Ambergris Caye Belize School goes Solar Power

Hello once again to all our faithful supporters. School has started again and it’s wonderful to see the school fill up with happy and enthusiastic children, excited to be back in the classroom after the long school holidays.

Literacy Day
The first celebration on the school calendar is Literacy Day and as always our students threw themselves into the celebrations with enthusiasm. Many created posters about books and reading. The 5 children from Std III, created their own story of Barbie and Kelly going on the Ferris wheel at the park. Being able to read and write makes such a huge difference for these children’s future.

Sailing Success
This was in the local paper today – we’re so proud of our kids for coming in 1st and 2nd in this district wide competition.

On St. Georges Caye, San Pedro Children Raced to Victories in Sunday’s Battle Regatta. Implementing the skills they learned in this year’s San Pedro Youth Summer Sailing Program, eight students aged 8 to 13 brought home medals and trophies in three different classes of sailboats during this past Sunday’s races. Sailing the Optimist class dinghies they have trained in all summer, San Pedranitos [residents of San Pedro] finished 1st, 2nd, and 3rd in the first and second heats, 1st and 3rd in the fourth heat, and swept 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 5th in the finals.

They competed against kids from Belize City, Consejo, and Ladyville. The top three in the finals were Kevin Velasquez, age 9, from Holy Cross, David Puc, age 13 from Holy Cross, and Jerdon Anderson, 12, of RC School. David Verralls, 13, of San Pedro High School, placed 1st in the catamaran class and 2nd in the Picos. The competition throughout the day was friendly and Our kid’s overwhelming performance was greeted with awe, admiration and congratulations from those they defeated and their sponsors.

We’re so proud of our kids! In picture below the Holy Cross students, from left to right, are David (black T-shirt), Kevin (blue shirt with boat trophy) and Alexander Rhaburn (white shirt with round logo) who also participated but did not place.

Sewing Center
The sewing center has gotten off to a great start and recently had a wonderful article printed in the newspaper – Mothers of San Mateo create business opportunity for selves. We are so proud of them! You can support the sewing center from home by either donating through the foundation, or by collecting together sewing supplies for delivery to Belize. Colorful fabrics, white cotton for shirts, used sewing machines and great ideas for craft projects are all needed.

Solar Panels
We are SO EXCITED to report that the solar panels are now on the roof of the computer lab and that as I type the hard working folk from Baker Renewable Energy are running wires and doing all the final touches to get the current running. This is a dream come true for the school and marks an important milestone in our vision to be more sustainable and green. The solar panels will provide about one third of the electricity for the school, significantly reducing our monthly electric bill for the next 25 years!. This project has been over a year in the planning – thank you so much to all of you who have supported this project.

We Need Your Help!!!!

On a more serious note, I am urgently appealing to you all for donations to keep this wonderful work at Holy Cross going. With the added costs of starting a preschool, and the reduction in donations because of the economy, we urgently need your financial donations to keep the lights on, the toilets flushing and food on the children’s lunch table. Please ask your church, civic organization, your friends. Please consider doing a bake sale, a pot luck dinner, a work-a-thon, a car wash, whatever you can think of to help Holy Cross continue to feed and educate incredibly wonderful and incredibly needy kids. Every donation, large or small, helps.

For those who like the numbers, here are some ballpark figures of what we can do with the money you provide:

$30 – feed a child for a month
$100 – buy one load of sand for the playground
$150 – cover the wage of one support staff for a week (eg security, preschool assistant, warden, cook)
$400 – cover the total cost of educating one child at the school for one year
$600 – pay the water bill for a month
$750 – feed a class of 25 children for a month
$1,500 – pay the electric bill for a month
$3,500 – feed the school for a week
$7,500 – feed a class of 25 children for a year
$25,000 – hire a dredge to fill in part of the school grounds

Donating is easy. To get the tax advantage, you can post a check to the Holy Cross Education Foundation, at 7550 Corporate Way, Eden Prairie, MN 55344, Attention: Brian Ostenso, Chairman or online at www.hcefoundation.org. Or you can send a check to the school directly at PO Box 59, San Pedro, Ambergris Caye, Belize, Central America.

Thank you all so much of behalf of all the staff and children
Lydia Brown
Volunteer Coordinator