Father and daughter Alexander and Anna Rekeda have worked tirelessly together to support Ukraine after the 2022 invasion and subsequent ongoing war. Anna’s work has now seen the full-time student awarded the Medal for Volunteering from the Mayor of Sumy for her ongoing and increasingly varied volunteering efforts.
The father-daughter duo is closely involved with Unity for Freedom, unityforfreedom.org, a nonprofit founded by entrepreneur and philanthropist Alexander Rekeda and his colleague Alex Gouzenko in 2022. The nonprofit dedicates itself to helping victims of the war in Ukraine who are experiencing hardship and destruction stemming from continuing Russian aggression in the nation.
With the support of an ever-growing number of volunteers, the vital nonprofit assists Ukrainians in need of shelter, food, education, and other essentials. Anna has been a instrumental part of the non-profit, doing fundraising and working on shipment of various aid to Ukraine
Mayor of Sumy Medal
After a year of dedicating pretty much all of her free time to Unity for Freedom, Anna Rekeda started her own charitable venture. She decided to offer free English tutoring to the high school students in Ukraine. She began with two students from Kyiv and one from nearby Obukhov. After several months, Anna started tutoring students from Sumy, which is much closer to the front line. Anna Rekeda’s prestigious medal and supporting recognition came after she has been providing free English tutoring to Ukrainian high school students for more than a year and managed to organize a club that expended that services to multiple high shcoolers.
The city of Sumy lies roughly 25 miles from the Russian border and has endured continued shelling for much of the war. After hearing of her efforts in the city, a local English teacher from Sumy provided Anna with a list of other high school students interested in learning the language.
She began personally tutoring several more of these students twice weekly before inspiring a number of her New Jersey friends to follow suit. Anna received the prestigious medal for her efforts in the Ukrainian border city and elsewhere nationwide.
The medal recognizes her volunteer work and unrelenting dedication to improving Ukrainian people’s lives. That includes personal tutoring and her broader volunteer and humanitarian efforts alongside Unity for Freedom..
Tutors Without Borders
Anna Rekeda and her friends group now regularly tutor around 20 Ukrainian children. The group, led by Anna, calls itself Tutors Without Borders, a club that continues to grow.
Hard-working New Jersey-based high school student Anna and her peer group founded Tutors Without Borders buoyed by their collective success in tutoring growing numbers of young Ukrainians eager to learn English.
Tutors Without Borders hopes to continue empowering eager Ukrainian youngsters with invaluable skill sets, including proficiency in the English language, that will open future doors to vast educational and professional opportunities worldwide. For these Ukrainian students, the lessons go beyond learning English; they offer a connection to a world beyond the conflict, a reminder that someone cares about them.