Superemos Foundation and "Christine King" Multi-Service Cooperative

Projects Newsletter

covering January 2004

 by Vengel Moreno and Fiona Graham

Introduction 

The new school year is here - and so are dozens of new students from all over Estelí and country districts beyond. Our center is once again a hive of activity, with a total of 189 students at secondary school and 38 children at the pre-school. The social work team is out and about identifying and setting up women's groups around Estelí, whilst the health project is in the process of improving care in the regional prison. 

Our center on the outskirts of Estelí

This emphasis on planning, monitoring and evaluation is one of our program's key strengths. It enables us to use donations to the best possible effect to benefit the local community. We hope you will continue your support in 2004, and thank you for enabling our programs to get off to such a good start.

Pre-School Program

Lunchtime for Lester, Evert and Lenis

There are lots of new faces at Little Red Riding Hood Pre-School, the center run by the Cooperative, which reopened early in January. For the first two weeks the new children attended during the mornings only, to let them get used to their new surroundings little by little. They quickly felt at home, to judge from the hugs they were soon giving their teachers, and their boisterous enthusiasm at break times.

Thirty-eight children are currently attending our pre-school, whose maximum capacity is about fifty pupils. More are expected to enrol in the course of February. For the modest monthly fee of 100 cordobas (less than US$ 6.50), care is provided between 6.30 a.m. and 5.30 p.m.

Past experience suggests that attendance at our pre-school will improve the children's nutritional status, as the meals provided - breakfast, lunch and two snacks - are carefully balanced in accordance with a plan drawn up jointly by the coordinator and the cook. The coordinator, like the other staff, benefited last year from a series of workshops on nutrition, a topic that is often broached at the monthly parent-teacher meetings. 

Rony needs a helping hand with his spaghetti

Cooperation between staff and parents is vital to ensure that the benefits children enjoy at pre-school continue at home. The first meeting was very well attended and a Parents' Committee was elected to represent parents' collective interests and help organize social events.

Génesis tucks in with a will

A new departure this year is Superemos Foundation's formal agreement with a pre-school called Sinaï, based in an extremely poor district on the edge of town, known as Nuevo Amanecer / La Porra. Carmen Irías Montenegro, a remarkable woman who made great sacrifices to study at our night school, gaining her Baccalaureate in December, runs the center together with an enthusiastic younger colleague. 

Under the agreement signed at the end of last year, Superemos will provide funding for the children's food and a contribution towards the teachers' wages until November 2004. Sinaï currently has no budget for maintenance, school supplies, toys and games or playground equipment. Superemos hopes to be able to help with at least some of these costs in future. 

We want to express particular thanks to the Schooner Foundation (US) for its constant support, without which we would be unable to maintain our pre-school program. Megan Hagler has also made a generous contribution to this month's running costs.

Graduation day, 20th December 2003

Adult Education Program

20th December 2003 - Graduation Day - was a happy and memorable occasion for dozens of students and their families. Graduates marched in cap and gown up to the rostrum, accompanied by a family member, to receive their diplomas. Some were hand-in-hand with their father or mother, others with a small son or daughter. The quiet pride in their faces reflected the culmination of years of effort, and for many the opening up of new educational opportunities: technical training or university study.

First Level Results

 (The results of the social sciences examination are not yet available.)

 Second Level Results 

Carmen Irías Montenegro (right) 
with Bertha Imelda Sanabria

 (The results of the social sciences and the physics examinations are not yet available.)

Overall, our results remain the best in the country for this program of study, which is acknowledged by the Ministry of Education to be more difficult than the Distance Baccalaureate.

María Isabel Torres teaching mathematics

There are now 109 students enrolled on the Adult Baccalaureate Program, which has a system of centralized examinations set and marked by the Ministry of Education, and 80 on the Distance Baccalaureate Program, on which teachers bear sole responsibility for assessment. The Adult Baccalaureate remains very popular because able students can complete it in three years instead of the usual five.

Classes are held all day on Saturdays and Sundays, and at night on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. The weekend classes started in mid-January, the night classes at the end of the month. The bulk of students (119) prefer to attend school at the weekend. However, transport is still provided free of charge for night school students, as they would otherwise be unable to attend classes in the evening.

Several staff meetings were held in January to review last year's annual plan of work and draw up a new one for 2004, work out the timetable and discuss the study plans which teachers have drafted for each subject area, and which are now being examined by the Ministry of Education.

We want to acknowledge the generous support of the Schooner Foundation and the Union Church of Groton, which have enabled us to continue providing schooling for people on low incomes, especially women - a vital tool for improving their earning power and educational status.

