Who we are
Project Chacocente moves families from the city dump of Managua, Nicaragua
to the clean air and fertile soil of rural Masaya, where the people
learn skills for living independently. Chacocente is a non-profit, integrated
project that aims to transform people, not just give them food and/or
housing.
[We are a 501(c)(3) organization, incorporated in the State of Massachusetts.]
The families sign a contract promising to "work" with us for five years, at which time they will receive the house they build and about two acres of land. Working with us means learning to read and write, to build, to farm, to solve problems, to govern themselves, to be more knowledgeable parents, and to start a small business.
The goal is to reintroduce the families into a society in which they have not participated in many years, and to teach them the skills they need to be self-sufficient. Literally, the project takes people out of one culture and shows them how to live in another.
Our history, or how we began
Executive Director
Project Chacocente
Project Chacocente began in January 2003, in response to the pleas of a high-school-aged youth delegation called the Mission of Peace.* "After visiting the vast, smoky wasteland of the Managua dump, the kids kept saying, 'We have to do something,' " explains executive director Cheryl Avery. "At first, we tried to tell them how futile it would be to rescue people without the help of the government or a large NGO. But they insisted, and finally I stopped saying 'But...' and started asking 'Why not?'"
Once I started seeking an answer, the Lord gave me a vision of what this project would look like. It broke every rule in the book about community development yet, as has been the case at other spiritual moments in my life, I immediately felt a peace and confidence that anything was possible
Executive Director
Project Chacocente
Five days after the MOP delegation left - having donated U$5,000 seed money - Project Chacocente was born. Nine families (roughly 60 people) are currently in the project, working, studying and achieving goals they never dreamed possible. While our primary goal is to transform the lives of these people who lived at the bottom of the social ladder, our secondary goal is to show that an NGO can successfully work with the poorest of the poor, and to share that model worldwide with other NGOs.
[* The Mission of Peace is a youth program of the
northeast jurisdiction of the United Methodist Church. Director
Ted Anderson can be reached at: hurlbut@madbbs.com or at
Box 33,
Chautauqua, NY 14722. (Phone: 716-357-4045; fax: 716-357-5225)]
