Help Bolivian Youth Access Higher Education

                                  OUR FORMER STUDENT, CESAR

 Cesar

Cesar, our former student, graduated in Electronics Engineering in 2021 from the state university, the UMSA. He was an outstanding student and was always eager to help the Project. Cesar provided math tutoring for many of our students and worked as a teaching assistant at his university.

Currently, Cesar works in the maintenance department of the most modern transportation system in the city of La Paz, the cable car (teleferico). He is excited to be able to apply many areas of his studies at this new job. Cesar also enjoys the adrenaline rush of being in the high towers of the cable cars.

One of Cesar's short-term goals is to become a Maintenance Supervisor in his job, and in the long term, he plans to open a company specializing in industrial maintenance, providing training and teaching at universities.

Congratulations Cesar!!

                                 OUR GRADUATES THIS QUARTER

Yoselin

Yoselin graduated in Business Administration from the Universidad San Fransisco de Asis. She worked in the administrative area of the Tahuantinsuyo and Villa Ingenio children's centers in the city of El Alto last year. Her job involved writing monthly and quarterly reports for the administrative section of the NGO and for the activities of the children's center. Currently, she is in the process of gaining work experience by working in a clothing store. One of Yoselin's goals is to save money to study International Commerce and then open her own business.

 Mariel

Mariel graduated with a degree in Clinical Laboratory Technology from the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés (UMSA). Currently, she is in her three-month internship at the transfusion service area at the Caja Nacional de Salud, the state health insurance office. Mariel is hoping to get a job contract in the same place after finishing her internship.

Arminda

Arminda graduated in Law at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés (UMSA). Arminda has an 8-year-old daughter and has dedicated all her time and effort to her studies and raising her daughter. She will soon achieve her goal of becoming a lawyer. Currently, she is in the final stage of her internship at the Prosecutor's office, aiming to obtain her professional degree in Law thereafter.

                                     SCHOOL SUPPLIES

In Bolivia, public education can be very expensive for low-income families. Parents must pay for schooluniforms (required at all public schools), books, school materials, special quotas for school activities and even musical instruments. Some families cannot afford to send their children to school. Thanks to the San Luis Foundation, which has been supporting us all these years, we can always cover most of the costs. Our students receive school materials from Helping Hands at the beginning of the school year and throughout the academic year. We also provide for the uniforms and special school requirements.

                                      FOOD BASKETS

Malnutrition is still an issue in Bolivia and this affects especially our girls and boys in elementary and high school. This not only leads to delayed growth, but to poor performance at school. We consider good nutrition to be crucial to the proper development of our students. Therefore, Helping Hands provides food baskets to 24 of our neediest families. The food baskets contain oil, oats, flour, semolina, api (a traditional Bolivian beverage), powdered milk, peanuts, eggs, wheat, quinoa, rice, salt, Swiss chard, carrots, turnips, and oranges.

It is the beginning of the school year again and Helping Hands continue supporting 65 students this 2024. If you would like to sponsors a student or just help out with a one-time donation, please visit OUR GlobalGiving website.

Helping Hands functions, thanks so very much to the collaboration of our friends and donors.  At any time, donations can be made to either of these two links. 

February

 Every year-end, we have an evaluation form where we gather suggestions for workshops that interest our boys and girls. Therefore, this year, we have a list of interesting topics that our students suggested.

The first workshop of the year was for our elementary and high school students. The topic "Discovering my worth, strengthening my self-esteem" was held by the psychologists Yamile and Viviana, who had already been giving us workshops last year.

This talk was a great learning experience about the importance of positive self-esteem and how it allows for emotional stability, strength to face adversity, improvement in interpersonal relationships, and motivation for our young people to achieve their goals of becoming successful professionals in the future.

March

 For the second workshop, one of our former Helping Hands students, Lizeth, led the presentation on Public Speaking for our technical and university students. Public Speaking is essential so that the students can share their knowledge clearly and precisely in their thesis, defenses and presentations, which are very frequent during their academic studies.

We are very proud of our former student, Lizeth, who graduated from the Universidad Catolica Boliviana with a Superior Technician degree in Management and Entrepreneurship in 2020. Lizeth then went on to study Economics at the prestigious state university, the UMSA, and graduated with honors.

She led an excellent presentation on Public Speaking.