Year of Dreams and Successes
From barrios to University – young Anielka has chalked out a path of success that is one-of-a-kind in the impoverished and neglected slums of Granada.
Anielka did not have to brave her tremendous odds to stay with Empowerment International’s program for six years. Like so many children in the community where she grew up, Anielka could have dropped out of school and continued the life of dependency and poverty. 
But she did not give up. She worked with EI through all her life’s ups and downs. The result is a confident young girl sure of her life plans and dreams.
Anielka recently did EI, her parents, her community and herself proud by graduating from her High School. She will now attend University where she hopes to study Business Administration. Read more…
My Camera, My World – See the World Through Children’s Eyes
What do kids view in their daily lives? A little girl at the gate, a dilapidated doorway, a grinning old lady, a man working on a sewing
machine, silhouette of a father and child.
You would be surprised at what Empowerment International’s kids see in their Nicaraguan neighborhood. Forty of some of these best and brightest photos taken by kids ranging from 11 to 19 years, have been exhibited in Denver.
These limited edition photos will be open for auction for one day only on October 8, from 6:30 PM to 10 PM. You can get the tickets here. The proceeds of the auction will directly benefit Empowerment International kids.
Kathy, EI’s founder, had noticed children’s enthusiasm for photography a few years back and since then has made several efforts to keep their spirit up. Every year, EI kids get their most cherished lessons when a photographer teaches them the intricacies of taking good pictures. Read more…
My third trip to Nicaragua in February 2011 felt like a homecoming. This trip, as I walked down the rutted, muddy streets of Barrio Esperanza, a poor neighborhood in Granada, I was accompanied by a group of older students from the area. My Spanish was improved enough from the year before that I could listen to them talk about what they were doing or planned to do after high school graduation.
Anyelo was a softspoken star among the graduates. He is studying to be a pharmacist, while also returning to tutor younger children in his neighborhood as a way to pay back what he has been given by Empowerment International. He and other kids like him are dedicated students whose parents or who themselves never could have envisioned a life beyond poverty before Empowerment offered them encouragement and support.
The EI model makes sense to me, a retired teacher.
Help children get to school with the required uniforms and supplies.
Work closely with their families, who often have little or no education and who rely on their children to help earn a living for the family, often at the expense of school attendance or completion beyond the elementary grades.
Provide after-school tutoring programs, conducted by both staff and some of the older students.
Engage kids in extracurricular activities that promote health and self-confidence. Connect graduates with higher education and training opportunities. Read more…
The Swiss Connection
Last year, Tobias Detlefsen from Switzerland visited us and what started out as a trip for holidays turned into a relationship that has been going strong ever since! 
Tobias, who is a teacher in Mühlematt-Schulhaus (Mühlematt School) in the city of Binnigen in north west Switzerland, was very impressed with EI’s work. He promised he would try to do something for EI with his class kids once he was back. And now, it’s not just his class kids but the whole school that is involved in raising funds for EI!
Till date the children have raised $962 and intend to continue doing the same. They are also sponsoring Ericka who is in 6th grade and want to keep in touch with the kids through Skype. Read more…
School time is back!
The school for this year has started and we could not be more excited! Last year, our students made us proud with a retention rate of 98% and pass rate of 89%. This year among the 250 kids going to school we have one university student studying architecture and two going-to-be graduates from High School.
Kids writing to their sponsors
Our office was a scene of organized chaos on the inscription weekend when we do all our school related preparations. Inscription time is when we update all data from the participating families, have parents and kids sign contracts for the new year, get kids to write to their sponsors and distribute school supplies to the kids for the year. The best part – this time our teenagers did most of the running of these activities.
And now let the school time begin! Read more…
