Mission Appeal
We are excited to share this video with you. It was sent to the Archdiocese of Miami for their use in Mission Appeals. There are no in-person appeals so this video will inspire support for the Claretian Missionary Fathers of Central America, TEACH's partner in the Tamagas area.
Letter of Appreciation from INSPA Scholarship Student, Tamagas Creek
The following is from Silvia, a young woman in medical school in Guatemala, who has written this eloquent letter thanking one of our TEACH supporters, John, for his assistance. It is translated from Spanish. John and all of you are good reasons why we empower students working for a better world.
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“Rejoice always.” Give thanks in everything, for this is God’s will.
Esteemed Sponsor,
Receive my cordial greetings and warm regards from afar. I hope you are in good health. In the name of the Creator of Heaven and Earth, I wish you great success in everything you do.
The purpose of this letter is to introduce myself. I am Silvia, a 19-year-old and a second-year student in the seven-year-long medical studies course at the Eastern University Center – CUNORI-USAC.
Why do I want to be a physician? I made the decision to study Medicine simply because it is something innate in me because it fulfills a dream I’ve had since childhood, because it is part of me, and because I wish to protect people’s quality of life by devoting myself to patients, to prevention, to counseling, to research, and to the proper treatment of disease. I also want to help people who have not had an opportunity to get an education. I want to help others with what I know. I want to persuade young people like me to get ahead and become someone in life; but I know that the career I’ve chosen is not easy, and I trust that with God’s and your help, it will be possible for me to achieve my dream.
I want to tell you how 2021—my first year in college—went. All my classes were virtual. I started on the first day of February. My first week was rather difficult because the village where I live lost power for a week and there was no WIFI signal, but I succeeded in getting on the internet, although it wasn’t easy to connect. Every day, I went to a spot where there was a weak signal, and if the signal faltered, I climbed a tree to stay connected to my classes. When the classes ended, at about 3 p.m., I went to charge my devices at the home of a man who had a generator. In my first week, I met new people and made new friends. Some nights I went to bed at 2 or 3 a.m. after I finished my homework and read the materials for my next classes. There were times when I became anxious and stressed because, while studying for an exam, I would lose power or lose the signal; but God never abandoned me, and thanks to Him, everything was possible.
On February 1st, 2022 I will start my second year of medical school. I have already registered. Now I must buy my books. This year I will start studying English at the Calusac Language Learning Center. To be a physician we must reach English level 12. On February 4 I’ll take an English language placement test to see where I belong. All my classes will be virtual but, according to what we’ve been told, exams will be in person.
I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your decision to support me in my medical studies. My family does not have enough financial resources to pay for my tuition, school supplies, and books—medical school requires lots of them—tutoring, and internet expenses.
I pray to God and implore Him to protect you and bless you for being willing to support me. I promise that I won’t disappoint you and that I will never rest until I achieve my goal of becoming a physician. I promise to give it my best. I will improve my grades, turn in my homework, and never rest until I finish.
I also ask you most fervently to not stop helping me. Together, we can make this happen.
Thank you. I look forward to your reply. May this year bring good health to you and to your family and friends. You are held in very high regard. God bless you and protect you.
Sincerely,
Silvia
This photo of me was taken when I went to donate medicines in 2021. Thank you for trusting me!
Sacred Heart of Jesus Educational Center
TEACH started to support this boarding facility in 2014. In 2019, TEACH budgeted total funding for the site of $4,000, allocated to the support of girls in residence while attending secondary school. This splendid residence was built with funds provided by an Italian NGO. It can accommodate up to 60 girls from villages too small to support secondary education. By living here, they can attend the appropriate secondary schools in Quirigua and Los Amates. The residence is operated by Religious Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary who provide mentoring, emotional, and spiritual support. In addition to attending school, the girls do all the cooking, cleaning and laundry, and develop skills in crocheting and embroidering table runners and purses.
The typical young woman in this Center comes from a low-income family of a remote village inaccessible by car. Reaching her home involves an approximately 2 or 3-hour car ride followed by a long walk. Básico (middle school) educational facilities where her parents could enroll her after she finishes sixth grade are often not available. In some villages where such facilities are available the young woman must walk long distances to reach them, which may put her at risk. Being a girl, her parents do not allow her to walk to school alone, thus impeding her academic development.
For these reasons, in 2010 the Sisters decided to build the Sacred Heart of Jesus Educational Center to provide housing for young low-income women from remote villages and offer them an opportunity to obtain human, academic, and spiritual training in an adequate and dignified environment where they can pursue their full development without their families having to worry. Located across Lake Izabal from El Estor, the site of the first TEACH supported school in 2003, the Sacred Heart Educational Center (CFSC) provides a safe and caring home away from home for girls from remote villages. Providing transportation and personal needs can be a struggle for the parents, but during the months the girls are at CFSC school fees and boarding costs are covered.
A typical day for a Sacred Heart girl begins with computer studies during the morning. Then, after lunch, she is off to her afternoon middle school classes, returning to the center for homework or to research assignments given by her teachers. The girls work together cooking and cleaning, and join in sports, singing and other activities. Weekends bring recreational activities and participation in the Holy Mass. She also participates in vocational programs for young people held by the parish or the vicariate. The end of the school year is usually marked by a pilgrimage to the shrine of the Holy Black Christ of Esquipulas. All this contributes to her human and academic development and prepares her to live as a member of society.
