What a truly incredible term!! Thanks to the brilliant support of our core funders La Vida, the Lata Foundation and the Richardson Family, our hostel guests and crowd-funders and El Rio hostel for supporting us in everything we do. We are now delivering seven active community programmes in seven communities and working with 550 children every week 🙂

The last quarter has been our most impactful ever and we are incredibly proud of our fantastic staff. Huge thanks also to our exceptional volunteer team who inspire us every day. As our English teacher Sebastian wrote in an open letter to our volunteer team:

‘I have seen in you the strength of a family that gives its energies to the well-being of all and seeks to improve the conditions of those who do not have them. I admire your courage and resilience, your charisma and the work you do every day. Thank you for showing me your dedication, your limitless youth, your blood devoted to shared effort, common work, service and the enjoyment of life through work! You are the strength and energy of the foundation!’

We are indeed extremely lucky to have worked with such talented, hard-working and joyous individuals. A special thanks to Chenaye (a returning Foundation legend from 2018) and Alex for rocking the activities role for a record four months 🙂

We were also very luck to find Kahra, who with her years of experience shaping child protection policy in the UK, has helped us review and update our Child protection policy for 2023. Running community consultations in four different communities, including with parents, children and teachers and working with all our staff, she has written our new policy tailored for our local context which you can read HERE. She has also helped create a whole library of supporting documents to ensure that our child protection policies across our organisation are following best practice guidelines. Her work has already had a big impact in helping us to identify more children who need additional support, and the impact of her two and a half months with us will be felt for many years to come.

We have also continued to provide monthly training sessions for all our Foundation staff. Highlights include: First aid training for 40+ Foundation and hostel staff across two mornings in May (thanks to Alex and Danilo) and two ‘managing your emotions’ workshops from Julieta (external psychologist) to help our staff with their own emotional wellbeing and also give them the best tools to support children across our programmes.

At Academic Tutoring, thanks to the support of La Vida and the Lata Foundation, we are providing 28 hours of teaching each week across five communities. You can read our January to June Impact report HERE. We are particularly delighted that parents have rated their satisfaction with the programme 10/10.

‘I have seen lots of positive changes in my daughter this term. Her concentration has improved, she is much better at sharing and working in teams. She absolutely loves Tutoring and all the activities. The Foundation has helped her a lot.’ – Onaida, Buritaca parent.

The Community English programme continues to grow with in-school sessions two mornings a week in two local primary schools. At Tutoring, we also run 7 hours + of English lessons each week. ‘My goal at Tutoring was to reinforce the self-confidence of each child and get them to trust in their English-speaking skills.’ Isabella, lead tutor Buritaca and Las Cabanas. In the last six months, English test results improved 10% across all communities.

The El Rio Games sports and arts programme continues to go from strength to strength, with 26 clubs across five communities every week, we are delighted with the range and quality of the activities on offer to 300+ children along the Troncal del Caribe.

In the last three months, we have also run four very large and very fun community festival days: A whole school multi-sport festival to celebrate Children’s day at Puerto Nuevo primary school (150 kids), a large Ultimate frisbee tournament (acting as regional trials), a 140+ sports festival in the Indigenous town of Quebrada del Sol and our end of term close, where our four dance clubs, Little Kids’ activities and our circus skills club performed in front of a 100+ strong crowd.

‘I am so proud of the feeling of friendship and support in the Buritaca girls’ dance group. They helped each other a lot to work on choreographies and simple things like fixing their hair before presenting.’ – Lily, Buritaca Dance teacher.

Hopefully the photos linked above go some way to capturing the joy of each day.

Art club has also once again expanded and now involves 55 children across four communities.

‘Through our art sessions, we create an open space in which kids have fun learning to draw and craft while using their observation skills and imagination.’ – Ami, Lead Art teacher

Little Kids’ Activities highlights include havng their own sports day and also enjoying trips to Q.Valencia waterfall and Yay Eco-lodge as part of their year round focus on environmental education.

To support the community of Q.del Platano, as well as providing school materials and educational support to the children now attending secondary school in Santa Marta, we organised a  farmers market in partnership with El Laberinto to help provide a space for local farmers to sell their produce direct to the public. It was a hugely enjoyable day and we are now planning to repeat it on the last Sunday of every month.

‘I enjoyed the event 10/10. It was great to be with the Foundation team selling our produce. The kids really enjoyed being at the maze and learning how to sell in the best way. They really grew in confidence and by the end they completely lost their fear of selling. We would definitely like to take part again :)’ – Sandra, Q.del Platano farmer and parent.

In the last three months, we also ran a community consultation and very successful two-month pilot for our 2023 Environmental programme including five days of Eco week activities between the 5^th – 10^th June. We are now actively looking for a programme sponsor and you can read about the programme, to teach environmental education to inspire positive and pro-active climate action from 500+ young people and their families, HERE.

We are also very proud of our Indigenous Community programme delivery. We have sent one of our lead teachers Sebastian to Quebrada del Sol to be a full-time member of staff, teaching English to 190+ children in the schools.

We have also run three sports and environmental education days, culminating in a large end of term festival day where 40+ Foundation and hostel staff went up the mountain to deliver one of my favourite festival days ever. It was always my dream to bring joy and education through sport in Q.del Sol when we met the community leaders 3.5 years ago, so to do so in such spectacular fashion, with such a large volunteer team, is literally a dream come true for me. Please see photos from that amazing day HERE.

‘On behalf of the Kogui District Ethno-educational Institution of Mulkwakungui, we want to thank the team of the El Rio Foundation for bringing happiness to our students through play and education. Breaking our routine and teaching a new learning process are helping both our students and our teachers. We would like this link between the Institution and the Foundation to continue and to strengthen to bring joy and good energy to our students. Thank you very much.’ – Teaching team, Q.del Sol.’

Each month, we have focused on a different Foundation value or skill and in June, it was ‘Gratitude’. To end the summer newsletter, we would like to say a big THANK YOU to everyone who has believed in us and has supported us to grow to where we are today. We would also like to share some of the things our team are grateful for:

‘I am grateful for the joy and enthusiasm with which I go to each Tutoring session in Villacuisa.’ – Paola, Villacuisa lead teacher

‘I am grateful for being part of this team 🙂’ Fernando, lead English teacher at Tutoring, Buritaca and Las Cabanas.

‘I am grateful to the communities that welcome us, appreciate and even care about us’ – Daniel, El Rio Games lead.

‘A huuuuge thank for the trust. I feel so trusted and encouraged in my work. I felt free in my work and supported at the same time. Thank you so much!’ Lily, Dance teacher.

‘I am grateful for gratitude month. It’s very special to me and spreads feel good vibes across the team and the community. It also promotes a good sense of humour and a positive attitude. I also feel very grateful that my work is something I really love.’ – Camilo, El Rio Foundation Psychologist.

If you would like to find out more about any of the above or you would like to sponsor any Foundation programmes, please don’t hesitate to get in touch – @elriofoundation, foundation@elriohostel.com or click HERE to donate. We welcome donations of any size 🙂

All our main programme overviews for 2023 are also available HERE

Hope you have a fantastic rest of the summer!!

Best wishes,

Felix and the El Rio Foundation team 🙂