TEACHERS are the BACKBONE to EDUCATE GIRLS in Peru

CW girls celebrate 35th anniversary while studies continue..
                                                        
We are 8 months now again in class time at Chicuchas Wasi School for Girls 2022. Each year our incoming 4 & 5 y/o kindergarten girls settle into their classroom to learn the ropes of CW school life. They each have a big sister to help them as needed. For this age group the main academic focus is on teaching them to read using our unique style of education. 

CW learning is fun
The little ones first learn the alphabet song and sing it many times with each other. Our 4and5 year old girls have been busy learning their letters by finger-drawing each letter, like M, and saying the letter out loud one by one over and over, while drawing each letter on a desktop sandbox (like an etch-a sketch). Next, they will learn to write their first name, and slowly add and practice daily words they use, like desk, chair, book; using the same sandbox technique, they will next draw the numbers 1-10, then 1-20 etc. This is part of the CW style learning with stepping stones for learning to read and prepare for mathmatics. All CW girls can read and write by the end of the 1^st grade. CW has been gifted an extensive library of books for all 1 through 6 primary grades. Many girls read more advanced books and have learned to love reading stories and writing poems to share with their families. To illustrate the wonder of reading words, the kinder girls will sit in story time as the teacher reads to them pointing out the letters. After kindergarten our students will move on to the 1^st grade where they will deepen these reading skills and begin to learn to read their first books and write.

Please donate on this link:
https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/educate-110-poor-girls-in-cusco-for-economic-survival/

THANK YOU

CW annual school talent competition

Last week our age-related competing subjects were mathematics, dance, poems and speaking and sharing in front of the entire student body. The 100 gift-wrapped award items of cute and colorful clothing (from CA friends) were given out to the winners for the best effort and creativity as all voted on presentations. Here are the images of top contestants translated for you:

Zafiro, second grade reads well and wins with her poem.
  "Oh! dear school
  thanks to you I learned my first letters to write read draw and paint
  thanks to your beautiful teachers, with love and sweetness
  teach us every day to be better
  Oh! dear school CHICUCHAS WASI
  I will always carry you in my heart
  thank you for opening your doors to me" - Safiro

Elizabeth third grade wins with her poem
“Today is a very special day
  all primary and initial grades come to celebrate our second home 
  I just want to tell you dear school
  that I have a lot of appreciation for you because here I have everything
 
  Today you turn 35 and we want to celebrate it
  during the 2 long years at home, you do not know how much we missed you 
  Here in your beautiful classrooms and with my dear teachers
  I learned that life is very beautiful and that we should not be sad about anything 

  Today I want you to know that I am happy in elementary school
  And that initial was also a beautiful period and I will be much happier with my high school dream
  when my dreams are fulfilled, I will wait with my heart open. That is why I want to tell you, with a lot of love and affection  "HAPPY DEAR SCHOOL DAY" - Elizabeth
 
Milagros fifth grade wins with her poem.
My little school
" Dear Chicuchas wasi, you opened the beautiful doors of your school to me, from the first day you welcomed me, you gave me love and patience with your teachers who taught me to be a better person every day. I have spent a few years with you, between your classes I learn everything every day, in time I understood that what I have lived will always be with me 
In your classes I learned to read, write, draw and have fun endlessly
Today that you are celebrating your anniversary that is why want to celebrate you, so that today and always you continue to occupy the first place in my heart" -Milagros

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Our tuition-based Maria School business plan - will begin to generate good income to support the Maria school as well as the Chicuchas Wasi school for girls as it reaches full enrollment. 

Cusco parents who demand quality private school education for their college bound children, plan to educate them at very competitive foreign and national universities. We really need your donations for this last move for longevity success in Peru. This is the perfect business for CW.org as the demand is here after covid permanently closed down many private schools that were functioning unsupervised in small rented buildings the last 2 years. The CW Maria school is a beautiful modern and colorful primary school built to deliver quality education and welcomed by the Ministry of Education..

