There is a need for scholarships to go to high school in El Salvador. The Salvadoran government only provides free public education through the 9th grade. NESES board member Kialynn has the following to say:
In El Salvador where unemployment is high… education is the only hope for a future.

The goals of NESES include inspiring young people to continue their education. This can best be accomplished by providing scholarships to reach their goals.

Tomasa and Gladys were two young girls who went on our first study tour in 1998When they turned 18, they had to leave the orphanage. Though they had both gone to school every day, they left the orphanage with only an 8th grade education. At that time free public school education only went to 8th grade, now it goes to 9th grade. Ricardo and Joy wanted to give these two girls the chance to go to high school and the Pocasangres gave them, gave the schools, the money for tuition and supplies and helped Tomasa and Gladys find a place to live. In December of 2004, at 21, these two young people graduated.

Ricardo stood in for their father and walked them down the aisle to receive their diplomas. What a proud day that was! Now they are independent and have become productive adults in El Salvador.
In order to offer more scholarships, NESES became a non-profit in 2003. Currently, we sponsor 20 scholarships a year for students who have taken a study tour, have maintained good grades and have been accepted into a high school program. The cost of each scholarship is about $400 a year.

We have negotiated with the orphanages to allow the students to remain living there if NESES provides the expenses while they are in school. We have visited with the directors of these schools to make sure the students are benefiting from their education. The students stay in contact with Aida, our NESES representative in El Salvador, and these young men and women are choosing projects to contribute to their communities. Johanna, for instance, is working in a hospital in Ciudad Barrios as a volunteer in medical records.


These scholarships are the major expense of NESES. NESES is committed to helping these students for three years so they can graduate like Tomasa and Gladys.
We need your donations to make a high school education possible for these 20 students.

Please give as generously as you can.

As NESES grows, grants can enable us to offer more students scholarships and with these and your commitment, we can change lives one diploma, one young person, at a time.

A story about Nehemias, Narciso and Eric: High School Recipients

Narciso and Nehemias are two boys from the orphanage, Ciudad de Los Niños in Santa Ana, El Salvador.
The boys both attend the Pan-American high school in Santa Ana.
We talked to their director in June of 2005. Narciso was struggling a bit with his grades. 'He is a very hard worker,' the director said, 'but his eyes have a difficult time focusing and I would like to arrange for him to have some testing done by an ophthalmologist and I will take care of the cost.' The tests showed that what Narciso has is a congenital disorder and the MD's recommendation to the school was that Narciso be given a little more time to work on tests. Nehemias is able to help Narciso in math.

Nehemias is studying health. His grades are very good. He is quite tall for an eighteen-year-old Salvadoran and the director knew who he was right away and said that Nehemias was a pleasure to have at school. Nehemias has a weekend job at a local furniture store and enjoys buying team soccer shirts. Ricardo and I brought him one from the Sounders, our local soccer team in Seattle.

When Ricardo and I talked with the priests who are in charge of the orphanage, they were not happy with Nehemias' attitude at the orphanage. They said that Nehemias was sassy, didn't tell them were he was when he wasn't in the orphanage, and showed off wearing team shirts that they thought he was conning relatives into buying for him. The priests were upset with the fact that Nehemias would jump the fence to catch the bus earlier than the other kids and was basically a "show off." We said we'd talk to Nehemias about his attitude.

As it turns out, Nehemias caught the bus early to spend his own money to pay the bus driver for Narciso's bus fare, as Narciso didn't have the $20/month for the fare to school. Nehemias didn't tell the priests about this as he didn't want to embarrass his friend.

Our story now goes to another student at a different school in the town of Cojutepeque. Erik was only sixteen and wanted to return to live in the orphanage rather than stay with distant relatives. He thought he had to leave Ciudad de Los Niños in order to get his NESES scholarship. When we visited him at his school, he told us it would be easier to live in the orphanage, if he could, so he would not be a burden to these relatives. Ricardo would have to call the priests to see if Erik could return to the orphanage.

Ricardo didn't want to bother the priests, but he wanted to do what he could for this boy. Ricardo made the call. Before he had a chance to ask about Erik, the priest started talking. "I don't know what you said to Nehemias, but he is a changed boy. He has written us a schedule of his outside activities, he helps around the orphanage and his attitude is 180 degrees different."
Erik was accepted back to Ciudad de Los Niños.
I believe the interest and influence that Ricardo has with the scholarship students, the directors and the priests is indeed that of a caring parent. These boys know that someone is advocating for them. That is making a real difference in their worlds of study and of life.