing additional books and some going towards the operational expenses of the CCL.  Thus with the same gift you can provide books for the Church in Albania while also equipping a leader for the Church in Albania through training at the CCL.
Development Project - Computers in the Lab $2,500 In addition to the theological and biblical education the CCL also teaches students vocational skills such as working with computers.  We were recently able to update half of the computers in our lab, but the other half are still from the late 1990's and 2000.  Purchasing 5 computers enables students to learn with updated equipment so their skills are up-to-date as they go to look for jobs.

The old computers, as they are retired, are used to equip students who show aptitude in computers.
Development Project - Software Upgrade $1,000 The computers in the lab are all running Microsoft Office 2000.  We would like to upgrade this software to either MS Office 2003 or to MS Office Vista.  Again, this helps our students be up-to-date with their knowledge and skills when they go out into the work force.  As a result they are more likely to be able to find jobs and thus more likely to stay in Albania and benefit the church here.
Development Project - Software Upgrade $1,500  -$5,000 Each year some of our students show greater aptitude and are able to go beyond learning simple office software.  They may be interested in working with web design or graphic arts or desktop publishing or any of a number of other software packages.  When we first started our lab we were given a grant to purchase both software and documentation (books) for students to use to learn and practice these software packages.  However, these packages are now 7 or 8 years out of date and desperately need to be updated.  The dollar amount of $1500-$5000 shows the variable nature of this project -- a lesser amount will allow us to purchase a few licenses for a few programs; a larger amount will allow us to purchase more licenses of more programs.
Development Project - Staff Training $350  -$1,400 Our computer teacher works full-time at the CCL and is actually a CCL graduate.  Her name is Anula.  She has been trained at the CCL in computers and has taken a few courses outside, but it would be a significant benefit both to the quality of her teaching as well as to the perception of the level of training we offer if she could be further trained and certified.  The class for certification in one area of MS Office costs around $250 and the certification test costs around $100.  So $350 would enable her to be certified in one program (for instance, MS Word) while additional funding would enable certification in additional programs (MS Excel, MS Access, MS Outlook, Pagemaker, Photoshop, etc.).
Development Project - Staff Training $2,400 - $12,000 Other Albanian members of our staff could greatly increase their effectiveness if they were to receive training in their respective fields.  For instance, our Assistant Academic Dean would very much like to take classes in biblical counseling.  Our translator (who is moving towards being an effective teacher in his own right) would be helped by classes in theology or specific Bible books.  Since we would want their classes to be moving towards an accredited degree they would probably need to take these courses outside the country, probably at a seminary in the Netherlands.
Development Project - Library $60 - $600 per year Currently our library (which is open to the entire evangelical community, not only to our students) has around 6000 books but no periodicals at all.  It would greatly increase the value of our library if we could subscribe to several different periodicals (Evangelical Missions Quarterly, Christianity Today, Moody Monthly, The Economist, Discipleship, etc.).  Prices for international subscriptions are higher than prices within the United States.
Development Project - Library $15 - $5,000 Another way you can participate in CCL's ministry is by developing its library. Our library is available to the community and enforces our emphasis on continued education.  You can contribute to our library either by contributing financially or by going directly to the link (above) and purchasing books from our wishlist on Amazon.
Development Project - Kitchen $1,200 The kitchen at the CCL is rather small and not always reliable.  This gift would allow a new refrigerator to be pruchased which would greatly facilitate the making of meals for our students as well as helping us to be more economical as we would be able to purchase in bulk.
Operational Budget - Student Books $1,600 School requires books.  Books cost money.  In addition to the books which are specifically for a given class, we attempt to equip each of our graduating students with the beginning of a small, personal library for their ongoing lifelong learning.
Development Project - Staff computers $1,750 + $2,500 + $500 Our Albanian staff are working on outdated computers & monitors.  It would cost $2,500 to upgrade their computers (the retired computers being used to equip graduating students) and $1,750 to upgrade their monitors.  An additional $500 would upgrade their office software to an up-to-date version.
Development Project - Classroom $750 Currently we have no maps in our classroom.  This project would enable us to have a set of pull-down maps with various biblical themes as well as current event maps to use during class.
Development Project - Classroom $750 This project would purchase an A/V computer along with the necessary software & cables to use in the classroom for powerpoint during class, to display songs during chapel, to show movies during student activities, and etc.
Building $1.6 million Currently the CCL is located in a rented facility which is mostly adequate and a wonderful blessing, but it could be so much more.  For instance, our classroom is 30 feet long and 11 feet wide - a bowling alley!  Does it work?  Yes, but how much better to have a classroom where more students could be closer to the teacher.  So having our own building would be a great advantage in that we would be able to design how it would be best laid out.

But having our own building would also be a tremendous blessing because it would allow the CCL to be less dependent on donations from the West as we move into the next generation.  Our desire is that the CCL be more and more self-sufficient and Albanian in its character.  If the majority of the facility costs could be met through a one-time capital campaign resulting in an owned facility (as opposed to the current rented facility) that would move us a long way towards the goal of ultimately being Albanian run without outside dependency.