By Mitch Lewis | Executive Director
It’s an exciting time for us as we prepare to launch our first cottage industry in Mozambique this October. Here’s a snapshot of what’s been happening:
Latest News in the U.S.
Here are some of the exciting things that are happening with the project:
The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction presented the Heeling Our World project at a Student Leadership Institute conducted at Pffier University. The story was shared with over 100 4th-12th graders across North Carolina.
We were awarded a Harold H. Bate grant to bring the project into Eastern NC schools.
Latest from Mozambique
We have modified our action plan. Instead of working with just a single village, we will now be using a hub and spoke approach. Our hub will be in Maputo, where we will create a training program at Mozarte. This is a vocational training facility which works with women and disadvantaged youth. Once trained, they will be able to share these skills with women from many of the surrounding villages. This should allow us to reach a much larger group of women, thereby providing shoes for a far greater number of barefoot children.
We are blessed to have found a gentleman in Maputo who will be a key player in the project. His name is Moises and he grew up as a barefoot child in Mozambique. (His video is part of this report) Moises realized that the only way he would ever have shoes was to make them for himself. This ultimately led to a career in shoe manufacturing. Moises, now known as “the master” has generously agreed to conduct workshops and help us in our training program. He will also be developing the production process for the shoes designed by the NC State students. These shoes will ultimately be sold at local markets and through an e-commerce site, with proceeds going to support the cottage industries.
Thank you so much for being a part of our team. We would love to hear what you think about our project. Any comments or suggestions on ways to improve it would be most appreciated. Are there any ways that we could work together to engage a larger audience and attract wider support? Please contact us at info@artstoendgenocide.org. Thanks.
Best,
Mitch
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