Inspire 3000 Honduran Children to Excel

Dear Donors, 

Thank you for supporting our fundraising efforts on this past July Bonus Day! We shared with you Antonio's incredible quest to return to school and keep studying in our bilingual high school track, which included him selling his cell-phone to buy school supplies.

We are ecstatic to report that with your help we raised $4,625 and GlobalGiving matched $1,859 - summing our campaign total to $6,484! We, like you, are astounded by Antonio's perseverance and maturity as we have seen him grow through the years in our bilingual education program (see photo). All of your efforts will continue to support students, like Antontio, who are benefitted by our education and bilingual track program. 

Many thanks for your support in our campaign! We could not have done it without you.

We are pleased to tell you about a NEW CHAPTER in our book of continued commitment to foster reading!

As our education team continues trekking towards providing a wholesome education for our students, we created a partnership with Proyecto Chispa or "Project Spark." This non-profit in Honduras focuses on providing books to schoolchildren and preparing teachers to engage creatively with their students. 

Together with the Department of Education in Intibuca, we provided training sessions for 120 teachers. Our Chispa partners covered topics like how to motivate students to keep reading a book they've already started and how to foster imagination by asking children to think of alternative book endings. Many teachers not only received the benefit of passing this knowledge on to their students, but also to their own children as many of them are parents too. One teacher mentioned how this initiative complements the digital books already available in Kolibri. Adding how her students come from low-income backgrounds who "couldn't allow themselves to buy a book, yet in Kolibri we have a great diversity of books. [I am] very happy to utilize this teaching method in my classes." 

With the conclusion of this training we have begun preparing our schools for this year's reading contest as we create excitement amongst the professors who can then ignite the "spark" onto their students. 

Until the next chapter!

Links:

• Mini Documentary of Chispa Training
• Training Blog on our CREE website

Another school year in Honduras is well underway, and we are excited for a new partnership with Project Trust!  As an organization, they connect gap-year students  (high school graduates, taking a year off before university) from the United Kingdom with partners abroad. Project Trust's Honduras representative, Jake Compaan, who also serves as director for the 'Vida Abundante' bilingual school in Yamaranguila, connected us with two young women from "across the pond" who have now travelled all the way to our bilingual school in Camasca.

Oli and Jasmine, will be spending half a year with us and they have already hit the ground running, by hosting an English enrichment program with our bilingual junior/senior high school students during their first month. And now that school is in session, they are happy accompanying our elementary school bilingual school students in their daily routines.

Their help will be invaluable as ANY volunteer at our school always provides an opportunity for our children to practice their pronunciation and vocabulary. We are excited to see what other projects they get involved in while they are down in Camasca and wish them a wonderful learning expereince that they can share with peers in the future. 

Welcome Oli and Jasmine, we are happy and excited to have you in Camasca! 

Dear Donor, 

We are in awe of how quickly another school year has come to a close and with it a reflection of many successes in our team's work. Alongside teachers, the Intibuca Education department and local mayors, we have accomplished so much and cannot wait for what 2023 will bring. 

At the Education Department level, we expanded our Reading Contest Program for the first time to all 17 municipalities. A competition event took place where 100 schools and 7,000 students participated. Students entered written essays and the final contestants presented an oral summary of one book at the event. A live Kolibri evaluation was also projected during the event to demonstrate the platform's potential, intriguing non-Kolibri teachers present. There was even a commitment from the Department Director to continue the Reading Contest Program yearly.

We have had success in meeting with 16 of the 17 municipal mayors of Intibuca to seek their commitment in providing an IT support for their Kolibri schools for the coming year. Moreover, another mayor has purchased TVs for their Kolibri schools. And another sent tablets, gifted from multiple non-profits, to be loaded with Kolibri by Shoulder to Shoulder FOR A PROFIT. After several years focusing on content development we are proud of our on-the-ground team's potential to bring in funds and help itself out. We look forward to finding even more ways to create sustainanility. 

Finally, we are filled with hope for 2023 as we have received funding once more from the U.S. Embassy,  $30,000, to support our team's work. Our partnership with the U.S. Embassy has been ongoing for several years now and we hope to continue being recognized for the work we do in our communities and the impact it is having year after year. 

Look for more reports in the coming year of what our team is up to and how we are continuing to bring change and innovation to our children's education.

Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year from Shoulder to Shoulder!

When we received our 2021 grant from the Inter-American Development Bank, our education program was able to reach 51 new schools all over the department. It was a quick deployment responding to the covid needs in Honduran education. After the pilot, our team wanted to make sure the schools continued to use Kolibri to its highest potential. For this we upgraded them with the latest Kolibri software over this past winter. The schools were all excited to receive the updated equipment back and the feedback was so great that mayors were calling us to join efforts. 

Over the past months, three mayors began laying bricks toward Kolibri sustainability:

** The Mayor of Intibuca (pictured) purchased TVs for all 9 schools in his municipality that received the pilot last year. This fulfilled our sustainability component where communities were asked to put their shoulder next to ours.

** The Mayor of Jesus de Otoro invested in additional tablets and computers for new schools to receive Kolibri, and

** The San Antonio Mayor, who has supported Kolibri expansion in his town since 2019, continued by selecting a municipal IT support staff to be trained in Camasca.

The action of these three mayors furthermore sends a message of support to help make Kolibri a success. Our team continues to meet with other mayors who also want to follow suit, making us excited for future partnerships. Thank you for following our work and supporting our teachers, our mayors and our team. 

With Respect,

Mariela Rodriguez

Communications Coordinator