SAINTE ANTOINE SCHOOL
Begun in 1993 when there were no other choices for secondary education in the area, the Ste. Antoine School has approximately 550 students and provides education through the 13th grade.  Transportation within Fondwa is almost exclusively by foot or donkey, and some students walk up to 6 hours round trip each day to attend the school. 

The school began receiving financial assistance from Family Health Ministries in 2000 in the form of teacher’s salaries, books, computers and nutritional assistance.  However, at this point not all children can afford to attend school every day or every year.  Sometimes children within one family attend on alternate days.

FHM works with both Partners in Progress on the communities six key priorities:

• Pay the teachers
• Feed the children
• Provide learning aides & school supplies
• Provide electricity for the school
• Provide higher education to the teachers
• Develop programs that will help the school become self-sufficient
  

MALNUTRITION PROGRAM
FHM's Infant and Toddler Malnutrition Program has been in place since 2002.   Widlene (left) is one of the fortunate children who began receiving nutritional support from Sister Karmel in November of 2004.  Unfortunately there are many more children than she can help who are suffering from kwashiorkor in this community. 

More recently the Malnutrition Program has been led by Sister Judy of the Sisters of Humility of Mary, and her regine of peanut butter is making a real difference.  Sister Judy is also adding infant formula to the protein supplements she's providing to 50 small children.  Mothers bring their children to the clinic three times weekly or monthly depending on the need.  They enjoy a snack when they arrive plus a hot breakfast and hot lunch before they walk home.  Weight and hemoglobin checks show the children are progressing.

Both peanut butter and formula are being carried to Haiti by FHM mission teams. To contribute, bring your donations of peanut butter or formula (any size, any brand) to the Family Health Ministries office at 2344 Operations Drive in Durham.  Call 919-382-5500 for more information.

FHM hopes to increase the number of children served to 150 by the end of 2009. Click here to help.

FATIMA HOUSE ORPHANAGE
The Fatima House orphanage houses between 50-55 children with an age range of 2 to 18 years. Most of these children are not true orphans, but are children from poor families that can not care for and feed them. Often children are placed in the orphanage after their parents bring them to the local health clinic near death from starvation.

When Family Health Ministries began work with the Association of Peasants of Fondwa, 50 children slept in eight bunk beds in a small, damp, rat infested, one bedroom shack with a dirt floor. There was no running water, electricity, but the children were clean, clothed and well loved. All children receive an education at the Fondwa School.

Phase I, completed in 2003, included the addition of three bedrooms made of concrete. With the addition of these rooms the children have been able to spread out and now each child has his or her own bed.

Phase II, completed in 2004 gave the children six additional rooms. 

Phase III, partially completed in early 2009, has more new bedrooms, a cafeteria, new kitchen facility, chapel and bathrooms. Included in the cost of phase III is $15,000 for a generator. 

It is planned that the children will eventually have running water and electricity.

Before the bathroom addition, children scooped water from the cistern (below) and then carried their bucket to an outdoor, screened area to bathe. The new bathroom will provide an indoor shower and toilet. The courtyard between the building's wings will contain plants.

MEASURING RESULTS
FHM is continuously examining the nutritional data collected from the children attending preschool through 3rd grade at the Saint Antoine School to try to gain some insight into how balance of local assistance and national instability is impacting this rural community. 

Two Duke University medical students worked on their third year research projects in Fondwa in 2008, measuring the effect of FHM's program, working to document the effect of the daily meal, anti-parasitic medicine plus the vitamins.

In addition, each spring, Duke University Students from the Global Health course Healing in the Developing World and Care of the Underserved collect heights, weights and hemoglobin counts for students preschool through third grade.

HOW YOU CAN HELP

SPONSORSHIP
FHM began a sponsorship program for students and teachers at the Ste. Antoine School to pay the teachers, without whom the school is impossible, and make sure the children are healthy, without which little learning can take place.

Donations to this program provide salaries and food for all the children at the school. Sponsors are assigned a particular teacher or child and are sent pictures and regular reports on the children's progress in school, giving sponsors a personal connection in Fondwa.

In addition to food, the school children receive a multivitamin with iron daily during school, the anti-parasitic albendazole 400 mg three times a year. and a yearly nutritional assessment.

To participate in the program, groups and individuals provide $25 per month or $300 per year for each student, and $85 a month or $1020 per year for each teacher.

FHM hopes to expand its program by finding sponsors for all 550 children in the school by the end of 2008. Nine of the 24 teachers are currently sponsored.

Sponsor a child in Fondwa.

Sponsor a teacher in Fondwa.

FOOD
Each mission team that goes to Fondw takes peanut butter and baby formula for non-nursing infants. This is a good collection project for Sunday School classes or service organizations.

To contribute, bring your donations of peanut butter or formula (any size, any brand) to the Family Health Ministries office at 2344 Operations Drive in Durham.  Call 919-382-5500 for more information.

SCHOOL MATERIALS
If you'd like to help provide school materials, review the list below, and send the supplies to FHM at 2344 Operations Drive, Suite 201, Durham, NC 27705. We will take them to Fondwa when we travel to Haiti in on our next trip.

You may also want to get involved in our sponsorship program, contributing $25/month not only for a child's education, but also to improve their health so they are better able to succeed in school.

For Secondary including 6th grade students:
calculator
small English/French dictionary
notebooks (for several subjects)
pens/pencils
compass
gum eraser
small backpack (The best kind are the small bags with two sets of strings called "sack packs," available at Dick's Sporting Goods, for example.)

For Primary students:
pencils
gum erasers
crayons (16 pack)
notebooks
ruler
small packpack (The best kind are the small bags with two sets of strings called "sack packs," available at Dick's Sporting Goods, for example.)

LIBRARY PROGRAM
In 2000, FHM began collecting books and magazines for use in the Sainte Antoine School classroom. Since that time, hundreds of books and magazines have been donated to the Fondwa library, including adult and children’s fiction, reference works, and classical authors.

Mission teams continue to take books to the children in Fondwa. Bring any donations, in English, French, or Kreyol, to the Family Health Ministries offices at 2344 Operations Drive, Suite 201, Durham, NC 27705. You may also make a monetary contribution for books.

ORPHANAGE TOYS/HAIR & BEAUTY SUPPLIES
Bringing gifts to the children at the orphanage is a great pleasure. You can also send them with a mission team (send them to the FHM office at 2344 Operations Drive, Suite 201, Durham, NC 27705) and Sister Simone will make sure they are well used.

Here is a list of the kinds of things the children enjoy:

• Jacks with ball
• Marbles (bag of 48 for playing Mancala)
• Mancala game boards with marbles
• jump ropes
• Small bottles of bubble soap for blowing bubbles
• Playing cards
• Dominoes
• Mini soccer balls – deflated and with a pump
• Rubber gands, hair ties, barrettes, ribbons
• Combs, brushes, hand mirrors and related items.
  

OTHER SERVICES TO FONDWA
Bringing electricity and water to the Fondwa school has been an on-going challenge. The school's computer lab is now powered by a series of batteries. The water line, completed in Spring 2008, also depends on a pump powered by the batteries. In the last two years, volunteers from a Chapel Hill, NC-area church provided in-service education on techniques for teaching science to the Sainte Antoine staff.