Many Blessings

Time has surely passed since my last update of life, yet the last couple of months have been a blessing in time. Spring break has come and gone and it was an amazing experience staying here in La Paz and just being local and seeing daily life here without being at school. I found that I truly do love it here for what it is, just simple life here, I truly enjoy it. I wondered earlier in the year when the bubble would pop, and I would just want to go back home. Or when the "new and exciting" would wear off and I would wake up to "real life". I think I have awakened and I am still just as enamored with this place and what God is doing here. Moreover, I find myself stopping, astonished that the Lord so divinely would bring me here and not only touch my life, change me and teach me, but use me as the answer to others' prayers. The Lord's work is so mysterious.
Within the last 2 months I have been working with my 7th and 8th graders on a major project, "Voices of Our Youth". As in years past, I had students write, "If I could tell the world..." journal entries. This year they ended up turning into persuasive speeches. Both the 7th and 8th grade presented these speeches in January. Before I knew it, I was sitting in the back of my classroom with goosebumps and tears welling up in my eyes over what these young hearts were saying. Surpassing the actual speeches, the students' interactions and dialogue they were having with one another blew me away. With this my mind and heart began racing and "Voices of Our Youth" came to be.

All Grade 8 students were put into pairs and were assigned to research a nonprofit organization of their choice and write a one page abstract outlining its origin and purpose. (Great way to introduce citations and research) The second part of the project was to evaluate the current work of the organization and how the student thought the organization could improve based on his/her research. Throughout the process the research was turned into a persuasive speech to be presented to the class. The top 3 speeches would present to the 8th grade, the top 2 to the 7th and 8th grade and the winner would be the benefitting nonprofit of a middle school arts evening..."Voices of Our Youth" . This would be a night of what the student thought were important...if they had a captive audience, what would they like to say? Of course they could do this in any format...speeches, poetry, dance, music...etc.

A local nonprofit, Para Los Niños, ended up winning (which was awesome). They are a nonprofit focused on helping the orphaned children of La Paz. They are actually located in a local orphanage, Virgen de Fatima, so the entire 7th and 8th grade got to visit the orphanage and see where the money would go and what the organization was all about. Certain students were brought to tears as they played with the children they encountered at the orphanage. Not one of the students was not with one of the kids of Virgen de Fatima--it was beautiful.
After such an experience, the project really took off. Students had all chosen different committees to be on and work began. Within roughly two months, (from the beginning of the research to now) tickets and promotions were made in tech classes, over 50 different local companies were contacted, 32 making donations, over 200 tickets were sold, 20 performances took the stage and close to $2,000 was raised to benefit the children of Virgen de Fatima Orphanage. Amazing. Thursday evening was truly breathtaking as I watched middle schoolers voice their hearts and minds, igniting an audience into laughter as well as bringing them to tears as the unselfishly came together and gave of themselves for the less fortunate children of Bolivia.

It's been powerful to watch the Lord work through the willing.