Give at-risk Colombian children a safe home

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.