Project Launch:

With a $488 grant in 2011, World Connect's Kids to Kids Program supported Proyecto SUENA, the only college mentoring project in the Huaraz area of Peru. Proyecto SUENA brings together college student mentors from Huaraz, the district capital, and children from Chavin, a low-income farming community. By facilitating weekly contact with college mentors as friends and taking the children on a trip to the college to meet professors, the program is helping to de-mystify the idea of college for the children of Chavin. The goal is for Chavin to serve as a pilot program, providing the blueprint for similar college mentoring programs in other low-income communities. The majority of families in Chavin rely on farming and sporadic construction work for their income. In most cases, both the mother and father work in subsistence agriculture and their children often contribute to the care of younger siblings and help care for animals. Domestic violence and alcoholism are part of the daily lives of the children in the community, meaning children in Chavin must often grow up quickly. Proyecto SUENA offers young people an opportunity to be more like kids and less like adults. Through Proyecto SUENA, the children interact weekly with young, positive male and female role models and see healthy and respectful relationships between men and women.