Hope Center

We met Maria and travelled down the terrible road to the school. They have completed some major improvements since my last visit and were doing the finishing touches on the masonry work. Much to our surprise, we walked into a decorated hall with three place settings to honor us. We visited the culinary and salon classes and reviewed the strategic plan with Maria while the students completed preparations for our special meal (since we were not expecting a meal at 3:00 PM, we had a big lunch at Happy Rwanda).


We presented Maria with the checks totaling $2800 and she said that would provide the needed funds for four months. She also had more good news from her meeting with REACH; she will have an intern that will be paid by that organization and one of her first responsibilities will be local fundraising. She will also help Maria to upgrade her Board to include a banker, a hotel and restaurant owner and someone form the Ministry of Education.


The time I have spent working with Maria and Philbert has been very rewarding and I hope to continue my support through email and fundraising efforts in the US. It was hard to say goodbye to both of them because I will miss them as people and working so closely with them.

There will be much more about the day’s activities from Luanne and Betsy when they post their impression of visiting the school, meeting Maria and the staff and enjoying a meal with the students.