Give Love. Give Hope. Give Opportunity.

This past week my volunteer class launched our official class fundrasier, Give Love. Give Hope. Give Opportunity and I want to share a bit more about what VE Global is doing down here and to ask you all to consider helping these kids.

Our class goal is to raise $2,000 (or more...) to help support these kids. The money will go to VE Global to help support the various programs that we're doing with the kids and to support the foundation and it's ability to bring these volunteers down here. 

I have been in Chile for almost 4 months now. I was only supposed to be here for 4 months. I can honestly not imagine leaving so soon now! I have grown to love these girls so much. VE is a really small foundation that only works with 7 institutions (homes for kids or community centers in at risk neighborhoods), but this organization has so much heart and enthusiasm, it is just amazing. The core programs that they have created range from a monthly sports league to a biannual art festival and then to a summer reading program.

They are all common activities in the US, but here they are often things that get overlooked. Sports are not really common in schools here, and art is encouraged, but for these girls in the hogar they don't have that Mom or Dad that they bring their latest painting home to, or the refrigerator that it's hung on for the whole family to see! They are not pushed in school to read in their free time, so the reading program (Vamos a Leer) encourages kids to read over the summer and then based on how many books they read they get to attend a huge carnival party at the end of the summer! On top of that, the volunteers are doing daily activities such as bakingg cupcakes, making pictures frames or kaleidoscopes or playing basketball in the patio.

All of these activities are things that help to kids to stimulate their brains and keep learning new things versus just getting in to trouble or watching TV all day. They also show them that they are good at things, which is something they don't get to see often because of where they live and because of the poor education system.  One of my girls practiced for weeks for our Festival de Arte program and sang Miley Crysus, Party in the USA.... IN ENGLISH and won the whole talent show! I was so proud of her and she was so excited and you could just see how much it meant to her to be able to do that!

The other main part of volunteering here is giving these kids love and attention. They are so tough and independent living in an hogar and while they do have women there to watch after them a lot of women are overworked and don't have time to really talk with the girls or help them do things. So that is a huge gap that we fill. We watch them play and pick them up when they fall down and ask them about school and what they are learning. We also try to encourage them and give them love and affection. Especially at my hogar where so many of the girls were sexually abused it is so important to teach them love and show them that they are loved and we do care about them.

I've kind of rambled a bit now, but the sum of this is that I really am very passionate about this organization and about the kids that we are working with here. If you are considering donating money this Christmas please consider making a donation to our class campaign. Your donation will go towards these programs that help these kids grow in so many ways.

To donate please visit this page Give Love. Give Hope. Give Opportunity or go to our facebook page and like us and then donate: Facebook Class Page.
Also, since I can't post photos on my blog you should definitely visit our facebook page to see pictures and videos of the kids we're working with. They are so cute!

My favorite photo of one of my girls and I at Festival de Arte.

Muchos Gracias y Feliz Navidad!