Several years ago, in an impoverished colonia of Tijuana, a beautiful and committed Christian couple, Evelyn and Obed, began reaching out to children in their community by serving them breakfast on Saturdays. Many children came from homes of single mothers with long histories of drug addiction. The parents were unable to provide even basic housing, food or schooling for their kids. So as Evelyn and Obed’s own children grew older they began taking many of these children into their home. Over the years, some of these children have been adopted and others live with them part-time. Since most of the children have learning disabilities, Evelyn and Obed have struggled to find a school for them could attend. This past year, they learned about Centro Pedagógico Didaqué, the school run by the Monte Horeb Baptist Church, and enrolled all 13 of their school-aged children. (Six toddlers are still at home.) The school was able to provide STEP scholarships for all of the children, as well as funding for books and uniforms. Some of the older children had never been to school and were quite nervous at the start of the school year. Dulce María is one of the older girls.

 

Dulce is 13 years old and came to school crying her first day in September. She had only attended a government school briefly several years ago. Dulce has speech difficulties and could hardly pronounce her name, let alone read or write. So we started with the basics, building her confidence and discovering her incredible desire and determination to learn. Now, nine months later, Dulce has learned basic reading and math skills and although still behind, will be able to graduate with the 6th grade class in July. As she has learned to read, her speech has improved and she proudly shares that she wants to go through high school and when she grows up would like to “help children who don’t have a home, or food or clothes or a school,” just as she has been helped. Dulce loves her friends, her church and her school and now looks forward to a much brighter future, one she never knew would be possible.