01 · Women in the lineage
Female Geshe-mas & Nuns
In 2016, the first female Geshe-mas were awarded. We fund housing, healthcare, and exam costs for women pursuing the highest level of training.
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Tibetan Buddhist monastics · Schools across Asia
Where wisdom grows, the world improves.
The Maitri Project funds the people who keep wisdom alive: monastics, female Geshe-mas, and children in rural schools, wherever resources are scarce.
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Our Mission
Support the people who keep wisdom alive.
For over a thousand years, communities sustained monks and nuns so they could devote their lives to study and practice. That tradition is now under strain. The modern world has drawn immeasurable benefit from these contemplative lineages, from meditation to ethics to ways of meeting the mind, yet little has flowed back to the communities that preserve them. The Maitri Project sustains these living sources of wisdom, compassion, and clarity, and invites the wider world to support the very traditions from which it has gained so much.
We stay in direct relationship with practitioners and institutions, so support reaches the places where it is most urgently needed.
From housing and healthcare to food and education, our work responds to needs identified by monastics themselves, across Asia and beyond.
Explore our work →
501(c)(3) · EIN 88-1720325
Your gift goes directly to the cause
Wisdom survives because people choose to sustain it.
85% of every donation reaches monastics and students directly: housing, healthcare, education, and retreat. A registered 501(c)(3); gifts are tax-deductible in the U.S.
Who We Support
Six paths, one aim: the continuity of wisdom.
02 · Housing & study
Sera Mey's Gyalrong House
A new dormitory will hold 65 rooms and support over 100 monks. Ten apartments are already complete, built through collective generosity. More remain.
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03 · Children's education
Anandakuthi School
In rural Nepal, this school pairs academics with well-being, mind science, and meditation. Funding covers tuition, supplies, and technology.
Educate a child →
04 · Healthcare
Medical & Life-Saving Aid
Many monasteries can't afford medicine. We cover healthcare for nuns and monks, including life-saving diabetic medication in the Kathmandu Valley.
Provide care →
05 · Sponsorship
Monastic Education
Monks and nuns rely on sponsorship to survive. We support vetted institutions across Asia teaching ethics, wisdom, and concentration.
Fund a scholar →
06 · Deep practice
Meditation Retreat
Deep retreat is where contemplative life comes to fruition, a thousand-year-old tradition, and a powerful cause of peace.
Sustain practice →
Female Geshes & Nuns
Trailblazing women advancing the teachings.
The Geshema path takes decades of disciplined study, yet funding remains scarce. We cover housing, healthcare, study, and exam costs, removing the barriers that keep these women from finishing their training.
Beyond institutional nunneries, we support practitioners worldwide, especially Western monastics without an established institution behind them, where modest funding can sustain a life of practice.
Nunneries across Asia & India
Sera Monastery · est. 1419
A new home for Gyalrong College.
One of the three great monastic universities of the Gelugpa tradition, Sera is now in Karnataka and home to more than 5,000 monks. An influx of new students has pushed Gyalrong College's housing far beyond capacity.
Ten apartments for the new Gyalrong House are already complete; more remain to be built. A donation directly supports these ancient lineages and the monks who uphold them.
Karnataka, India
$100Kraised so far
$500Kgoal
20%
We've contributed $100,000 toward Gyalrong House, 20% of our $500,000 goal. Help us build the rest.
A living tradition
A thousand years of practice, carried forward today.
Every gift sustains the daily rhythm of study, prayer, and retreat you see here.
Watch & Witness
Stories from the field.
Short films from the monasteries, nunneries, and schools your generosity supports. They loop with the sound off. Tap any film to unmute.
Female Geshes & Nuns
Rise of the Geshe-Ma
The trailblazing women earning Tibetan Buddhism's highest scholarly degree.
Sera Mey · Gyalrong House
A Home for Gyalrong College
Building dignified housing for the monks of one of the great monastic universities.
Anandakuthi School · Nepal
Educating the Next Generation
Where children from underprivileged backgrounds learn academics, ethics, and meditation.
Our Impact & Milestones
What collective generosity has made possible.
Every figure below is work already done, funded by donors, delivered through our direct relationships with the monastics and institutions we serve.
$100K+
Donated in direct support to date
More than 100,000 USD given in support of monastics, practitioners, retreats, education, and life-saving care, reaching need directly, through relationships we maintain ourselves.
Across Asia
& worldwide
& worldwide
10
Residential apartments built
Safe, dignified housing for monks in advanced study at Sera Mey, a long-term investment in the continuity of monastic education.
Sera Mey
Monastery
Monastery
3
Doctoral-level degrees supported
Strengthening the future of Buddhist scholarship, teaching, and contemplative science, years of disciplined study brought to completion.
Across Asia
Geshe-mas
Female monastics funded across Asia
Housing, healthcare, study, and exam costs for nuns and the women pursuing the Geshema degree, removing the practical barriers that stand between them and the highest level of training.
Nunneries
across Asia
across Asia
Western
Western monastic institutions in need
Direct support for practitioners and communities without the protection or financial backing of an established institution, where even modest funding can sustain a life of practice.
Worldwide
~12
Children's full school years funded
Covering tuition, supplies, and basic needs at the Anandakuthi School in rural Nepal.
Nepal
100
Monks fed for a full month
Food resources at the World Peace Temple, letting practitioners stay focused on prayer, study, and service without the strain of food insecurity.
World Peace
Temple
Temple
Life-saving
Diabetic medication provided
For monks and nuns in the Kathmandu Valley who would otherwise have gone without treatment, directly preserving life and the ability to practice.
Kathmandu
Valley
Valley
Hundreds
Children guided in Vipassana retreat
Meditation retreats in rural villages bringing ethics, attention, and compassion directly into communities.
Rural villages
How We Steward Your Gift
Every dollar is directed, not diluted.
We stay in direct relationship with the people and institutions we serve, so support reaches need without passing through layers. Here's where it goes.
85%
of every donation goes directly to the causes: housing, education, healthcare, food, and retreat. The remaining 15% keeps the organization running and funds high-quality media we share freely with partner organizations.
The five program categories total 85%; the remaining 15% covers operations and the open media we share freely with partner organizations.
The Collection
An exhibition of lives sustained.
Each plate documents the monasteries, nunneries, and schools your generosity reaches. Select any to view full size.
Every face here is a life your support helps sustain. Add your gift and become part of the story.
Donate
Your donation supports the growth of wisdom, compassion, and clarity globally.
Choose where your gift goes: study, healthcare, housing, or retreat. Giving takes under a minute, and every gift is secure and tax-deductible in the U.S.
$25
A week of meals for a monastic in study
$75
Life-saving medicine where care is scarce
Most chosen
$150
A month of a child's education at Anandakuthi
$500
A room toward the new Gyalrong House
$
Give →
🔒 Secure · Tax-deductible · 501(c)(3) · EIN 88-1720325