Alessia Alessandra
de Borbón
Alessia Alessandra’s passion for philanthropy started within her family and grew throughout her schooling. Her family's generosity towards supporting the arts shaped Alessia Alessandra’s mindset to understand the importance of giving back. At six years old, Alessia Alessandra was injured in a severe car accident. However, once taken to the hospital, she had to remain in the hallway for hours because there were no children’s rooms available. Immediately after the incident, Alessia Alessandra worked with her parents’ support to donate a children’s area for the hospital’s trauma center. Years later, after having skipped two grades, she found herself attending the Montessori Model United Nations (MMUN) program. Inspired by the MMUN and learning about the great impact young students can make, Alessia Alessandra was encouraged to start two NGOs of her own.
Take the CAN out of CANdy was a non-profit organization that collected cans throughout October for local food banks in the Hudson Valley. The second NGO, Help Mothers on Mothers’ Day, collected monetary donations during May to support Free the Children, a human rights organization created by Craig and Marc Kielburger. In middle school, Alessia Alessandra traveled to villages in the Dominican Republic, not only to distribute food there but also to live and cook with the locals. Those experiences gave her the motivation to push herself in her philanthropic work. They also taught her the importance of connecting with the people she and her foundation support.
Through the MMUN, Alessia Alessandra met Her Excellency Dr. Joyce Banda, former president of Malawi and one of Forbes’ Most Powerful Women in Politics. She became both a mentor and dear friend to Alessia Alessandra. Following Her Excellency’s advice, the de Borbón Foundation was born. Our foundation has worked to help support other charity organizations such as the Joyce Banda Foundation (JBFI), AIME Mentoring, and The Jack Brewer Foundation.
The first of these three partnerships is with Her Excellency’s foundation to focus on helping reduce the maternal death rate in Malawi. Pregnant women who walk long distances to their nearest hospitals outside of their home villages are often rejected by the hospitals because they do not have the financial means to give birth there. Instead, they walk back home and give traditional births, which are extremely dangerous to both the newborn and the mother. With the help of the JBFI, the de Borbón Foundation has adopted clinics so that women can give birth safely and in sanitary conditions, free of charge. Additionally, in collaboration with the JBFI, we donated school uniforms to students at the Nkhande Primary School in Malawi, working school by school to ensure that every student attending has a uniform so that they can attend classes. AIME Mentoring, our second partnership, was founded by Jack Manning Bancroft and is an education program founded in Australia that gives Indigenous students with great potential the skills they need to go forth with their ventures and succeed. Our third partnership is with former NFL player Jack Brewer and The Jack Brewer Foundation, whose core principle is “Empowering From Within.” The Jack Brewer Foundation is taking action towards helping communities in Haiti with access to food, medicine, and education. Alessia Alessandra also met Jack Brewer through the MMUN Conferences in New York City, and we have been honored to collaborate with his organization.
Alessia Alessandra’s ultimate mission is to ‘normalize’ a philanthropic mindset — for young people to feel that it is their responsibility to give back to their community, rather than exoticizing public service as a rare interest. At the moment, she is a writer and communications strategist with an inclination toward working with clients backed by a goal to create social impact.