Our Mission
Creating Opportunities for Guatemalans is dedicated to educating children in poverty as a means to a better future. Many parents in our community have only a primary school education; some are illiterate. Their lack of education keeps them in low-income jobs and makes the basic costs of their children’s education unaffordable. Parents are unable to help their children with their homework, meaning the children often lack the necessary support to be able to succeed at school. Poverty also results in poorer health for these parents and their children. Our organization is working to change the children's lives from poverty to progress.
Our Story
Creating Opportunities for Guatemalans was founded in 2014 and is run by Directors Vicki Horsfield from Canada and William Garcia from Guatemala.
Vicki first came to Guatemala in 2012 and fell in love with Guatemala. Seeing the extreme poverty resulting from the 36-year civil war, she decided to move to Guatemala permanently.
After working with several NGOs, she and William started Creating Opportunities for Guatemalans. William himself grew up in poverty in Guatemala and was sponsored as a child to attend school. He is a living testament to the importance of child sponsorship in Guatemala and his experience helps him guide our students and our programs.
Our organization is devoted to bringing hope to Guatemalans for a better future.
Our Vision
To empower Guatemalans to break out of the cycle of poverty and become self-sufficient as a result of receiving an education.
According to the World Bank (Guatemala Overview: Development news, research, data | World Bank):
· 55% of the population live in poverty due to limited access to basic services (including education) and productive job opportunities
· Frequent natural disasters are also key contributors to Guatemala's high poverty levels
· The country's child malnutrition rate is among the ten highest in the world.
· This high level of poverty is the reason for significant emigration.
