Meet Cherline. In 2010, she dropped out of school, suffering from anxiety and low self-esteem.
In the summer of 2011, Cherline met with team HavServe with her mother and seven siblings in their home, a one-room dwelling made of mud walls and floors and a roof thatched with palm leaves and corrugated metal. She shared that the conditions of their environment made it impossible for her and her siblings to continue attending school, exacerbating a lack of self-esteem and confidence. After a quick assessment, HavServe invited her to participate in our mentoring and service learning opportunities, so that she would have the readiness to finish school and find a pathway out of poverty and misery.
Today, Cherline is a well-adjusted schoolteacher and mentor, an active community leader and advocate for early childhood education, married, and living in a new brick home. As a proud alum of HavServe, Cherline is having a clear impact on her community.
Cherline’s life and the lives of her siblings and other talented young girls just like her have been dramatically impacted thanks to the help of our dedicated corps of volunteers.
Cherline, her siblings, and other young girls participating in our programs are becoming community leaders, teachers and starting small businesses and showing a measurable change in their ambition. In an economy where quality education is necessary for employment, it remains to be unaffordable to most students in Haiti, especially girls. The country is experiencing a gap in skilled labor. This ongoing crisis is fueling a dangerous level of youth unemployment resulting in both depression and delinquency for people between the ages of 15 to 35 or even younger. Furthermore, the evidence that educating girls creates healthier, wealthier, fairer, and more stable communities is overwhelming in rural Haiti. Thanks to volunteers, HavServe is able to continue providing ongoing training and resources to youth like Cherline and her siblings, to grow professionally and socially!
If you would like to meet Cherline and her peers to see how they are impacting communities with HavServe in Haiti in 2019, come be inspired at our annual academic enrichment summer camp or visit our Children’s Academy and Learning Center. Register as a special volunteer today.
