Franklin Honduras Project

18/02/2016

Bob and Craigen are in Honduras, doing Scholarship work and moving on to help at CEVER (vocational school in Yoro). This is Craigens letter: Dear Friends,

Bob and I have been in Honduras a week now and have just about finished setting up the scholarships for fifteen students. One of them is starting colegio at seventh grade for the first time. Seven are continuing on the program either as 8th graders or 11th graders. The other seven are returning after a year or two out of school. Dilia Lopez, Lorenzo’s very bright daughter, is one of them. She is still working in San Pedro Sula since the family desperately needs cash and needs not to be supporting her. But we are rejoicing that she has a year of working under her belt . Now she is ready to work five and a half days each week, then take the bus home to El Junco Saturday afternoons and study on Sundays at the Instituto Technico Cristiano de Nuevo Horizonte – Christian Technical Institute of New Horizons. We had a student graduate from this school last month, and we are confident that this school is a better match for her than IHER. Her brothers Elisas and Lorenzo are also registered for their first schooling since Lorenzo’s stroke. We think God is blessing El Junco with a change in expectations for education!!

Bob and I weren’t expecting so many scholars. I wasn’t prepared with a sponsor for each student. So when we took them to the internet establishment to get new Gmail accounts and send letters to their sponsors I got shook up and made some mistakes. Dick and Dianne didn’t get a student, one sponsor got two and I assigned someone who isn’t even involved this year. It was crazy. I’ll straighten it all out in time. Most of the pairing is good.

In the meanwhile, THANK YOU VERY MUCH for making it possible for Honduran villagers to go to school. The Scholarship Committee of parents and community leaders is making plans to set up a Centro de Enseñanza, a learning center in the El Junco community building. There the scholarship students will share their learning with illiterate adults, younger kids and with each other. We’re looking into getting satellite internet service and a laptop so they can write their letters without going into town and can work on their English and their computer skills there.

Honduras is changing as the world is changing. You are making it possible for this group of fifteen individuals and their families to grow into the 21st century. God bless you.

Craigen and Bob Healy

P.S. We’re heading to Yoro now to teach English at the vocational school for six or seven weeks.

09/02/2016

Neighbors of El Junco. Across the valley, up another mountain. But neighbors.

04/02/2016

Dino visited us to share Honduran music of praise with us as part of the band "La Vid".

We would like to welcome the newest member of our studio, Dino Enriquez. Dino is from La Lima, Cortes, Honduras. There he studied at Escuela de Musica Victoriano Lopez in San Pedro Sula. He is an undergraduate Piano Performance major and says he is looking forward to developing his musical skills here at Southern Miss. Welcome, Dino!

21/11/2015

Work being done at the clinic in Buenos Aires, near Pinalejo.

03/11/2015

Honduras used to be known as the "breadbasket" of Central America. It grew enough of the basic staple crops of beans, rice, and corn to feed its own p...

27/09/2015

Our amigo Samu Bustillo with his new team in Mexico, Team Leone.

29/07/2015

At the clinic in Buenos Aries, Lisa Armstrong's project

08/06/2015

Subirana is a village that has projects on the IERH's "to do" list.

Yesterday Don and I participated in a medical brigade that traveled to a small clinic in an indigenous community Subirana. The clinic was originated by North American Missionary Dr. Joyce Baker an...

15/05/2015

The Maine Conference is commencing a fund raising appeal to benefit the CEVER school in Yoro, Honduras. Have you been wondering what happens when work teams go off to Honduras for a week or two?
The Maine Honduras Partnership has facilitated many eye-opening trips to Honduras where UCC
members and our friends have formed relationships with Honduran Christians, expanding our
understanding of the wider body of Christ. Our partners in the Iglesia Evangelica y Reformada have
learned from us as we learn from them.
Some years ago they introduced some of our volunteers to the vocational school that they
established and try to maintain. It had been underfunded for its mission of training young people in
auto mechanics, machine work, woodworking, welding and other skills. We responded by raising funds
through selling fair trade coffee. While much of the Partnership’s work in Honduras has been assistive
in nature, helping poor people “get by”, we look to the Cever Vocational School project as having the
possibility of changing the lives of young students. Our hopes are matched by the hopes of the parents
who must make sacrifices to pay the tuition out of their meager income.
Now the need for costly expenditures on tools and equipment has become critical. CEVER will not be
able to continue its mission at a level acceptable to its students and directors without a major infusion
of resources. At the same time, the Honduras Partnership veterans of Falmouth Congregational Church
and Falmouth Foreside Congregational have decided to make their unused funds available for a
Partnership project. They will match all contributions up to $5000, for a total of $10,000. The choice of
CEVER is a natural. All of the money raised will be used to replace worn and broken tools and to make
some older machinery operational. If 100 churches each raise $50 for CEVER we can do this.
We are inviting your church to consider making a donation to improve equipment in the vocational
education programs at CEVER. Pastors, will you please announce this appeal to your congregations
and post it on your bulletin board? You can schedule an informational program for your church by
contacting Bob and Craigen Healy who have recently returned from CEVER and are enthusiastic about
spreading the word so that throughout Maine many of us can participate in buying needed tools and
supplies in 2015 . You may reach the Healys at [email protected] .
Thank you for your considerable support of our Honduras mission!

27/02/2015

The house is getting a new roof and new bano.

25/02/2015

Just some of our friends with us in El Junco. Please add names if you can.

25/02/2015

The 2015 project sponsored by the Franklin Assoc. of UCC.