Meanwhile we still need your support for the Chicuchas Wasi School for girls that we continue to deliver at no charge to our poor families. Please see PIE and donate. Thank you so much for the gift of education for girls.

We share with you the 35 years success of Chicuchas Wasi Org. nonprofit. This is the moment and the last few years needed to implement the promise of longevity and free education for poor indigenous girls in Cusco, Peru. We are VERY close! Please stick with us a bit longer. Financial independence for CW School for Girls is in reach! The ‘Maria co-ed tuition-based School’ will not only raise the funds to support the free CW school for girls and the Maria school – we will be providing quality education for boys and girls with our Chicuchas Wasi academic teaching style. Empowerment and respect for all is what both schools promise students along with confident young adults going forward. 

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I am sorry to keep asking but please donate any amount you can during this process:

to be able to operate CW School for girls the next 2 years while Maria start-up operation gets going. 
*Proposed 2023 Chicuchas Wasi School Budget $158,908.40  Included: school meals and transportation each year.
*Approximate 2023 Maria School budget $25,000 is minimal; to start-up Maria school with 3 classrooms & 3 teachers, maintenance of school and utilities. As student numbers grow so will the income from tuition for the operations of the school.

Many blessings to us all for a brighter, pandemic free new reality.

Please donate with this link:

https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/educate-110-poor-girls-in-cusco-for-economic-survival/

Chicuchas Wasi School for Girls are back!
                THANK YOU 
Your continued support makes the difference!
 

CW's future when the (tuition-based ) 'Maria Tuition School' classes are filled, will be self-supporting. CoVid upset our plans to open the Maria school in 2020 until new school year in March 2023 due to lock down. We begin enrolling new students before year end.    PLEASE DONATE
during this transition period to self-suffici9ence with the tuition based Maria school.

NOTE: Thank you all for hanging in there with us. We have a little way to go yet but the impact of our work is self evident in the success of our girls...some are at the university today. 

PLEASE DONATE  on this link:      
https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/educate-110-poor-girls-in-cusco-for-economic-survival/
THANK YOU

Links:

• Official Chicuchas Wasi website

Happy July Ends and New Worries begin -Rae Lewis July 27, 2022

 CW girls love school and learning and are easily engrossed in the daily school routine. A rare surprise this month was a three week visit from Yoga Teacher, Elaine, who came from New Zealand to visit Cusco, CW School and teach the girls English,Yoga and Meditation; enthusiasm is an understatement for the joyful emotions of the girls (see photos). The teachers are busy with normal class activities and special programs, they also daily reinforce the covid precautions: mask, handwashing and distance for school and home life and not one case among them. See photo of the graduating class --color guard transfer to next promotion girls.

CW survived the two year home-school during the Covid crisis pretty well. CW also provided emergency food staples for our 100 families unable to work and afford food for those two years. Amazingly, CW administrator Ruth also managed to finalize the Cusco fundraiser project ‘Maria School’ construction in 2020. Unfortunately, Covid and the Gov. order to continue home school derailed our plan to enroll Maria students in 2020 and the delay ate up our new school set-up funds. 

In 1987 when CW was founded, I promised to share CW successes and difficulties encountered going forward. After 35 years managing the mostly smooth and lately bumpier years, Ruth and I have hit a snag. After 30 + years working together -Ruth supervised the building of both the CW school and the Maria School while I manage the administrative and fundraising work in California, and if a problem appears we put our heads together to find the solution. Today Ruth and I are burning up the phone lines to solve the new financial hurdle. 

Our perfect plan to shift Cusco funding to Peru - but not yet
CW has prepared well: both schools are constructed well and provide large classrooms and necessities for the long term, and our staff and teachers are ready with new additions picked for the Maria School. The nonprofit ChicuchasWasi.org owns them both outright and we are ready, BUT we have just hit a bumpy road full of potholes: The new Maria School's modest start-up funds are gone, post covid donations are down, and the loss of a hoped for special grant to finance the transition of California fundraising to Cusco fundraising. The tuition from the ‘Maria School’ ( ready to begin enrolling boys and girls for a quality college prep school) is ready to open March 1, 2023. Rae submitted the grant proposal to fund the start-up costs to transition to ‘Maria School’ financial self-sufficiency. The granting entity has decided to hold off on all grants: still recovering post covid there are few grants available. We have tightened our belt- English and art classes on hold until funds allow, but daily school meal and school bus programs continues. CW School will not close, BUT we must transition the future funding to the Maria School project and need secure funds to do so.

