Land purchase for ownership of the school

ACES continues to grow every year, this year we have 115 students and 10 teachers on staff.  Our goal for the coming year is to again expand our facility.  Within the next two years, the vision is to raise the one story wooden structure, which houses 5 classrooms and to construct 3 larger classrooms under the current structure, out of concrete.  Living in the tropics the necessity of concrete structures makes itself more than apparent.  The maintenance on a wooden structure is a constant.  You are constantly fighting the elements, hurricanes, rotten wood, termites and the sun and salt continuously erroding and fading your paint.  

Within the next two months we will connect to the town's sewer system, funds were raised for this project through our annual Gala and Art Action.  Next month, the Belize Red Cross is helping the school obtain solar panels and a cistern system to help defray our monthly utility costs. By this time next year our mortgage on the school will be paid in full, so the annual deficit will be much less. As a non-profit organization ACES operates solely on the small tuition collected from the student's parents or sponsors and the donations from individual and corporate donors. Funding from the government of Belize is still not available although we have applied for government grants.

The world beyond the boarders of free public schools is so much different.  Often I relate the story of having a $450,000.00 BZD budget to operate this school with tuition bringing in only $200,000.00 BZD. People will give a quizzical look and I respond, "Yes that means we have to go out and raise $250,000.00 BZD every year just to keep the doors open."  Their response is always,"How and why do you continue to do it?"  My answer is always the same, "We do it for the love of the children and by the Grace of God go I..."