Learning outdoors for children of the favelas

Last year, SINAL began a partnership with the British Council through its Active Citizens program, a methodology designed to train young community leaders to approach subjects of identity, culture, dialogue and community, to empower them to take action improving their own communities. Since the last few months, we have received groups of passionate young leaders from different neighborhoods of the greater Baixada Fluminense area (the urban sprawl of Rio de Janeiro), which are characterized by precarious infrastructure, low-income and insecurity.

 Through the trainings, the youths designed their own projects which will have begun to be implemented and will continue in the next months with our accompaniment. Some of the projects are:

            Building a rain catching system for the local school to use in its organic garden beds project, (another one of our community projects). The kids will also build an exact scaled replica as the project moves along, as a special project in their Math class.

            Installing a series of recycling “eco-points” in the neighborhood of Santo Antonio, characterized by having one of the lowest waste-treatment infrastructures.

            The intervention of a garden in a local plaza, where a community event was held with capoeira and recycled art workshops for children. The goal was to clean an area that was full of garbage and was instead planted with crotolaria, a plant that attracts the dragonflies that eat mosquitoes that carry dengue fever.

 We will upload more photos of the projects as they unfold, for now, here are some of the photos from the project crotolaria!

 Thank you to all donors who helped us achieve this. It has truly been a journey seeing these kids grow more empowered, confident and responsible!

As we wrap up the year, we want to look back on the many accomplishments that we - thanks to Global Giving's generous donors - have been able to achieve.

Starting in the beginning of the year, we continued our work to reform and revitalize the spaces of the school, that for years have been plagued with poor infrastructure. The area in which the garden now is was so poorly taken care of that the children could not even enter there. Therefore, our team wento to replace the floors, paint the walls, and make it safe for students to use. Then, our education coordinator, Luisa, continued the project "Aventura dos Sabores" with the creation of the garden and vertical garden using plastic bottles. Here is a video of the project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKYE5Bnhh34

In May, students from Canisius college worked side-by-side the Student Council students in order to build recycled funiture, paint designs on the walls, and improve the gardens. The SINAL team also built a "tool shed" for the students to keep their gardening tools inside. 

Throughout the rest of the year, Luisa and the SINAL team continued to work each week in the garden with the students. They did science experiments using plastic bottles, oxiginated water, and bio-fertilizers. The students also came to SINAL to plant trees and to learn how to do mosaic. They, together with other community members, made a mosaic that said "Everyone together" to put in the central plaza. 

The last few weeks they have focused on maintaining the garden and lots of games related to biology and healthy food.

We are looking forward to next year, where we plan to build a water catchment system together with the engineers without borders local group.