Provide Quality Education to 15000 Amazon Children

- Vaga Lume association attends international event in Washington, DC

Our colleagues from Vaga Lume attended REACH to Forest, an international festival that took place from February 20 to March 3 at the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, USA. Vaga Lume was one of the organizations chosen to actively collaborate in the event by promoting the empowerment of children living in rural communities in the Amazon through literature.

The festival was attended by environmentalists, scientists, filmmakers, journalists and artists. Vaga Lume was represented by one of our educational volunteer and a 12-year-old boy, from the Menino Deus community (Portel/PA).

The boy is one of the kids that is benefiting of a library built by our work, he took part in a table alongside the festival's ambassador, eight-year-old British boy Aneeshwar Kunchala, who is passionate about the Amazon rainforest.

- When in Washington, we took the opportunity to meet our international partner, GlobalGiving 

Our Institutional Relations Manager, accompanied the team back in Washington and visited GlobalGiving's office. It was a great opportunity to strengthen ties, both organizations shared more about the difficulties of the causes they work on, and expressed their hopes for the future.

We are very grateful for GlobalGivin's warm welcome, such an important partner for Vaga Lume's international presence.

Vaga Lume was elected the Best Education NGO in Brazil for the third time by Instituto Doar

The initiative rewards organizations with excellence in management, governance, financial sustainability and transparency.  This is yet another recognition of our work done by many hands who believe in the power of access to reading for children and young people in the Amazon.

We're almost at the end of the year and we couldn't help but share our achievements with you. In 2023, we expanded our operations, opening 6 new libraries in communities in Castanhal and Santarém, in Pará. 

To support our growth, we strengthened our presence in the territory with the opening of our headquarters in Manaus.

Accessibility in libraries is an important matter for Vaga Lume and this year we sent desks adapted for people with disabilities to make the reading spaces even more welcoming.

You already know that Vaga Lume libraries operate in community spaces, but you may not be aware that the most committed libraries have their own libraries, built with the support of partners and donors. In 2023, São Sebastião nd the and Menino Deus communities in Portel, Pará state, finished building its new headquarters. 

Conference of local representatives from Amazonian communities reaffirms the exchange of knowledge

To strengthen our network of more than 880 volunteers, we held two meetings in 2023: the 3rd Virtual Meeting and the Meeting of Representatives in São Paulo to work on our reading mediation methodology and discuss topics related to literature for Amazonian children.

In a move to share our methodology, we offered the Vaga Lume reading mediation course to public school teachers in 7 of the municipalities where we operate.

Treasuring the traditional communities' culture,  in 2023 we held handcrafted books workshops in  in Soure, Pará, and Uarini, Amazonas,  in order to record oral traditions.

As for the Net Program, 8 communities and 8 schools and social organizations from São Paulo took part in our exchange program. More than 350 young people took part in workshops and exchanges throughout the year, sharing their realities, their dreams and their challenges.

Vaga Lume celebrates the opening of an office in Manaus, capital of the state of Amazonas

To celebrate the opening of Vaga Lume's new headquarters in Manaus, we brought together partners and people who believe in the power of reading for the first edition of the Vaga Lume Manaus Dinner.

Lia Jamra, our executive director, shared the importance of the state of Amazonas for Vaga Lume's growth: "Having a team in this very important hub in the Amazon is a big step in our resumption of growth. Not only because it facilitates the logistics of training and monitoring of activities, but also because of the strength that the city and state represent in the Amazon context".

All these achievements have been made possible with the support of donors like you, who believe in the transformative power of books and join forces with Vaga Lume to plant seeds of bright futures for children and young people in the Amazon.

We thank everyone who accompanies us and supports Vaga Lumeus on this journey. We hope to count on you in 2024 to continue bringing books and libraries to the Amazon. Donate and help us build a bright new year for the children of the Amazon.

Links:

• http://www.vagalume.org.br