Stichting Help

December 2016

Trip-report November/December 2016 available.

"School uniform party" for 25 children from flooded houses of Sosúa Abajo en Maranatha.

October 2016

So Haiti has been hit again, now by the Hurricane Matthew. In the Dominican Republic (DR) it was not so bad compared to Haiti. The south coast was the hardest hit, but the damage in Sosúa and Puerto Plata, on the north coast, was relatively small.
Just like six years ago, after the big earthquake, many Haitians will again flee to the DR in search of food, medical care, a roof over their head, in short everything what is missing in their country after the disaster. As in Europe, people in the DR do not know how to cope with a large influx of refugees. Poor Dominicans see them arriving with envious eyes. Haitians work for the lowest wages and have to endure everything as it comes. Dominicans, who already have hardly any work, again feel threatened in their existence. Police regularly turn large groups of illegal Haitians back across the border, after which they equally quickly return here. The Haitian prostitutes jostle the Dominicans, because of the low rates, and accept all the risks.
Desperate mothers send their children to a distant relative, who lives in the DR. But often they already have six children and have barely enough food and care. If then another four distant nephews and nieces arrive, this is impracticable and these children will also quickly become tramps.
The Colegio Asher, which is located in a poor neighbourhood in the DR with a lot of Haitians, will again feel the consequences, just as before. Our foundation does everything within our power to supporting this school.

September 2016

In 2006, 10 years ago already, we began to help underprivileged children in the area of Sosua and Puerto Plata to go to school. In 2007, the foundation Stichting Help Sosuakids naar School was established for this purpose.
During these years, we have donated a total of some 3,500 school uniforms, shoes and thousands of school supplies, such as pens, pencils, coloured chalk, notebooks etc. etc. We also paid the salaries of some teachers of the Colegio Asher for 10 years. More than 1,700 new beautifully-printed t-shirts have found their way via us to the poorest children, and some 400 kilos of pieces of cloth for sewing lessons have been transported to Puerto Plata from the Netherlands.
We can certainly look back on the result achieved with satisfaction, but we continue looking and thinking forward.

Thanks to significant assistance from Canada, the Colegio Asher has been able to have new school buildings available. Partly as a result of this, the number of pupils in the school in the future can grow from 230 to some 500. In consultation with the Colegio Asher, our foundation has decided to set up a library in one of the buildings. Not only will the students of the Colegio be able to make use of this, but also many students from other schools, and the approximately 3,000 inhabitants of the impoverished district of El Batey la Union. Besides Dominicans living in that area there are particulay many Haitian refugees.The books can then, under supervision, be read in the library, but cannot be borrowed.
There is very little use of internet in schools on the north coast.Extensive use of computers, instead of books, is not included in the curricula. The many long power cuts and problems with the wifi reception also prevent reliable everyday use of computers. Although you can see a lot of Dominicans with a smartphone, permanent use of the internet is far too expensive for many of them. There is also little knowledge of programs apart from Facebook and WhatsApp. Many poor Dominicans and Haitians, however, have absolutely no knowledge of the internet.The setting up of a library with reference books and a lot of school books and textbooks is therefore still not obsolete and superfluous in the coming years.It will take many years before the use of computers and internet has been introduced structurally and made accessible to everyone there.
However, in recent years we have donated a number of new 7 inch tablets to the Colegio Asher. We hope these will build a bridge to a broader future use of them.

Will people help us to continue setting up the library and donate money to purchase some books, which will be very welcome on account number NL30ABNA0572739818 of our Stichting Help Sosuakids naar School.
Perhaps an idea for visitors to the Dominican Republic, who have seen the poverty there and want to do something to about it.  

August 2016

vouchers for new school uniforms

June 2016

Trip-report May 2016 available

"School uniform party for 29 children from the country on 28 May 2016"

April 2016

We are going to adjust our approach for school uniforms to the changing attitude of the Dominican government. During the past year, significantly more school uniforms have been given to underprivileged children by the Ministry of Education in the DR. Only children who already go to school can sometimes get such a free uniform, but the first school uniforms and accessories must always be paid for by themselves. This is the reason that there are many underprivileged children who do not go to school as a result of lack of money.
In May 2016, elections are being held in the DR and in such a year there is always a lot of money given out in order to win votes. It is therefore the question whether the government will continue to make school uniforms available on the same scale after the elections.

For the time being, our foundation has decided to focus on the influx of a greater number of children who do not yet go to school and less on providing uniforms for six years to the same children. After the first year, the children will themselves have to try to obtain a uniform or parts of it from the government. Nevertheless, we will continue to monitor the children. Should it turn out that they subsequently do not receive the necessary things from the government, we will then take care of this.

Our foundation has limited resources. The method above means we try avoid providing unnecessary uniforms and we also encourage the children to take action themselves during their school-going period. Where necessary, we will of course continue to assist.

March 2016

During my visit to Sosúa in November 2015, I met a fellow countrywoman, Janny Koldenhof, in hotel Casa Marina. She is an enthusiastic, energetic lady who regularly visits Sosúa and immediately offered that she wanted to help our foundation in the area of fundraising. She has many more contacts in the East of our country. Our foundation is very grateful for her help.

February 2016

The Colegio Asher has taken the second new building into use.

January 2016

Colegio Asher