The Help Them Help Themselves Foundation is a non-profit charity that focuses on providing shelter, healthcare and education for the children of Central America. Just as our name suggests, we believe in helping to provide an environment in which kids can be safe, healthy and obtain a proper education so they can help themselves attain a better future.
We understand you work hard for your money and when you decide to give some of that money to a good cause, you have many choices. We want you to know that Help Them Help Themselves puts 100% of the donations made by our incredible supporters directly into changing kids’ lives! No one working with the organization receives a penny from the donations, not one cent. All of any amount you feel you can give goes directly to giving children and their families in need a helping hand. We all often take for granted the simplest of things, a bed to sleep in instead of a dirt floor, medicine when our children or grandchildren get sick, an education that allows our children to choose a future. Many parents in Central America do not take this for granted. Survival is what is first and foremost on their minds. But Help Them Help Themselves is changing that every day and we encourage you to be a part of that with us. We are not asking you to provide a hand out, that is not a long-term solution, we are asking you to help us give kids a hand up and help them change their lives for the better.
Over the past several years Patrick Hiebert, one of the developers and business owners of the Gran Pacifica Beach & Golf Resort in Nicaragua, and many volunteers who work with Patrick have been making a difference in the lives of kids’ health and education in many ways. Homes have been built for families in need, schools built and school teacher salaries have been funded, funding for many kids to go to post-secondary education has been provided, micro-loans for local Nicaraguan entrepreneurs to start or build their own businesses and provide a life for their families have been made, and much more.
Our largest project so far, will be life changing for so many people in need. Gran Pacifica with the assistance of Help Them Help Themselves has built a clinic in Nicaragua in the country’s poorest rural area which desperately needs healthcare. While building a school in this area in a Sugar Cane farming village called El Zapote recently we realized that a clinic would make an incredible difference. We saw many cases where a clinic that provides free healthcare to the local people would dramatically improve and even save lives. Kids who had broken an arm falling out of a tree didn’t receive any care at all. So not only did their arm heal at a 45 degree angle because the parents couldn’t bring the child to the nearest hospital an hour away, but the child had to endure the many nights of excruciating pain without any medicine while it healed poorly. And unfortunately, that is a mild example. As Patrick was talking with one of the volunteer teachers he learned that one of the brightest 8-year-old boys in his school, Francesco, had not been at school for a few days. Everyone believed he just had a flu. Patrick was horrified to learn that Francesco had died of pneumonia simply because his parents could not afford to bring him to the hospital or pay for the simple treatment that would have saved his life. For a few dollars, this boy’s life could have been saved. Anyone of us would have gladly brought him to the hospital if we had known the situation. It was that night that the plan to build a local clinic that would save children’s lives was born. A clinic where the parents know they can bring their children and they will be cared for at no cost.
We urge you to join us in making a difference.
It only takes a few dollars and when you go to bed tonight you can sleep knowing that your donation likely gave a child a chance to grow up.
What more selfless thing could you possibly do?