Fundraising appeal:
Education at Aldea Infantil –
Building blocks for the future.

What can be done to provide chil­dren in a very poor coun­try with a future?

The staff at Aldea Infan­til in Guatemala know the answer and have proven it hundreds of times over: Educa­tion is the key. That is why the Kinderzukun­ft Foun­da­tion (Stiftung Kinderzukun­ft), which runs the chil­dren’s village, is current­ly focus­ing even more strong­ly on creat­ing the condi­tions for better educa­tion for the chil­dren. As long-stand­ing support­ers, we are delight­ed to present three current educa­tion­al initia­tives from Aldea Infan­til in our Valdivia News­room today.

Break­ing the vicious circle with education

Educa­tion is more than just impart­ing knowl­edge. Educa­tion also opens minds and souls. Through educa­tion, young people recog­nise their oppor­tu­ni­ties and find the moti­va­tion to seize them. And only educa­tion prevents them from falling back into the vicious circle of igno­rance and pover­ty as adults, in which so many people in the coun­try are trapped.

For Guatemala is no trop­i­cal paradise. Over 50 per cent of the popu­la­tion lives in abject pover­ty, and 21 per cent are illit­er­ate. Wide­spread corrup­tion hinders any kind of posi­tive social devel­op­ment. Earth­quakes and hurri­canes repeat­ed­ly cause enor­mous damage. And climate change has a much more pronounced effect here than it does in our part of the world, with droughts and heavy rain­fall caus­ing frequent crop fail­ures and a down­ward spiral of hunger and disease.

Wound­ed souls

Such diffi­cult condi­tions some­times seem too big and too abstract to face. But with every child who comes to Aldea Infan­til, they are given a face. These chil­dren are marked by broken fami­lies, by a life of inse­cu­ri­ty and violence. Gangs force them into their service for drug traf­fick­ing, extor­tion and robbery. They expe­ri­ence sexu­al­i­ty almost exclu­sive­ly in the form of assault or unfil­tered consump­tion of social media.

It is there­fore not surpris­ing that the work at Aldea Infan­til is not done once the chil­dren have been provid­ed with food, cloth­ing, a safe bed and regu­lar school­ing. Espe­cial­ly with the onset of puber­ty, even after years in the village, behav­iour­al prob­lems some­times arise that require increased educa­tion­al and psycho­log­i­cal support.

3 Initia­tives for education

The foun­da­tion has there­fore taken on the addi­tion­al mission of getting chil­dren off the streets and provid­ing for them until they reach adult­hood. They should be given a real chance in life, as we recent­ly described in two exam­ples. This can only be achieved through educa­tion – combined with the free­dom to devel­op and discov­er their own abil­i­ties. In order to promote these factors even more strong­ly, Aldea Infan­til has recent­ly launched a number of projects:

• Improv­ing the qual­i­ty of teach­ing in schools: With the support of the Guatemalan Ministry of Educa­tion, teach­ers have devel­oped new meth­ods to iden­ti­fy learn­ing deficits on an indi­vid­ual basis, help chil­dren catch up and thus make lessons more effective.
• Greater moti­va­tion to learn by promot­ing indi­vid­ual inter­ests: Pupils in Years 6 and 9 were given specif­ic insights into secondary schools and educa­tion­al path­ways to help them strength­en their plans for the future in 2026. This also boost­ed their confi­dence in making their own deci­sions and reduced the school dropout rate.
• Read­ing festi­val in the library: The library is a core part of the educa­tion­al programme at Aldea Infan­til. The books strength­en read­ing skills, language devel­op­ment and gener­al knowl­edge; the read­ing festi­val play­ful­ly awak­ens the joy of read­ing and improves the chil­dren’s language and imagination.

Every­thing for a happy christ­mas celebration!

Educa­tion is a price­less commod­i­ty, but the costs are often modest compared to other areas. The “educa­tion wish list” that the foun­da­tion sent us for Aldea Infan­til before Christ­mas is there­fore quite manageable:

• • Furni­ture for a cosy read­ing corner in the library: £1,150
  • Better media equip­ment with projec­tors and micro­phones: £1,500
  • Support for the employ­ment of an addi­tion­al specialist
  • in speech ther­a­py and psychol­o­gy to help with the grow­ing workload
  • involved in caring for young people in partic­u­lar: £450/month
  • With your help, you can change a child’s life: every contri­bu­tion — large or small — counts. Every euro creates opportunities.
    • 10 euros a month provides a child with school supplies — the foun­da­tion for learn­ing and the future.
    • 24 euros pays for eight hours of tutor­ing — time in which a child can believe in them­selves again
    • In addi­tion, ne new kitchen uten­sils need to be purchased – espe­cial­ly modern freez­ers (approx. 560 euros each) that can oper­ate at a reason­able cost in the trop­i­cal climate.

So today we invite you to help us help others! Aldea Infan­til may only be a small island of hope, but here you can help direct­ly, trans­par­ent­ly and with­out any deduc­tions for organ­i­sa­tion­al over­heads: every euro of your dona­tion goes direct­ly to the children.

Stiftung Kinderzukun­ft

Rabenaus­traße 1a, D‑63584 Gründau

Vera Berd­ing

Head of Market­ing and Public Relations

Tel.: +49 60 51 48 18 16

Fax: +49 60 51 48 18 10

Email: vera.berding@kinderzukunft.de

Website: www.kinderzukunft.de 

Dona­tion bank account: Commerzbank Hanau

IBAN: DE79 5064 0015 0222 2222 00

BIC: COBADEFFXXX

Please quote „Valdivia Future— Kinder­dorf Guatemala“ in the refer­ence field.

(Image source: Stiftung Kinderzukunft)