Chile is recognized for its breathtaking nature and the warmth of its habitants. However, as you may have seen during the last weeks, it is a country with huge inequalities, where more than 200,000 children and teens are out of the educational system. With your help, we will provide underprivileged Chilean teenagers with formal education and music workshops, motivating them and developing their self-esteem, artistic streak and providing them with a safe space for building community
These children and teens are living in conditions of poverty and exclusion. Most of them are exposed to spaces of violence and abuse, and accumulate experiences of failure and abandonment by the adults responsible for their care. Family ruptures, economic crisis, neglect are part of their lives. The school is for them a space of protection. Students living in poor neighborhoods cannot afford musical instruments or instruction and therefore, need our support.
Hogar de Cristo will provide, apart from formal education, instruments and music lessons to underprivileged teens in order to motivate them and to create a safe place for them to come together and feel part of a group. Music becomes an element of motivation for young people who were excluded from the education system and for students who at some point in their school stage decided to stop studying. Furthermore, students develop motor skills and creativity and music helps collaborative work.
Thanks to the music workshops, which are carried out at the Betania school, young people believe in themselves again. Chords and sounds promote the commitment of young people to learn in school, they mean a project, an achievement and a goal, which improves their self-esteem and the willingness to continue their education beyond music. Therefore, thanks to music, teenagers will continue studying in high school.
This project has provided additional documentation in a PDF file (projdoc.pdf).