Maribel Najera is one of the hard-working Ix-canaan Scholarship students. Her education is being funded by Print Audit of Calgary, Alberta, whose generosity allowed her to graduate from High School last year. She is now enrolled in the first year of an excellent Business Administration Program.

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Mothers and babies were lined up in front of the Ix-canaan Clinic well before the 9 a.m. starting time for the Well-Baby Clinic, another of the projects of the students of North Carolina State.

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Last year’s group of volunteer students from North Carolina installed a cement floor in the home of Eddi Felipe, a child with Down’s Syndrome. When they returned to North Carolina they discussed how best they could help him.

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The N.U.F.E.D. School is a technical institute here in the village for grades 7, 8 and 9. The purpose of the school is to bring as much education to the kids as possible before the end of Grade 9, because it is most likely that they won’t be able to afford more education after.

Each year, the volunteers from North Carolina hold a class for the entire N.U.F.E.D. School on Emergency Medicine and First Aid Techniques.

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The first day begins with a tour of Project Ix-canaan, during which the students donate, unpack and put away their donation of medicines in the Ix-canaan pharmacy. This is a huge help to the operation of the clinic and to the people who can seldom afford the cost of antibiotics, antimicotics (anti-fungals), analgesics, diabetic meds or other necessary medicines.

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Once again we have had the pleasure of spending a week working with a team of volunteers from North Carolina State University. By the time the week is over, the group will have built cement floors in homes with no floors, they will have learned to make tortillas, they will have run a Well-Baby Clinic through the Ix-canaan Clinic, and a Health Program through the N.U.F.E.D. School. They will have restocked the Ix-canaan Pharmacy with basic meds, they will have visited Tikal, and they will have made lasting friendships throughout this small rural jungle village.

From dawn to dusk the waiting line in front of the clinic was full of people. (You can notice here the way the line has moved forward with the line of shade)

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Dr. Brad Krusky, leader of the Dentistry for All team, poses with two of our scholarship students … from the left, Darling Patricia Mejia Ramirez, Brad, Rosa Magali Tut Mejia and myself. We thank the Dentistry for All team for being one of our major donors to support this program.

These two scholarship students, Prisma Hernandez Garcia and Juana Melendez Soberano, have been with the Ix-canaan Scholarship Program since they began studying grade 1. They are now studying at the Grade 7 level at a new upgrading school here in the village.

These 4 students, and another 4, are under the umbrella of the general scholarship fund which is funded by a variety of people who give what they want to this general fund. You can also choose to support a specific student for her entire scholastic career which costs $600 for the first year, and goes up every year that they stay in school.

This program began as a program specifically for women of the community who were unable to complete their schooling as children, but has since expanded to include some girls who were unable to pay for their basic junior high school education at the NUFED school. Educating the women of the families has been shown to raise the socio-economic level rapidly and effectively.

Early on the Monday morning of the Dentistry for All annual Dental Journey, Dr. Brad Krusky, the leader of the group, gives a quick pep talk to get the group revved up for a long busy day of seeing patients.

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Meet Karen Topolinski, a Canadian woman who collected funds before coming to Guatemala to help several campesino families build a cement floor in their home. Here, she is with Edgar Adelio, our Floors Coordinator as they are beginning a floor in the home of Brenda Luis Valenzuela.

Its hard to imagine what it is like to step out of bed every morning onto a dirt floor, to put the kids down to play on a dirt floor, and to try to keep yourself, your family and your house clean with a dirt floor! Yet the worst part of it is the parasites that either live in the dirt floor, or are carried by the sand fleas that live in the dirt floors. It is a huge health risk for everyone, but particularly for the young children who are just learning to crawl and walk.

A donation of $125. and your help as a volunteer or as part of a group of volunteers (4 or 5 people often go together to fund and build a floor) will pay for your building guide (Edgar) and build a floor of 12 sq meters for a family who doesn’t have one.

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