Disaster Response in the Philippines
When an unexpectedly strong and devastating monsoon flooded the capital recently, our staff in the Philippines feared for the many church partners that were affected by the rains and flooding.
Continue Reading ›From Negative to Positive Motivation
Rowel kept telling himself, “I’m going to be rich someday, and when I grow up I am going to show everyone in my neighborhood, especially my father, that I am good for something.”
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Church Partners in a Peculiar Little Town
In a developing city in south-central Philippines there is a peculiar little town called Abkasa. It is cut off from the rest of the main city by a single dusty road that is narrow and very bumpy, a couple of kilometers through tall sugar cane.
What Happens After Child Sponsorship?
A question typically asked by sponsors who are miles apart from their sponsored children is, “What happens to sponsored children after they leave the program?”
Thankful for a College Education
Theresa is one of the 28 sponsored youth who are studying at the AMG Skilled Hands Technical College through our ministry’s Complementary Intervention’s Non-Formal Education funds.
Living in Manila: A Day in the Life of Jessa
Nine-year-old Jessa lives in a tiny hovel situated within a crowded squatter community in metro Manila. She wakes up at 4 a.m. and it is still dark at this time of day. But inside Jessa’s home, it is always dark.
Training for the 2011 Special Olympics World Summer Games
Emilda is competing at the 2011 Greece Special Olympics in June and we are watching her train. She has been training daily since February, with her mother as a constant and faithful companion.
If at First You Don’t Succeed — Sell Banana Chips
When Apriliz was about to enter college her family was completely penniless. But Apriliz’s mother is resourceful and she thought of a way to send her daughter to college: cook delicious banana chips and sell them around the neighborhood.
The Making of a Special Olympics Champion
“My problem was she couldn’t run in a straight line,” Coach Gen explains. In several of the local competitions in Iloilo, Emilda lost some races because she would crisscross from lane to lane.
Skills for Life: Hand Sanitizers, Christmas Decorations and Spaghetti
“Our objective is that before (the sponsored children) leave the center, they should have something to fall back on for their daily living,” said Liza, child development worker and youth facilitator for Paglinang Student Center. “Not all of them can go to college and not all of those who do make it to college can land a good-paying job.”
My Mountaintop Experience
I’ve been to the crummiest, smelliest and most depressing communities around the Philippines, so I thought that climbing up a pile of trash wouldn’t be any different.
Rural Life in the Philippines
Due to poverty, many children drop out of school to work in sugarcane plantations. Here, they are exploited and forced to work long hours for meager pay. Negros Occidental has the highest magnitude of poor families in the country, mostly concentrated in rural areas. About 33 percent of the population lives on less than $1 a day.
