One Sparrow

Our main intent with our programming is to disrupt the “charity state” mentality of the region by no longer expecting hand outs or one- time relief support. All of the work we do is focused on addressing the long term development of the community by teaching the skills needed to be self- sustaining and to provide for their families’ future.

Education initiatives are focused on small business entrepreneurship and innovation rather than the traditional k-12 education as leaving or attending college is not a feasible or profitable for the majority of the local population. We aim to revive a local economy that allows continued financial stability and growth in the region.

By focusing on medicine, agriculture, and technology, we are not only addressing the knowledge gap within the country now but setting communities up for the jobs and industries of the future

Our first step is to introduce ourselves to the community. In order to ensure a positive reception and to sow the seeds of collaboration, we address a community’s immediate needs. Next we turn our focus to capacity building. We find individuals within the community who have a sustainable plan in the area of agriculture, healthcare, or technology. We then provide funds, resources, and mentorship so that they can take their project to the next level. We leverage our team’s collective expertise and knowledge base to provide innovative and forward thinking solutions to the community. Thus providing a space for local development and growth.In exchange, they partner with us to “pay it forward” to the local community.

Our vision is to leave a lasting imprint on each of the communities we partner with by building a multipurpose educational center. Each facility would be a place for discovery and innovation, teaching concepts such as sustainable farming practices, programming and engineering, medical care, small business development, and financial literacy.

In January 2019, we launched a project with the aim of providing agriculture enrichment education to the students at a school in a rural village outside of Cap Haitien, Haiti. The village is in extreme poverty with food resources being very scarce and expensive to purchase. With the partnership with a local organic farming business – Haiti Compost Business (HCB) - we were able to set up a weekly instruction program that is taught to the students and develop a plot of land near the school to host a community farm. The curriculum for the weekly instruction has been developed in partnership with HCB to allow the team to tailor the lessons to match what is happening in the garden that week and to give a well rounded education on how to start, develop, and successfully run a garden in Haiti. Along with teaching the basics of farming and agriculture, we are teaching the students about the importance of water sanitation, proper hygiene, nutrition, and meal planning. The farm sits on an acre of land. We started planting 7 primary crops, all core to the Haitian diet so the families will be able to take home half of the crops from the harvest of the garden; the other half of the crops will be sold to a regular distributor for consistent sales.

We work with 45 students twice a week every week. OVER 1,440 INTERACTIONS A SEMESTER.

As the farm grows and the programs gain traction we have a second school that would like to participate in the program starting in the Fall. The second school is in the same area, so we would be able to expand to include workshops at two schools on a weekly basis, with both sets of students working in the same garden on the weekend. The curriculum has been internally developed and we have plans to edit and formalize the curriculum. The materials will get produced within the year and will be a valuable tool for the instructors to get started on the program. These materials include the handouts, presentations, and course guide needed to launch the program at additional schools.

We have successfully implemented our rural school farming project at 2 schools and have 3 schools that are waiting to start the program in the fall once additional funding is secured. We have over 100 students that are taking part in the program twice a week each week. 45 students, from our first year of the program, have continued into the second year of the program. We have 55 students that are currently in year one of the program. The farm is producing weekly harvest of crops that are shared with the participating families and sold directly to vendors.

Our Rural Women's Healthcare program supports 20 Mobile Health home visits per month and has completed over 300 home visits in the local community of Limbe, Haiti. The client we support, Serving Sante Health Clinic, has been able to increase its support to the community with our help from 5 days a week 7-6pm, to a 24/7 Urgent care clinic. The clinic has also started monthly community education sessions as a result of the One Sparrow Free Health Conferences that we provide to the community 2x a year.