Empowering Indigenous Youth for a Healthy Future

To our community partners, donors, and volunteers, thank you for your support during this wild and unprecedented year. Because of you, we have been able to successfully adapt our programming to meet new community identified needs and challenges due to the pandemic. 

Since our last update in early fall, we have provided 80 students with Adventure Guides, school supply kits, and new toothbrushes and toothpaste. Students have not been in-school since mid-March which has had significant effects on learning, mental health, and child development. 

Bonnie, our community health educator, comments, “when the pandemic began, everything was so confusing and uncertain, we initially thought we would be out of school for a few weeks, or at most, a few months, and then everything would go back to normal.” She says “the pandemic has had a tremendous impact on Guatemala’s education system.”

Everyone around the world is adapting to remote distant learning and Guatemala is no exception. However, many families in rural Guatemala don’t have access to the internet or technology devices to participate in virtual classes. “Teachers looked for a way to work with their students and many did it virtually, but unfortunately in Guatemala not everyone has access to technology, especially the youngest students in schools, so how could teachers work with those children who were left wanting to continue learning creatively?” states Bonnie. 

To address this need, Bonnie says “The most feasible strategy that the Rising Mind team considered was to create an adventure journal where each activity included detailed instructions for the student and family.” Furthermore, “our goal is that our students receive personalized activities and education materials and that we create an education model without barriers, where the child builds on his or her own learning, regardless of whether the teacher is present or not.” 

Currently, we are charting out plans and creating materials for the 2021 school year. Stay tuned for some epic educational coloring books, socially-distanced Forest Playgroup outdoor adventures, and the pilot of a new club, geared toward older kids (8-12 years old). 

Until then, we wish you and yours a very happy, safe, and healthy new year!

Rising Minds has always been focused on addressing community identified needs related to health and nutrition, employment, and sustainable agriculture. The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced the necessity of working alongside Guatemala’s most vulnerable populations to provide health workshops and educational materials, and combat food insecurity with the implementation of family and community gardens. The RM team has spent the last few months developing a COVID-19 Relief Action Plan to adapt our programming to address new community identified challenges due to today’s reality.  

As in-person classes were suspended in mid-March in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, schools switched to remote and distance learning.  Educators, students, parents, and care-givers all over the world are adapting to the reality and challenges of remote learning. Guatemala is no exception. Many families in rural Guatemala don’t have access to technology and the internet to participate in virtual classes, making it harder to stay up to date and engaged. Teachers are doing their best to accommodate varying circumstances, but with already limited resources, it is proving difficult to provide at home educational materials to all. We want to help address this need by providing at-home resources and materials to empower parents and caregivers to confidently teach and inspire children to learn. 

The Rising Minds Adventure Guide will encourage children and families to learn about health, wellness and the environment. With daily challenges, observations, prompts and activities, the Adventure Guide will facilitate engagement with important topics, often overlooked by traditional curriculum, related to disease prevention, nutrition, mental health, climate change, and environmental education and conservation. Curriculum developed for our In-School Health Training Initiative will find a home in the Adventure Guide and we will be able to engage both students and their families. Some example activities include making hand sanitizer, sanitizing household products, a teeth brushing challenge, following a recipe to make a healthy and nutritious meal, and daily meditation and yoga exercises. Our guide will be divided into weekly activities and challenges. We will schedule check-ins, all socially distanced and following safety protocols, to monitor the progress and completion of the activities and to provide necessary support to our partner families. We’re excited to roll out this at-home resource and activity guide and can’t wait to be back in action working to serve the children and families of San Juan La Laguna.