Give at-risk Colombian children a safe home

What a year it has been so far! Half-way through 2019, and we already have so much to share with you all! We would like to take the chance to offer our sincerest gratitude to each and everyone of you. Thanks to your generous support we have been able to grow as an organization this year, and learn new ways in which we can expand our impact on our at-risk children. 

We are excited to inform you about the following achievements:

• We formed an alliance with MAPFRE's corporate volunteer program, which develop activities for people that live in vulnerable situations and suffer from extreme poverty. Our St. Patrick boys were invited to participate in their “Providing Opportunities for Working life” project, that has been recognized as one of the best human resources practices for the employment inclusion of people belonging to vulnerable social groups. These activities also took place in our other program, Nuevo Amanecer. 
• Worked with a volunteer group “Ante Todo Colombia”, where the volunteers worked with the children on various workshops based on entrepreneurship, gender equity, and technology management. These workshops took place in 2 of our programs in Bogota during a time period of three months. The cycle began with a workshop in St. Patrick, on “Life project based on entrepreneurship”, where 22 students participated, of which were either finishing high school, doing technical and/or university studies.  “I always dreamed of running a business and being my own boss, but I thought it would be impossible for me, but this workshops along with my college education motivate us, help us grow personally, construct our capabilities expand our visions about our professional future”, said Pablo* (20 years old).  He has been in the St. Patrick program for over 4 years, and is currently studying Business Administration at Politecnico Gran Colombiano University and takes advanced English courses. 
• As you are aware, during the week of April 8^thwe participated in the Little by Littlecampaign, where all donations from $10 to $50 were matched at 60%. Although we did not have much of a successful campaign, it was a great opportunity to expand our donor community network and our small contributors, thanks to the support of ten advocates selected among our most committed donors. 
• On Saturday April 13^th, Andrea Juliao a professional dancer, lead an integrated activity through dance and aerobic exercises with our children and their visiting families. The purpose of this activity was to facilitate the integration of family members with their children, strengthening bonds and relationships amongst them. 
• To finalize International Children’s Day celebrations, we received a visit from Francisca Werth Coello, a Chilean writer and narrator who was invited to Bogota for the Book Fair known as FILBO. Francisca carried out two dynamic workshops of reading, creative writing and crafts with a formative and multicultural context for our children at Nuevo Amanecer and Casacorazones programs. 

*His name was changed to protect his identity. 

Let us know your thoughts on our achievements so far. We would love to know ways in which we could improve, whether it’s advice or an opinion, feel free to contact us! We are eager to finish the rest half of this year strong.

New year, same purpose! To all our Global Giving partners and friends, thank you for the amazing year we had. A special thank you to all our new donors who significantly contributed towards the end of the year. With your help we were able to raise over $37,000 USD, and attend 1,415 children in our five residential programs. With this money, we renovated the facilities in one of our homes, increase the funds responsible for school uniforms, materials and those corresponding to the daily menus in all of our programs. Additionally, with your support we had the chance to successfully hire a full-time nutritionist and a choir professor. We are eager to share with you all, that in 2018, we were awarded by Globalgiving as Project of the Month, Top-Ranked Organization and officially recognized as an Effective Organization.

This year taught us that girls in our country still face enormous vulnerability. Specifically, in one of our programs, out of 155 children attended, 83% were girls of ages 12-18. Moreover, 46% of these children’s reason for admission was family conflict and 22% was sexual abuse. The term family conflict covers a broad range of issues including, authority, financial and behavioral, which are mostly coupled with the single mother household situation. Such situation triggers conflict in which young girls are subject to emotional abuse, which if not treated, will result in them repeating such behaviors, adding to the vicious cycle of conflict. Because of this, in 2019 we will work to strengthen their formation strategies by focusing on empowerment and self-confidence through group coaching, leadership training, competitive sports, and psychological intervention that will help them overcome their difficult abusive past.

One of our young girls Paula expressed her worries, “I don´t want to follow my mother’s footsteps knowing how much I can succeed in life”. Although we cannot directly alleviate these grim adversities from the environment itself, with your help, we can invest our resources in directly helping the victim. In providing these resources, we can achieve our long-term goal in successfully re-integrating them into their households and society.

With the New Year ringing in, we want to make a difference in the lives of the young girls of our organization. Together, we can spread the love and show these young women the endless possibilities life can bring when you believe and love yourself more. We invite you to join us in supporting our girls in becoming strong women who will hopefully not only make a change in the world, but more importantly learn the value they bring to society. We look forward to having a year full of projects and positive energy!

Thank you again for all your support in helping us fulfill our mission in inspiring our children to overcome all the challenges they have lived.

This #GivingTuesday  when GG will be giving out $150,000 in proportional matching, we are happy to share with all of you some early year end results.

In “Nuevo Amanecer”, of the 139 children and adolescents cared for during 2018, 118 successfully enrolled in schools and more importantly the majority passed the academic year. Twenty-two children who could not be enrolled in school, carried out school reinforcement activities. To support their personal development, we worked with SFK, Spirituality For Kids, an international program of values and emotional skills, that helps children recognize their potential, focus on their goals and understand the impact their decisions make.  

