Partners and friends in Cahul

We have been writing to people about our partners here in Cahul and we thought it might be nice if you could actually see their lovely faces!

After the crisis in 98 when the currency devalued by over 30% (notjoking), my partners Galina and Mariana (principal and asst.principal) were left with the task of running a grade school with no budget for even chalk or paper and where teachers were in a holding period of up tp 6-8 months for getting paid.

Anyway, in that environment they found out how to form an NGOand realized that they could win financing from abroad if they couldlocally raise 30-50% from parents and teachers... Thus they--with alittle help of another PC volunteer some years back--have radicallychanged the infrastructure and environment of scoala primara A.Donici. It's lively, colorful, has a small library and an indoor bathroom and cafeteria... Way less than adequate for a hurting centralcity MPS school but way better than a lot of the other primary schools around here. They have empowered the teachers and parents to create activities for the students of A. Donici enabling field trips andextra curricular activities. They have also accomplished many long-term leadership initiatives for teens (service and civic initiatives...). They just finishing a renovationproject to open a room up in the school for kids with disabilities to be integrated with the rest of students for part of their education, soemthing very new and exciting for Moldova!

They possess an overall attitude of hard work and follow-through, and the organization has a strong foundation consisting primarily of the relationship between the two founding members (Mariana and Galina).They share common values and have established a long history of open and healthy communication. Further, they have a lot of respect within their immediate community (teachers, parents...), within the NGO and professional community in Cahul. We're beginning a really exciting Civic Edu project that I will soon be writing more about.






Here's an old pic with John R. and Naima (our site mates) after we frist arrived. The other two people are Jen L who was just leaving after serving in Cahul and Ion, a Moldovan now living in Great Brit.

Here's a pic of one of Jess' medical partners named Maria Dunas.