UPLIFT Haiti Team in Baradères and Kay Mak This Week
July 25, 2011
An UPLIFT Haiti team arrived in Baradères, Haiti, Saturday night. Today, the six-person team will begin a week of helping women in a vocational program develop their culinary, sewing and embroidery skills.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, two team members will travel south to Kay Mak to lead software training sessions at a community computer center being established by UPLIFT Haiti.
UPLIFT Haiti is able to conduct these projects because of our U.S. and Haitian volunteers and because of the continuing generosity of supporters who donate cash and materials. You can make tax-deductible donations at http://uplifthaiti.org/donate.htm. We are grateful for your support.
The Baradères vocational program is administered by the Little Sisters of St. Therèse, who also operate a medical clinic and elementary school in the town. The sisters established the vocational program to enable women to find jobs or start their own small businesses in Haiti’s food service and textile industries.
The Kay Mak computer center is operated by a community group, the Kòdinasyon Peyizan Nan Ma (KPM). The solar-powered center began offering services to the community in February, when UPLIFT Haiti delivered the first two of seven planned high-performance, low-energy-use desktop computers, along with other computer and office equipment.
This week, UPLIFT Haiti will train a group of Kay Mak residents how to use word processing and spreadsheet software programs. Ultimately, the center will provide residents with several opportunities never before available in their community, including access to business services, the internet, and computer-based education and training.
In Baradères this week, the UPLIFT Haiti team will demonstrate a variety of hands-on culinary topics for the women in the vocational program, including safe food handling and preparation. And in a new initiative, the team will show the women how to sew and embroider sturdy, attractive, reusable shopping bags for marketing to an export audience.
The bags will be made of brightly colored ripstop nylon. Team member Evelyn Brewer designed the bags so they can be rolled up into a tiny, tight bundle for easy stowing in pocket or purse. Over the past few weeks in Maryland, Evelyn and Sister Miguelina of the Little Sisters of St. Therèse worked to finalize the design. Sr. Miguelina leads embroidery training for the vocational program.
In addition to providing training, the UPLIFT Haiti team is delivering goods and supplies donated by our supporters: culinary and textile supplies for the Baradères program, and printer ink, a laminator, and office software for the computer center.
During an UPLIFT Haiti visit in February 2011, two of the three embroidery instructors, Sr. Welone (second from left) and Ms. Nadege (fourth from left), examine the students' projects. In February, UPLIFT Haiti volunteer John Spencer (left) and residents of Kay Mak log onto the first two desktop computers of the community's new computer center. |
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