A Bracelet for a New School Year

The school year officially kicked off on Monday January 30, 2012 in El Progreso, Honduras. OYE held their first meeting of the year on Saturday February 4, 2012 to welcome the family of scholars both new and old. There were a total of 55 scholarship recipients and three new to the family. The room was filled with excitement as the students filed in and sat down expectantly. It was in this moment that the OYE staff and interns could see the future of Honduras. 55 students listened while the current leaders of OYE spoke with the hope of learning from them and how to one day change the world they live in.

Once a month during the school year, the students and OYE staff sit down together to talk about upcoming projects, touch base on what is happening within their lives, and hand out the scholars’ monthly stipends. This meeting was no exception. It began with an introduction of the OYE staff, the interns and each of the four coordinators explaining their area of expertise: sports, arts, magazine and radio. Marisol Fuentes spoke as the Director of OYE, Luis Parades spoke as Program Coordinator, and Michael spoke as the Marketing Director/Volunteer and Communications Coordinator. Following the introduction of the OYE staff the two social work interns introduced themselves: DeAngela Alexander and Amy Williamson, both of whom are seniors at Mary Baldwin College. The scholarship students welcomed these two new faces to the OYE family with open arms.

Before this meeting was held Faby and Yarli, two of OYE’s youth coordinators, and OYE’s interns were busy making charm bracelets to give to the scholarship students for a current fundraiser. They stayed up until well into the night putting together these jewelry pieces for the students. At the end of the meeting as each of the scholarship recipients received their stipends and two charm bracelets. It was an excellent way to end the meeting – an initiation to a new school year and several more unforgettable months at OYE.