Elisabeth, 12, and Maria Teresa, 12, are from Huilloc,
an impoverished town in the high Andes. They are now
teaching traditional weaving and attending secondary
school in Urubamba, Peru.
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2011 Urubamba, Peru
Forgirlsake raised $5,780 to establish a textile-teaching course, providing an opportunity for indigenous girls teaching the course to attend school. Its financial success will resonate in their community and the program aims to break racial barriers between indigenous and non-indigenous groups.
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2010 Morogo, Tanzania
This year our objective was to raise $6,265 to fund a
solar-powered computer lab for the Sega girls’ school
in Tanzania. Instead, we raised $9,273 and were able to purchase additional computers and provide internet
access for approximately three years.
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2009 Maasai Mara, Kenya
In this past year we raised funds for a library at a girls'
secondary school under construction in Maasai Mara, a rural
region of Kenya with a high poverty rate. Instead, we surpassed our original fundraising goal and raise $9,600!
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2008 Sironko, Uganda
In 2007 we accomplished our goal of sending seven girls to high school. Later we discoverd that nine more girls from the same elementary school had passed the graduation exams — so how could we stop there? In 2008 we raised an additional $6,950, and now these nine other girls are also on a path that can offer them and their community new opportunities.
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2007 Sironko, Uganda
In our founding year, our goal was to raise $4,200, $20 at a
time, to send five Ugandan girls to secondary school for four
years. Instead, we collected $6,350! The additional funds
enabled us to send a total of seven girls from the village
of Sironko in eastern Uganda, to Buhugu Secondary School. |
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info@forgirlsake.org |
2011 Urubamba, Peru
This year Forgirlsake raised $5,780 in support of a textile-teaching course that gives the indigenous girls teaching it the opportunity to go to school. |
In 2011, Forgirlsake teamed up with Toronto-based Alma Children's Education Foundation to support
a unique grassroots project in the High Andes of Peru. At the heart of the project are three indigenous girls, aged 12-15, who are teaching the ancestral weaving traditions of their remote mountain village to a group of about 30 girls as part of an after-school arts program. In raising $5,780, Forgirlsake supported this project so that these and other indigenous girls can overcome the confines of poverty and social stigma, and attend high school.
The three girls are yachachiq, which means those who teach in their native Quechua language, and as
expert weavers will share the weaving traditions of their mothers and grandmothers with non-Aboriginal
girls attending high school in the Andean town of Urubamba. Their leadership role looks to build the
girls’ self-esteem while breaking through the deep social divide between indigenous people and Peru’s mainstream society.
The Tejidos Andinos Project, which is Spanish for Andean Textiles, will also provide the girls with the means to attend high school while having numerous economic knock-on effects. From the remote village of Huilloc, located some 3,500 metres above sea level in the Sacred Valley of the Incas, the girls, and most like them, rarely have the opportunity to descend to Urubamba on the Valley floor. The program will provide for their room and board as well as weekend trips back to their community, two hours away.
With the funds Forgirlsake raised for Tejidos Andinos in 2011, the three girls also received $150 each in pocket money, an important boost to family incomes, which average 60 cents a day. The wool used in the weaving course will be sourced from the girls’ village and neighbouring communities. Beyond the three indigenous girls, the course aims to provide a vocational trade for the girls taking the program. Urubamba and the Sacred Valley of the Incas is the gateway to the renowned Machu Picchu ruins, a popular tourist destination. The project’s goal is to be financially self-sustaining within three years by selling the bracelets, scarves and ponchos produced by the girls in the program.
Raising Girls' Self-Esteem
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Despite Peru's significant indigenous population, there remains a gaping divide with the mostly mestizo society.
Indigenous people remain largely outside the economic mainstream and face high levels of discrimination as a
result of their skin color, language, and traditional dress.
Indigenous girls and women, often the victims of abuse
and discrimination within their own communities, are at
the very bottom rung of Peru's societal ladder.
In rural communities like Huilloc where education is poor,
about one-third of adults receive no formal education and
are illiterate. Indigenous people, and girls in particular,
face many economic and social barriers to studying in
urban centres.
Tejidos Andinos is a way to bridge that divide. Elizabeth,
12, Maria Teresa, 12 and Alicia, 15, will now be able to
attend school in Urabamba and teach their weaving
traditions, fostering an appreciation for a foundational
element of Andean art and culture, while at the same time
establishing themselves as student leaders. While the
weaving course is expected to be overwhelmingly attended
by girls, the hope is that some boys will participate to
encourage greater mutual respect – an important aspect
in a society with a high incidence of abuse towards women.
By supporting these young girls, Forgirlsake encourages
them to gain a sense of empowerment and self-esteem
as teachers and leaders, as well as break the barriers of
discrimination between indigenous and urban groups.
This is what two of them had to they say about their
experience in the succesful Tejidos Andinos pilot project:
"When I first started at the school, I always felt
discriminated against. They would call me 'chuspas',
saying 'they don't know anything'. But now we feel
recognized, now they don't call us that."
— Maria Teresa, 12
"Before we were discriminated against for our clothes
and our custom, our native language, Quechua. I
would feel really bad, it would embarrass me. Now with
this project, the majority of my peers appreciate the
weaving techniques I've learned in my community.
— Alicia, 16
For more information on the Alma Childrens’s Education Foundation, visit www.almafoundation.ca.
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