Address
373 Somerville Ave Apartment C
Somerville, MA 02143
Website
www.ninosdeveracruz.org
Description
Niños de Veracruz is a non-profit organization founded by Lasell College students in 2003. Our mission is to support children of cane and coffee worker families through educational scholarships and microloans in Coatepec, a city in the state of Veracruz, Mexico. We have awarded over 120 scholarships since 2005 and made more than $20,000 in small no-interest loans for small business, health and shelter.
Sixth grade kids of cane/coffee workers in Coatepec, Mexico often drop out of school at the end of the year to work with their parents in the fields. At that age, costs for school uniforms/books increase, and parents--often earning little more than $6-7 a day--are faced with the choice between expenses for food and school vs. the child’s income potential. Niños de Veracruz offers small scholarships, $200 per child for the best students in each sixth grade class of the Jorge Cerdán school. This is enough to move the child into 7th grade. Our first 7th-grade scholars are now studying in the university.
We are proud to be an all-volunteer organization As an organization in the US working in Mexico, we also train US college students and volunteers and empower them to understand and change their world. Courses, internships and interaction with our scholarship and loan recipients enable them to trace the complex connections between their lives and consumption and low-wage agricultural work in Mexico. They develop skills in fundraising, event planning, marketing and organizing.
Niños de Veracruz has also begun a partnership with a boy’s home in Orizaba, Veracruz. There we have established a small library of books, cds and educational dvds.
Category
Education – K-12, Education – Other, Hunger & Poverty, Women