Upon finishing her Básico studies, the young woman leaves the Center and, with luck, continues her education, provided she has a scholarship or finds work to help her pay for her schooling. Because of their financial straits, the majority of the young women go back home to their villages.
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This describes the program through 2019, but of course the onset of the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic changed everything in 2020. In March the girls returned home to their families, and then in September some returned to the Center to finish their academic year studies. They were provided with free internet, links to their teachers via WhatsApp, loans of cell phones, and other support. They stayed safe and successfully passed their exams. The girls who remained home in their villages have also been in touch with their teachers and strive to complete the school year.
January 2021 - School has opened again. Status at Sacred Heart is forthcoming.
Report from Instituto Básico Comunitario San Antonio María Claret
Dear Members of the TEACH Board of Directors:
Please accept my cordial greetings and wishes of success. I hope Our Lord and Creator of the Universe showers His blessings upon your daily endeavors.
The purpose of this report is to inform you about the operation of the education center operating in the Village of Semuy to provide secondary education to our community or sector.
The coronavirus pandemic that is affecting the entire world is present in our municipality of El Estor. Thanks to Our Lord Jesus Christ, it has not reached Semuy, but because of the carelessness of some irresponsible people who are not practicing social distancing in our country, I believe it will involve the communities, given that some people are not observing the sanitary safety measures when they visit the towns.
In reply to the questions I received from you:
1. Did the girls living in the dormitory have to return to their villages because of the Covid-19 pandemic? How many girls are now living in the dormitory?
They are not living in the dormitory because we are observing the orders issued by the President that are currently in force in our country so as to avoid sanctions imposed by the authorities. The girls had to go home with their families to protect themselves.
The teacher, however, is still living in the dormitory because she is required to prepare her plans and study guides of which one copy is distributed to the students and another to the office of the schools’ supervisor by order of the Ministry of Education.
The teacher works on the Natural Sciences, Physical Education, and Dance courses that seven girls are still taking.
2. Have there been any coronavirus cases among the students or their family members or among staff members?
Blessed be God! None of us in the teaching staff or student body has tested positive for coronavirus; I understand that neither have the students’ family members.
3. How are the students being taught? In person, or from afar with computers, cellphones, or other means
Students are receiving study guides, a strategy known as “I Learn at Home” that has been implemented by the Ministry of Education. The teaching materials are available on the MINEDUC platform that is distributed to students.
We prepare our own teaching guide based on our curriculum. Each teacher gives me the teaching guides for the courses he/she teaches and I photocopy them and return them to them ready to be distributed to students. Students appear in person, by grade, wearing masks, to receive their guides. Students who have questions come to see their teachers. We do it that way because we do not have telephone signal coverage.
According to the Ministry of Education schools will not open again during this school year. The year will go on using the strategy “I learn at home” until it ends.
Here are some photos of students handing in the portfolios containing the schoolwork they have done at home using the teaching guides.
We will continue to pray that sponsors may continue their support because our youngsters need the opportunity to receive a secondary education in their own communities while living at home with their families.
Thank you very much, warm regards, God bless you,
Sincerely,Ernesto Coc Xol
Olga's Quarterly Report April-June 2020
Livingston School Project
Work Performed
The TEACH organization has promoted education in various Livingston communities and has been a staunch partner of the Maya Qeqchi Cultural Center Association in ensuring the success of its pursuits. The beneficiary schools have been the Lagunita Salvador Coeducational Rural Official School and the Creek Cuatro Cayos Official School.
Transportation project for the children of Baarra Sanabria.
Nutrition Project for the Creek Cuatro Cayos school.
Scholarships for the first three young graduates of the Lagunita and Ensenada Puntarenas Village schools.
Purpose:
Strengthen and promote primary and secondary education for children wishing to improve themselves academically.
School Year 2020
April, May, and June of this school year have been difficult months because of the covid-19 pandemic that has affected the entire world.
In Guatemala it has affected public health, employment, education, and the economy. The quarantine has brought everything to a halt, just as it has done in other countries around the world.
Our children’s education and our country’s schools have suffered because of the insufficiency of technological services.
Nonetheless, our teachers--Yolanda Xi and Luis Felipe Caal--have managed to perform their teaching duties and ensured our children’s progress. They made it possible for their students to continue learning at home.
The following pictures show what they have been able to achieve with their students.
Luis Felipe Caal, the Creek Cuatro Cayos teacher, pays weekly visits to the school in order to distribute homework to his students and urges their parents to support their children in completing their homework so that he can review it every other week.
Yolanda Xi, the Lagunita School teacher, distributes learning guides and notebooks to students so that they may use them at home with their parents’ support. She, too, visits the school and reviews the homework every other week.
Fighting the pandemic, having to make changes from month to month, and continuing to teach the children in the communities has been a great challenge.
