Fund a teacher and teach a class in Latin America

I hope all is well with you. It has been a great few months on the projects.

The final few weeks are underway for all our scholarship students in Guatemala. As well as studying the students get to participate in inter-school football tournaments. This teamwork and competition is another benefit of staying in school which the scholarships provide.

Our scholarship students were once again involved in our reforestation programme to make the most of the rainy season. Over the past twenty years we have planted hundreds of thousands of trees to offset all of The Phoenix Projects’ carbon footprint (and much more!). Our scholarship students are leading the way by showing awareness of the need to reforest, not deforest, for a better future.

The students are always involved in cultural celebrations in the school and in the community. With so many outside influences in today’s world, culture can often be forgotten so it is very important to keep these events relevant.

As part of the scholarship programme the students get involved in litter clearing days around the community of San Pedro and the shore of the lake. They have undertaken several this year and this time they filled dozens of bags of rubbish which is then sent to the Municipal landfill site. Recycling is still a work in progress…

In Peru twenty-eight students and three teachers were involved in this year’s Impington International College, Cambridge, United Kingdom, trip. The final terrace of the vegetable garden was cleared of rocks and levelled out. Drip-irrigation was installed and vegetable seedlings were planted, including onion, beetroot, lettuce and cabbage. The temporary large stone steps between the main school and the classroom which was built on the first Impington trip were replaced (lots of rock which was removed from the vegetable garden went into the concrete mix.)

We used part of the funds raised to build an oven in the school. This will be used primarily for baking bread and for larger-scale school meals and celebrations. Fifteen students received one-on-one teaching in maths, languages, English and art. The school storeroom and library was also given a good clean and sort.

A large mural was painted to celebrate the relationship with the school and Impington International College and as is tradition the trip was finished off with dance and food.

In Ecuador graduations marked the end of the school year with our six local teachers playing an important role in their education, especially as we continue to try to recoup the losses of crucial teaching time due to the pandemic. There were also graduations from pre-school into the main primary school.

Classes will restart with the new school year in September when we will continue with our local teachers as well as providing some school materials and helping out with the daily food programme where we can. We will continue with paying for the internet as well as covering some maintenance costs including painting which will be undertaken in September. We have already provided the materials and the members of the community got together for a minga to build a wall to protect the school.

On top of our educational support we will be undertaking further work in other rural Andean communities starting with Azabí, an hour further into the Andes from where we currently work. Azabí is a forgotten tiny hamlet of about thirty families in the cloud forest which is only reachable by dirt track. We started by delivering essential food supplies for the elderly and disabled members of the community.

Azabí is also where we have implemented a large-scale Plan Huerta, the first harvest of which was recently undertaken with an excellent yield from the 4 acre (1.5 hectare) piece of land. This will economically help several members of the community as well as sustainably cover the costs of Plan Moo management.

We only have a few days left to confirm places for the upcoming Patagonia charity challenge in November so if you are interested please do follow the link below. Plans for 2025 charity challenges are already in the pipeline - one of which will be celebrating 20 years working in Ecuador where apart from climbing volcanoes we will spend a day doing community work. For information on the challenges and indeed our work please do contact me on dom@thephoenixprojects.org

Thank you all as ever for your generous donations to the projects, without which none of the above would have been achieved and would not be possible in the future. 

Have a great September

cheers

Links:

• Patagonia Charity Challenge