Here´s an e mail I recently wrote about an incredible opportunity for the foundation. I´m excited about the possibility of expanding.. Read on.. :)

I have some exciting news that I wanted to share with you. Today Pastor Dario shared an opportunity that seems to have popped up in front of us. Behind our church there is a methodist church that has been running a school. They run it out of a small rented building (so small they have gym class in the street). There are 60 students right now. However, they are being forced to close the school because the owners of the building they rent are selling the building. However... the director approached pastor dario to ask him if he would please mind taking over the school and running it on our church property. (In fact, the teachers have been going to the school asking him to please take the offer as well. They would love to continue teaching.) We would LOVE to do this. They´re selling all of the school materials (including desks, file cabinets, school books, uniforms, etc.) all of the things one would need to run the school. They´d like to sell it all to us for $3,500. However, if we can pay $1000 next week they´re willing to give us a year to pay the other part. They really just don´t want to see the school fall through.
Also, it would cost a minimum of about $5000 to build some walls behind the church to make classrooms. Since the kids are on vacation right now we can construct the classrooms quickly and begin classes in April when all of the kids go back to school. It would be SO wonderful to run a program like this. We´d have a better eye on the kids, more contact with the parents, the kids would be taught christian values in classes, and the kids wouldn´t have to deal with corrupt teachers selling materials, etc.
The other neat thing is, the 60 kids that attended this past year paid $18 a month to attend. With this money they were able to pay the staff to run the school. In other words, a school would give the foundation a way to be able to sustain itself. There are very few christian schools in Guayaquil, and I know people would be interested in getting their kids in the school. Families who can afford to pay would pay, but the needier families would be given scholarships so their kids can study for free. I think we would probably want to look into hiring a social worker to be able to sort out the families who are in need from those would can pay.
The only thing is, there´s not much time. We´d have to pay $1000 next week to get the materials. Do you think there´s any way we can make this happen? What are your thoughts? Does it sound like a good idea? Do you have any questions?