Luz y Verdad Christian School in Catacamas

Students: 124 / Teachers: 7 / Grades: Pre-school - 6 

About Honduras: Honduras is a mountainous land with rain forests, and fertile coastal plains. It is located in Central America and has borders with El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua, the Pacific Ocean, and the Caribbean Sea. Tegucigalpa is the capital city and Spanish is the official language.

School Profile: Luz y Verdad (Light and Truth) Christian School is located in a remote village in the ranching district of Olancho.  Hardship is a way of life for this school.  The teachers have continued to teach despite low pay, changes in leadership and the ebb and flow of maintaining a private school that does not receive support from the government of Honduras. 

Luz y Verdad has faced facility problems with worn-out adobe tiles on the roof and a need to reinforce walls to insure that children would not be injured due to a collapse.  The school was not in a position to bring in new students when parents would visit and see holes in the roof, run-down bathrooms and a questionable wall structure.

In an act of partnership, the community and church members stripped the school of its old tiles and rafters.  WWCS volunteers came in on HANDS teams and reinforced the walls, built a new steel-truss roof and installed new electrical lights for the school.  

The teachers of Luz y Verdad sold popsicles to help pay electricity bills for the school.  In 2005, they ran a 30-day funding drive to raise new support for a matching grant from WWCS.  The school raised over $1,000, and was "re-born".  Pride in the school and its staff was renewed.

Now this school is involved in the latest battle for survival.  Honduran officials are mandating that teachers are paid a minimum salary.  In previous years, Luz y Verdad has operated with dedicated teachers who were paid much less than the public school standard for teacher wages.  The government is now putting pressure on Christian schools to increase the salaries of teachers to a set standard.  This means the school needs to increase its student population quickly.

To keep tuition low and Christian schooling available to children from lower-income families, Luz y Verdad needs the help of sponsors like you. 

Act now!