Nutrition at the Creek Cuatro Cayos School
The nutrition project has been working as follows:
Because of all the changes required by the covid-19 pandemic, students and their families have been staying home and the economy has contracted.
For that reason, it has become necessary to deliver the school meals to the students’ parents.
Vitamins and vermifuges intended to supplement the body’s natural defenses have also been entrusted to the parents
Vitamins and vermifuges being delivered to parents. This woman has five children in the school.
Parents are grateful for the support provided to the students and are also grateful to the teachers for their efforts to care for their children despite the restrictions imposed by the government.
The Guatemalan government has already started reopening the economy but has not yet determined if students will return to school.
Donations Doubled Appeal a Huge Success
An appeal was made in the Spring/Summer edition of the TEACH newsletter, The Aldea, announcing that an anonymous donor had pledged to match any non-sponsor donation made during the period June 15th through the 30th, not to exceed $10,000. This urgent appeal was made because the Covid-19 pandemic had caused our Mission Appeals and annual BINGO fund-raiser to be canceled and we were concerned about supporting our 13 TEACH programs in Guatemala. The communities in Guatemala are also experiencing hardships due to the pandemic.
The generosity of our TEACH supporters was overwhelming. Contributions received in June totaled nearly $18,000, of which $10,765 was from non-sponsor donations. Our anonymous donor honored all non-sponsor donations made during the entire month, and donated the entire $10,000.
As a result of The Donations Doubled Appeal, a total of some $21,000 was received. We give a special thanks to our anonymous sponsor, to all of you generous contributors, to the authors of the newsletter’s articles, and to Karen Abraham and Toni Maltagliati for the excellent newsletter.
Greetings from Felipe, Teacher at Creek de Cuatro Cayos, June 19, 2020
Good evening, TEACH. Greetings and many blessings. Today, 6/19/2020, they paid me for the month of May. Payment was delayed because—as you know—here in our community everything is hard to do because of the pandemic that is gripping the whole world. I am very grateful to the Lord because you have never stopped supporting us. Thanks for this great help at a time when it is very dangerous to even go out on the streets.
Thank you. God bless TEACH. My family always prays for you and asks the Lord to strengthen your determination to help the many people who are affected by this crisis. Goodbye.
Buenas noches teach mis mas sinceros saludos augurando toda clase de bendiciones.la cual informo que él día de hoy 19/06/2020 entregaron mi pago del mes de mayo Se tardo porque Ustedes saben donde estamos nosotros aca en nuestra comunidad es difícil salir peor con esta pandemia que esta afectando todo él mundo estoy muy agradecido con dios de que ustedes nunca nos an dejado de apoyar.
Gracias por esta gran ayuda ya que ahora cuesta buscar empleo y es muy peligroso de andar en la calle.gracias dios les bendiga teach y siempre la mi familia ora por ustedes que dios la de mas fuerza para apoyar a muchas personas que están en crisis adios
This Little Light of Mine
As we celebrate the season of gratitude, it is so obvious how many gifts are shared by TEACH supporters as we carry out our mission. Our world is filled with so many problems, which are at times overwhelming. We are called to assist young people in Izabal, Guatemala with their education. Often when we visit our sites, “This Little Light of Mine’ is our theme song. Amazing gifts are called forth as lights shine, with amazing results. We see that the light is bright for the students’ future.
For the last eight years, David Greene has been a vital bright light for TEACH. His gifts of organization, academic experience, Spanish language, knowledge of the country of Guatemala and its culture, generosity of spirit, etc, etc, have contributed to our current success. Thank you, David, for your gentle guidance and dedication. You have given so much of yourself for the benefit of many, many students.
Bright lights continue to emerge. In July 2018, Shawn Lowe organized and led our 4th Annual Workshop for TEACH teachers, building on David’s foundation. Shawn’s experience an educator was valuable. She was assisted by another educator Vicki Koivu-Rybicki, who reminded us that we are Learners and Teachers, as we listen and discern.
As the TEACH story continues, we are grateful for you our supporters, for our dedicated volunteers and teachers, for our excellent partners in the US and in Guatemala, and for the sacrifices of our families and students. You are invited to become part of the story. What gifts might you have to share?
We ask your prayers for our continued work. Prayer unites us across the distance, creating solidarity with Guatemalans that many of you will never meet. It makes a difference for them.
Good News (Box)
New TEACH baby! David Coc Tzi was born on Sept 15 to Ernesto and Imelda, Semuy Middle School teachers. We rejoice with you!
In 2018, the Aldea of Punta Cocoli will be the site of a new primary school for 36 students, the majority of whom have never been to school. The project is with the assistance of partner GSSG (Guatemalan Student Support Group).
Alternative Gifts – Looking for the perfect Christmas gift? TEACH cards are available. We also have cards for birthdays, anniversaries, and memorials for loved ones. Contact shari.zamarra@gmail.com or 703-323-9367.
Sanabria Students Travel to School by Boat – Life Jackets Needed for Safety
During this 2017 school year, many primary school students were able to cross the Rio Dulce River to attend school because of a boat given by TEACH. Check out their story on the TEACH website.
The students’ safety is very important. $1200 is needed to purchase life jackets to prepare for the 2018 school year. Can you help?