So the World’s Biggest Blog Party is underway!
Hopefully some of you were listening in last night when Lori Santoro (Founder and CEO of Casa de Sara) and myself (Dan Frye, President of the Board of Directors) were interviewed on BlogRadio. We are so excited about our new blog and the opportunity it provides for us to tell you about what is going on with our organization. If you missed us last night on the broadcast allow me to review some of the exciting highlights about Casa de Sara right now!
When Lori started CdS back in 2000 she had no idea what it would grow into. In the past eight years Lori and her team of volunteers have created an organization that has evolved into a full-time, non-profit business that provides education, healthcare and special projects for impoverished hispanics and indigenous people in the Americas. Our number one project is our “escuelita” which translates to “little school”. If you have checked out our main site then you have seen some of the pictures of our students and our classroom. We are very proud of our school! Most impoverished children in Bolivia attend public schools— if they go to school at all! Bolivia is the second poorest country in the western hemisphere, so needless to say, the public schools are not well equipped for the students. Some schools only have old desks and very limited number of textbooks which students share. The rooms are barren and many have no chalkboards. We have all seen pictures of situations like this in various third-world countries but very few people have attempted to do something to make a change for the better. Our classroom looks very much like many classrooms here in the U.S. I personally love how its filled with bright, happy colors and visual aides to help stimulate the minds of our children. We currently have 50 students split between kindergarten and first grade. Ultimately our goal is to build a bigger school so we can add more grades but that will take more funding and their are many hurdles to be cleared before that can happen. But we are full of hope! We have seen the miracles that happen when you give a child the opportunity to learn. Bolivian children are the same as children everywhere. They represent our future and we know they are worth the investment of love that CdS provides.
In addition to providing educational opportunities for our children we also help provide healthcare to the students and the people in their communities. On one of her many trips to Bolivia Lori met Dr. Edwin Escalante who agreed to become our staff physician. Dr. Escalante has been invaluable in helping to keep our students healthy and free from parasitic illnesses and more dangerous disease such as malaria. Our students also receive daily vitamins thanks to our generous donors. In addition to our escuelita and healthcare program we also have a “Sarita” program. The “Sarita” program allows young women (late teens to early 20’s) to work in our schools as teacher’s aids. Through this opportunity the girls learn a trade, build their resumes, and earn money for their own educations while attending high school or college. The goal of the program is to get young women interested in the teaching profession so that one day they will become teachers themselves.
So what’s next for Casa de Sara? Well our school year is almost over (school runs from February thru November) but back by popular demand is our summer program. The summer program offers dance classes and soccer clinics and other culturally relevant programs for our kids.
In closing let me ask you to keep coming back to our blog. Feel free to contact us with any questions or comments. And please consider helping us financially. A few American dollars stretch much further in Bolivia so no amount is too small. Keep tuning in to the World’s Biggest Blog Party for updates too. If you know of someone who wants to blog for any of the charities and help raise funds that would be great! The WBBP’s goal is to get 1,000 bloggers to raise $1,000 dollars each. That would be one million dollars raised for charity in just three weeks! But lets not stop there as the needs are great and I can promise you that giving is far better than receiving. Gracias!