The Grant that almost was
The funding we need will pay 3 classroom teachers the first and second year and grow the Maria student body as students move a grade up and new students enroll. The loss of the hoped for start-up funding is a now a big pot hole in our self-sufficiency plan going forward. The ‘Maria tuition school’ will generate good income to support its operation and with full enrollment also the budget of the CW free School for Girls. We will have success. The Cusco parents who demand quality private school education for their college bound children, plan to educate them at very competitive foreign and national universities. We really need your donations for this last move to success in Peru. This is the perfect business for CW.org as the demand is huge after covid closed down many private schools in rented buildings

You made CW possible and share the 35 years success of Chicuchas Wasi Org. nonprofit. This is the moment and the last couple of years to guarantee the promise of CW longevity and free education for poor indigenous girls in Cusco, Peru. We are so close I can almost touch it. Financial independence for CW School for Girls is in reach! The ‘Maria co-ed tuition-based School’ will not only raise the funds to support the free CW school for girls and the Maria school – we will be providing quality education for boys and girls with our open arms and value strong style. Empowerment for our forgotten girls and respect for all is what both schools promise along with quality education for confident young students going forward. So please help us make this slow shift to self-sufficiency in Cusco, Peru. Our CW team is ready! California is ready! And our students and families are ready too.

                 PLEASE DONATE Today

https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/educate-110-poor-girls-in-cusco-for-economic-survival/

As the founder of CW in 1987, I have become increasingly and sadly aware that most of the nonprofit projects I knew in Cusco have had to close down due to Covid or when the founder could not continue to raise needed funds as she aged or the founder died. Fortunately, I am healthy and continue to write to you all each month from my home office in California. But I am a realist: next year I will be 80 and must keep the promise I made to the children that CW will be able to welcome many more little girls like our students and alumnae for generations to come. Ruth and I co-founded the CW school (she the teacher and I the nurse) have worked together for 30 years. Anyone who has met Ruth knows she is a powerhouse at 55 years, and will take CW forward for years to come. She has already begun grooming Gloria to follow here one day. This fact gives me peace of mind, plus I quite able to manage my part in CW CA.

Please dig deep to help us get the start-up process started. Below are the numbers that you will help you understand.  I have made them as clear as I can, all thanks to our efficient California board Treasurer and Bookkeeper Isabel

The 2022 Chicuchas Wasi School budget was $156,560.00. we are still raising for last 3 months of school. On August 1, 2022 we have a $42,000 bank balance. Please see the wheel image breakdown.
*Five years ago we began saving for a serious emergency (my death and the only fundraiser) and have $180,000.00 untouched in a different bank. Watching my friends close down their 25 yr projects was upsetting. Not being grim, but a practical person must prepare for unforeseen events-it matters to our CW girls and team.
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Proposed 2023 Chicuchas Wasi School Budget $158,908.40 
Included: school meals and transportation for each year.
Proposed 2024 Chicuchas Wasi School Budget $ 161,292.03
Funds above are needed to operate CW School the next 2 years while Maria start-up operation gets going. 
Approximate budget is minimal to begin Start-up Maria school (3 classrooms/3 teachers, maintenance of school and utilities) As student numbers grow so will the income from tuition for the operations of the school.

Approximate Maria start-up budget is $25,000. per year
is minimal to begin Start-up Maria school (3 classrooms/3 teachers, maintenance of school and utilities) As student numbers grow so will the income from tuition for the operations of the school.

Many blessings to us all for a brighter, pandemic free new reality.

Links:

• Official Chicuchas Wasi Org. website