By Diana Rae Lewis | Founder and President
This is our first report to you about our new top priority project, 'Safe Transportation for Vulnerable Girls'.
First and foremost, THANK YOU for YOUR donations to help us acquire another urgently needed school van.The one we have been using we bought second hand 4 years ago and it makes 6 trips daily over bad roads to manage all the girls. It was overworked with 105 girls last year, breaking down often and beginning in March we will have 110 students and we must split the workload with 2 vehicles over these bad roads. Bigger pricy tour buses are out of our reach. School buses like in developed countries are not available or used here due to the bad roads. A plan to asphalt the access road to reach our entry road is in the works now, but we are learning patience as things move slowly in Cusco.
No transportation for our girls = no school that day.
Rural areas in Cusco are not well served by public transportation and poverty makes even the small change needed for bus travel impossible for our famlies. Getting to and from our school by walking for an hour or more is too difficult, especially for our vulnerable younger girls living too far away to walk safely to school. The rain and wet muddy conditions that children commonly encounter on their walk to school in rural areas is why many never make it more than a few days if that, per week. The teachers seldom appear at the school for all of the same reasons more than once or twice a week, if at all.Therefore, the schools often are closed down in these areas and the children desperately needing them are denied an education.
A brief CW history will explain more. In 1987 CW began providing emergency shelter for the thousands of abandoned children living on the streets of Cusco. These children taught us that their fathers often left the family in search of distant work and never returned. Their uneducated and often teen mothers were unable to provide for them and out of desperation sent them to fend for themselves as young as 6-7 alone. CW refocused in 1997 on educating indigenous girls and our school was created specifically for impoverished rural girls unable to go to school, adding to the prevailing belief is that girls are inferior to boys for learning. By educating girls we are changing their lives, their families and communities. Aside from education we provide empowerment for a future of financial survival and opportunity. Without girls education, this age old belief will continue to cycle from grandmother to mother to daughter keeping girls/women poor, abused and unable to care for their children if alone.
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Last year a father and Mason, his 17 year old daughter, made a visit to our school and look what Mason has to say about her experience with our girls and program:
“While my father and I were in Cusco the December of 2013, our tour guide introduced us to the Chicuchas Wasi School for Girls. The day we visited, a storm washed out part of the road, which meant that the car we were riding in could barely make it to the school. The director told us that on days like this, most girls can't go to school, because there isn't enough transportation for them.
My father and I were welcomed into the school with open arms. As we left, we realized that there had to be something to do because we had never seen such appreciation for education before. I have now turned my attention to fundraising for the school. The school is in dire need of more buses. This project is actually on the top of their "to-do" list for 2015. The school receives no government funding and is run by mostly external donations. The school appreciates every bit of help they can get.” To donate, please visit http://www.globalgiving.org/fundraisers/one-word-project/
Please share this project with your friends and help fund the necessary transportation for these girls who are so eager to learn.
Give the Gift of education for girls **Please DONATE today**
“When we liberate girls with an education, they liberate those around them."
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