By Diana Rae Lewis | Founder & President
With graduation and CW school closure behind us, our 10 teachers and admin team come together to relax, lunch and laugh together. This team is amazing with unlimited dedication and passionate creative skills that hold student focus and develop the love of learning. Left front is Simeon, our all round handyman, weekend security and school bus driver who never complains - he loves his job. Ruth stands in the back, happily exhausted and so proud of her team. We are one big family, we work hard, celebrate birthdays and our successes together. CW has been blessed for 34 years. We could never have achieved all we have the last 2 years without the love and support from you.We pray the covid nightmare is over for everyone everywhere, but we realize it is not.
THANK YOU ALL - Rae Lewis 2.22.2022
Our CW girls are so excited to return to their beloved school and friends they have missed seeing the last 2 years. Parents recently met with Ruth on the school patio to learn about the new strategy being planned for returning safely to the classroom, parent vaccinations, mask precautions, and the yearly cultivation of nutritious food on the school grounds for the student meal program. CW girls are creative problem solvers and during CW home school have become more self-motivated and independent. Major wins are CW girls now demonstrate more self-confidence and self-esteem than before Covid changed all our lives.
Once again our CW parents created a plan together forming groups to prepare the soil around the school buildings, plant potatoes and other seasonal vegetables for the season. Our CW community is an agricultural one, with Andean skills that produce a hefty harvest they have demonstrated with pride in earlier years.
HOT NEWS:
The three student families forced to return to their rural family farm in the mountains have not yet returned. Returning students number 123 for this school year.
The fundraiser tuition based Maria School has been ready to open for 2 years. Finally we have been given the green light to begin registering new students, but parents are afraid to commit to tuition in case students end up with home school again. I doubt that will happen, but I understand their concerns. We will open the Maria school in March if there are enough students to pay the teachers needed. We will wait to see how the few remaining private schools are doing – we all will need some reassurance.
We look forward to returning foreign visitors to Cusco and to CW school with occasional volunteers (one monthlong volunteer coming for June), and the economic lift that will bring to a country dependent on tourism. The year 2022 will be a lift for us all.
CW's future when the 'Maria Tuition School' classes are filled, will be self-supporting. CoVid upset our plans to open the Maria school in 2020, but we are grateful that our CW large extended family is well. We plan to begin enrolling new students in March 2022 when the school year begins again and parents are ready.
Some photos for you:
Our CW school and the Maria school are located close enough, but far enough away to not be in competition. The bottom image is of the amazing CW 33 year leadership team. We are: Gloria (teacher/assistant administrator,) Rae (CW Founder 1987,) and Teacher/Administrator Ruth and Co-founder of the CW Maria school in 1997 together with Rae - who shortly after returned to California to manage overall administration and fundraising from California.
CW School is our beautiful sun burst color school created for poor Indigenous Girls (tuition free), and the new modern (tuition based) Maria school will one day fund both schools.https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/educate-110-poor-girls-in-cusco-for-economic-survival/
NOTE: Thank you all for hanging in there with us. We have a little way to go yet but the impact of our work is self evident in the success of our girls...some at the university today.
Links:
By Diana Rae Lewis | Founder and President
By Diana Rae Lewis | Founder & President
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