In “St. Patrick’s home”, we cared 45 children, and young adults. Eleven, who are conducting university careers, reached the average required to pass the semester, which shows their high level of commitment. To strengthen other competencies, Frontech company, gave a free course of basic computer security. When receiving the certification, Freddy (19) said "I feel that every time I am more prepared to finish my studies and fulfill my dream of being a systems engineer."

In light of these achievements with your support, we would like to give thanks, and wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving.

Finally, we kindly invite you to save the date and join us in the #GivingTuesday Matching Campaign on November 27, and also if possible ask your friends to  help our children on that day.

All the best!

Diana Zamudio G

General Director

There are many things to tell you: This year we dedicated our efforts to improve the houses furniture in all areas. As you already know, thanks to your contributions through Global Giving, we finished the playroom and we got our brand new bus. As a result, our children in 2019 will be able to get to school safely. Also, we changed 63 beds of Nuevo Amanecer and 30 of St. Patrick, as well as the mattresses, the sheets, pillows, shoemakers, entrance mats and lockers. Without your help, this simply would not have been possible. You should have heard Jonathan 6 years old when he saw the mattresses: "We're not going to want to get up in the morning," he said. We would love that you could come someday to learn about the program and share the achievements obtained thanks to your commitment to this cause.

Fortunately, by the end of this period, 52 of the 145 boys and girls who began their process earlier in January were successfully reinstated to their families. We wanted to briefly share with you this special story of a group of siblings who stayed for two years in the program. Three siblings, Sara 9, Jennifer 11 and Andrew 12, were withdrawn from their family because their mother, head of household, was not a guarantor of their fundamental rights. Her work in prostitution to get the minimum resources to feed them, forced her to leave them in the care of the elder, which is a common situations of poverty. The result: The ICBF took away the children and were sent to our protection program. During these two years they joined more than ever, returned to school with normal difficulties for the little assistance and attention of their mother.

"If you knew how hard it is to get a decent job, you wouldn't take the kids away from me, instead, you’d help me find one." These were  Mercedes’s words when she first came to visit her children at the foundation’s home.  Over time, each of the mother's visit was a surprise for her: The children were gaining weight, had good grades and she was involved with discipline from the workshops dictated on Saturdays by the psychologist. She had to make great efforts to successfully pass home visits to the team and be able to recover the children, but with the support and advice of the institution achieved it a month ago. In Colombia, 50% of children entering protection have single-parent families in the head of women with very low educational level.  

Through 30 years of experience, one thing we have clear: Parents always wants to be with her children despite their shortcomings and difficulties. This premise led us to chart the course for 2019: With the help of all of you, we will significantly strengthen the support and training of families and prepare them for family reimbursement when the children leave the foundation. Family groups should be accompanied more closely to achieve a sustainable impact on the quality of life of families. Thus, the Parent School Project "The right seed" will be underway.

Thank you again for your support for our project. Please feel free to contact me with any questions, comments or ideas at calidad@ninandes.org

Kind regards,

María Camila Matíz  

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Hello dear GG Donors

Welcome to August! Time runs very quickly; It’s amazing seeing how we’re already halfway through with 2018!

This recent Bonus Day was quite amazing. Thank you all for your early and great contributions which were matched, to help our children build their self-esteem and confidence through our Happy Hearts project. It’s a pleasure to show you how things are going with your generous donations. We have been able to speed up the progress for the remodeling of our recreational space. Since then reached significant progress in the paint jobs, furniture acquiring and creative designs on the walls that provide additional tools to challenge children’s creative mind.

A few weeks ago, Andres one of our children in Nuevo Amanecer, experienced an emotional crisis. At the age of fourteen, he has lost the feeling of being loved as he grew up in a violent household, where his father throughout his entire life physically and verbally abused him. Witnessing this abuse, he felt like violence was simply the only form of expressing such feeling, causing him to struggle with managing his emotions and even worse lacking motivation in everyday activities. During his crisis, he resorted to violence in which he attempted to physically hurt other children. Once the situation was controlled, the psychologist mentioned how he has a wall built upon pain and emotional trauma from abuse, where he does not allow anyone into his heart. Getting through this wall, is the ongoing challenge the team is currently facing, but there is a light at the end of this tunnel. Such light consists of his recently given opportunity to start school, which gives him a sense of distraction and self-confidence.

We deeply believe that this new space we are building with your active participation, will grant Andres, and all the children coming from family hardships, a positive, inspiring and motivating ambient to channel their emotional difficulties into a creative manner. Similarly this space will encourage them to complete their daily homework tasks and thus further develop any talents they have discovered during their time at our Foundation’s program. With the help of volunteer participation and guide of our professional team we have been able to provide our children with creative techniques that do not employ the use of violence and as a result build their sense of confidence through personal achievements.

 We'd love to get some feedback on our project, so feel free to let us know how we have done. Again thank you so much for your commitment with our at-risk children in Colombia.

Kind Regards,

Patricia Gonzalez