You can help us by making a contribution to our bank account:
Stella Onlus, Intesa San Paolo, IBAN IT98W0306909606100000062629
When you look up at the sky, at night, since I will be living on one of them, for you it will be as if all the stars were laughing. You, and only you, will have stars that know how to laugh!”The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Stella Onlus
Stella Onlus is a non-profit agency that deals with projects in the educational, healthcare and social fields (deals with projects about education, health and sociality), in particular for the protection of children’s and women’s rights, mainly in Togo and, from 2024, in Sri Lanka.
What we do
- We promote solidarity initiatives and remote support for local educational and welfare projects.
- We finance and collaborate in the realization of local projects concerning infrastructure (construction of schools, hospitals, orphanages, etc.).
- We send there specialized people (especially doctors) to assist local professionals and/or transfer new skills to them.
It is essential for us:
- to have local contacts, lay or religious, who follow the development and and heads the project
- to choose projects in the best interest of children, woman and of the most disadvantaged families
- -in addition to providing basic aid, to promote self-sufficiency and empowerment of the local population, actively involving them in the projects
- whenever possible, to buy materials or to use services locally, in order to support the country’s economy
- transparency: the funds that we raise are managed with transparency and responsibility towards our donors, who may access our accounting data and our balance sheets at any time
Our history
A doctor who goes to Togo (in west-central Africa), a school built in less than 6 months, a cultural exchange project between the elementary schools of Arona (No) and a school in Africa, an internet setup, the arrival of medical equipment and the solidarity and the desire of many people to make a meaningful contribution. And this is how, 3 years after the first trip to Togo, on July 21, 2011 Stella Onlus got started.
Our local contacts are the nuns of the order of Nôtre Dame de la Trinité and thanks to their work we are sure that the funds and the equipment we send to Africa will end up where they are supposed to. Going to Togo periodically, we are able to keep track of the projects and focus on the priorities.
In 2024 we decided to support the Community of Weligama region, in the south of Sri Lanka, gathered around the mission of Father Charles Hewawasam, who managed to reunite different ethnicities and religions for a common aim: help the most disadvantaged families to deal with the economical crisis that has afflicted the country for 20 years.
The project was born in collaboration with the Realmonte Association, which, in 2005, in collaboration with the Catholic University of Milan supported Father Charles in the foundation of “The School for life”, where meals, stationery and clothes are provided to the most disadvantaged families.
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The founders
Stella Onlus
From Antonio’s meeting with Sister Stella and from the experience in Togo was born the desire to create a project in favor of the organizations supported by the nuns of the Order of Notre Dame de la Trinité.
The solidarity of friends and acquaintances has shown the need to give continuity to aid in Togo and to guarantee transparency to supporters in Italy. In 2011 Lucia and Valentina worked to found Stella Onlus.
Antonio Benedini
I was born in Milan on March 2, 1947 and I live in Arona, in the province of Novara.
I am an orthopedic surgeon.
I have two children, Lucia and Michele, and four wonderful grandchildren.
On April 9, 2009, my wife Marcella, with whom I shared my life for 36 years, was no longer at my side, because of an incurable disease.
I contacted Sister Stella, a Togolese Doctor who got her medical degree in Milan and in August 2009 my experience began at the Hopital Saint Joseph in Datcha, a small hospital run by a religious order, on the outskirts of Atakpamé, My work was mainly of surgical treatment of deformed limbs in children and adolescents, with the help of Sister Stella and a young local doctor, Pier.
My interest was not limited to surgery. Sister Stella took me to a village of huts in the middle of the forest where many classes of school children were taught under thatched roofs.
Through the help of Lions Club Arona-Stresa, which I am a member of, a school with 3 spacious classrooms was built.
Lucia Benedini
I was born in Arona and I live in Milan. I am married and I have 2 children, Tommaso and Camilla. I have a degree in modern literature, and I work in Milan in a public relations agency.
In May 2010 I accompanied my father to Togo for the inauguration of the new school in Ketognakopé. I was prepared, or at least I thought I was prepared, for what I was about to see. Instead it was very difficult to believe.
You ask yourself how can people possibly live in huts or crumbling shacks, who walk hours to get water at a well, who don’t have anything at all, children with swollen bellies, deformed people abandoned along a dusty road, children with no future.
And then you come back home, to our daily life and you re-adjust to “our world”. But something stays with you, in your deepest soul and you can’t pretend it doesn’t.
Valentina Scanziani
After graduating in political economy and a brief stint at the United Nations, she began her career in consulting in 1997, later working for over 20 years in the family business. For more than 10 years, she has been leading various social initiatives, which have increasingly become central to her professional and personal journey. This dedication led her to leave the family business in 2021 to fully commit to socio-climatic justice, both in study and practice.
After co-founding Stella Onlus in 2011, she deepened her interest in systemic issues, becoming a co-founder of Ashoka Italy in 2014 and Uno Ecosistemi in 2020, organizations working to promote social change. Believing in the crucial role of culture and media in shaping imaginaries and visions, she founded and now directs Voice Over Foundation in 2020, an organization that produces and disseminates content to raise awareness and support social and climatic justice.
Stella Onlus is an association established on 8 July 2011 and has been registered at the Anagrafe Unica delle Onlus, held at the Regional Directorate of Lombardy of the Revenue Agency since 21 July 2011.
We would like to thank Esseblu for creating the logo and the imaging.
