Help marginalized Mexican children and teenagers

Dear GlobalGivers, 

Do you want to know the power of youth? 

In Iztapalapa, the dense Mexico City borough of 1.8 million inhabitants that is #1 for COVID-19 cases in Mexico, people are not sheltering in place and many lack water to wash their hands. Rumors have spread that Covid-19 is a disease of the rich or that it is all a political scheme, so many people here believe there is no risk. Yet this community, Iztapalapa, is #1 for Covid-19 cases in the country.

Today is #GivingTuesdayNow, a global emergency response to the unprecedented need caused by COVID-19. Will you donate extra today?

Ari, who we told you about in the last report, needs your help to stop COVID-19 transmission in his community of Iztapalapa. With your donation, we will quickly and remotely train up Ari and 79 of his peers to become leaders for local Covid-19 prevention. We will run a digital educational campaign to get accurate information to the entire borough in a way that resonates with them, and we are installing portable handwashing stations for those who have to go out to work and don´t have running water at home to wash their hands.

Together, through these key and quick actions, we will enable 800,000 people in Iztapalapa to stay safe from COVID-19.

Mexican youth have the power to stop Covid-19 in crowded and marginalized Iztapalapa. Will you make it a reality?

With gratitude,
Shoshana

PS- Sending along a few photos of how Ari and his peers are being agents for change in their homes and communities so far.

Dear GlobalGiver,

Imagine you started high school, but then life in one of the poorest threw you off track. A couple years later, you are 20 years old and you are committed to finishing high school. So you apply to the public “IEMS” High School Education Institute of Mexico City that accepts all types of youth who have fallen outside the system. They also offer a small stipend so that you can cover your basic expenses of food and clothing and focus on school.

You live in the densest municipality in the country, a place known for its extreme poverty and marginalization. Hand in hand, rates of cancers, diabetes and respiratory diseases are increasing. You want a healthy future, but you don´t know how to make it happen.

Ari is one such person. Over the last 4 months, he has participated in four workshop sessions, building skills to eat healthily and reduce excessive alcohol consumption. And to become an agent of change in his community. In the coming months, he will start replicating the workshop with his classmates, changing not just his life but that of his friends and peers.

At our year-end holiday party, Ari told us that he appreciates the workshops because he feels heard. He now knows how to take care of his health and he loves sharing with his family everything he has been learning. He told us that the workshop sessions are fun, that he learns not through listing to a boring lecture but through engaging in interactive activities. And in a city of so much violence, he feels like the other workshop participants and the Yo quiero Yo puedo facilitators are his family.

We will also be sharing evaluation results with you over the coming years, so that you have hard proof of the impact your donation is having. Know that you are enabling Ari to change his life!

With gratitude,

Shoshana