​Transforming Communities, One School at a Time
Jackie and Giuseppe Carnevali with staff and students at Maktha School, India.
My late husband, Giuseppe Carnevali, and I established the Carnevali Foundation in 2004 to provide educational opportunities for children in disadvantaged communities.
We first went to India in 2001 to hire engineers and set up offices for our company, Navionics. Giuseppe was a renowned engineer, most notable for his invention of electrical navigation charts for boaters and for his love of the sea. His inventions included auto-routing technology, user generated cartography and the development of vector charts in the first GPS-enabled chart plotters. Giuseppe received many accolades, including a “Lifetime Achievement Award” from the USA National Marine Electronics Association.
Hyderabad, India, proved to be an optimum place to hire engineers and set up Navionics offices. Simultaneously we learned that many local schools were severely underfunded and lacked the basic facilities required to help students thrive. We saw the opportunity to give back to a community that was instrumental in the establishment of a strong engineering division. Thus our philanthropic work began by setting up a partnership with the Hyderabad Education Office to find the best location to build our first school.
My experience as a Massachusetts public school administrator enabled me to support the transformation of under-resourced schools. A partnership with the Hyderabad Education Office was formed and the practice of WASH was adopted. WATER, SANITATION and HYGIENE are the Carnevali Foundation’ guiding principles. All our schools have potable water, separate toilets, libraries and sufficient teachers and classrooms: the key features of a successful school.
Today we serve pre-school, elementary and secondary aged children in equipped classes. We support eligible graduates as they go to college, and adults from the local community can attend classes in reading, writing and math. The success of our work inspired us to also fund schools in Nepal and Ethiopia.
How great that we can continue to transform communities, one school at a time!
Jacqueline Carnevali
Co-Founder, Carnevali Foundation