Daysi Moreno (top left) with 3 youngsters 
from Santa Cruz

Social work 

Coordinator Hilda Duarte and her team are currently doing outreach work in a rural community called El Jícaro and in poor districts of northern Estelí: Los Ángeles, José Santos Zelaya, Arlen Siú and Nuevo Amanecer / La Porra. (In Nuevo Amanecer they are working together with Carmen Irías Montenegro, who runs the local pre-school). They aim to expand the existing handicrafts group that meets weekly in the Cooperative and identify local women's groups with an interest in learning craft skills. 

The craft skill groups have a dual purpose: participants acquire a marketable skill (crochet, dressmaking, embroidery, etc) and take part in training sessions on preventive healthcare and self-esteem. The latter is a major issue for women here, many of whom suffer greatly as a result of the male chauvinism that afflicts Nicaraguan society.

Over the last two months we have been seeking, with the assistance of the Third World House which coordinates joint initiatives with Estelí's twin cities in Europe, to promote the crocheted bags and other items produced by the handicraft groups. Our aim is to market local handicrafts through the fair trade shops which operate in some of these cities, which would help to generate some income for workshop participants. 

Daysi Moreno, pictured above, is currently trying to find suitable premises for the group of girls and young women that meets in Santa Cruz, a rural community south of Estelí. Over the past few months her pupils have developed their crochet and embroidery skills and learned a good deal about preventive healthcare from health promoter Gladys Ruiz.

In the past month Gladys, Hilda and Daysi have held two discussion workshops in the regional prison: one on human relations, with eighteen male inmates; and one on building a personal relationship with Christ, in which nine women inmates took part. It is worth stressing that topics are chosen in accordance with inmates' wishes; many prisoners have a strong interest in religion and are keen to develop their understanding further and share their insights.

Women prisoners making a piñata

Women prisoners with the finished piñata

The women's group also enjoyed a craft workshop in which they learned to make piñatas, which are brightly colored figures filled with candies and used in party games, especially for children's birthdays.

We are indebted to the Dorchester House Multi-Service Center and Dr. Peter Loewinthan and his friends for enabling us to maintain this program.

Healthcare Project

The year began with a check on the inventory of the Cooperative's dispensary, so as to ensure all remaining medicines are used by their expiry date. Nothing is wasted; drugs that seem unlikely to be used in time in the Cooperative are donated to other institutions in need, such as the local Health Center. In this case, drugs to the value of about US$ 300 were donated to the regional penitentiary, which is chronically short of even the most basic medical resources. 

The dispensary was restocked with the most frequently prescribed drugs to the value of US$ 826.

Healthcare coordinator Gladys Ruiz signed agreements with psychologist Dr. Ada Luz Corrales and Dr. Aura Estela Garmendia, a family doctor with experience in genecology, who will continue to provide regular consultations at very low cost for cooperative staff and beneficiaries of the education projects. She also signed a contract with the prison under which an odontologist and a  family doctor will provide free healthcare once and twice a month respectively.  

We would like to thank Ellen Parlow for her continuing interest in and support for the health project.

Environmental Workshop

Workshop staff are currently gathering information about the feasibility and desirability of a water pump project in rural communities near Yalí in the department of Jinotega, which lies north-east of the department of Estelí. 

Legal Advice Project

The legal advice project is in the process of being reorganized. Project workers Hilda Duarte Solórzano and Daysi Flores Toruño are interviewing potential coordinators, with a view to employing on a contract basis an experienced lawyer able to provide needed training. They are also doing outreach work in local universities so as to attract interns.

Thanks are due to Megan Hagler for her support in maintaining this project.

Cooperative Store

The cooperative store reopened in new premises in mid-January, to coincide with the start of the secondary school's weekend classes. It has been doing a roaring trade on Saturdays and Sundays, when staff are besieged at break by hungry students.

Its product range includes over sixty products: school supplies, staple foods such as rice, beans, cheese and vegetables, household goods, garments, snacks, juice and coffee. These are bought in bulk as far as possible and sold at low prices.

Although the store still has a debt to the Cooperative's reserve fund, this is gradually being reduced. Now in its seventh month of existence, it is operating on a sound financial footing. 

Benjamín, Daysi Flores and Vengel at the store

Financial report

Source

- To everyone who has helped to further the cause of social justice in Nicaragua by contributing to our programs -

THANK YOU !

*  The Administrative Board and staff of the Christine King Cooperative

*  The Assembly and Board of Superemos Foundation 

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