Ancora Ministries Inc.

Goal #1: A local community where NO child is hungry.
Goal #2: Guatemala where NO child suffers from malnutrition.
Goal #3: Healthy families who have their fundamental needs met.

We believe that God has a plan for every single child. We partner with vulnerable and underserved communities in Central Texas and Guatemala to make sure children have their the fundamental needs met so that they can be everything they were created to be!

What does that look like?
1. It looks like food and nutrition programs so that children can develop to their full potential, and perform at their best because they aren't hungry all the time.
2. It looks like clean water programs so that families can drink water that isn't contaminated with fecal matter (poop), bacteria, parasites, and other pathogens that make them sick all the time.
3.. It looks like community projects like road improvements, building onto village schools, and health initiatives like anti-parsite treatment for kids.
4. It looks like education programs so that our partner communities can become more resilient, self-sufficient and begin to create opportunitiies for success.

Ancora is 100% funded by people who share our passion for helping children and families be everything they were created to be.

$5 will provide nutrition for a child in Guatemala for a month.
$20 will provide weekend food bags for a food-insecure child in Central Texas for a month.
You can make a difference today by setting up a monthly donation at https://ancoraministries.org/donate!

In Guatemala, we work community by community. We provide a nutritional supplement which contains all the necessary micronutrients a child needs for optimal development to children between ages 6 months-6 years. We add water filters, latrines, and safe cookstoves to every household that needs them, prioritizing the need and meeting the needs as our capacity allows. Along with these nutrition, health, and sanitation initiatives, our staff offers trainings on first aid, safety, and healthy food preparation, to make sure families have the tools necessary to be self-reliant.

In Central Texas, we work at the school level, delivering "backpack bags" of food to each school in our program every week. Those backpack bags are given to identified students through school counselors or interventionists on Fridays, and provide enough food for a child to have 3 meals per day plus snacks over the weekend.

In Guatemala, we have a team of 3 employees and 15 volunteers on the ground to execute our mission. The team is made up entirely of Guatemalan residents. Currently we are working in 2 communities (about 200 people in each community) in the southern rural mountains, as well as a network of churches in and around Guatemala City that serves another 300 people.

In Central Texas, we serve 270 students each week through the HaysHope2Go backpack program. Our Executive Director executes the local programing, as well as directing the Guatemala programming by working with the team on the ground.

Ancora Ministries launched In July 2020. In our 1st 6 months, we helped 90 families - 480 people - in Guatemala, primarily through food and nutrition programs. We provided over 19,000 meals.

In 2021, we have launched nutrition and medical initiatives in Guatemala, as well as food security initiatives in Central Texas.
In Guatemala, we worked in 8 communities providing preschool nutrition programs. We also ran nutrition intervention programs (4 months in duration) to 15 communities from June-September. In all, we served 1577 families - over 2300 people. We provided nearly 42,776 meals, school supplies for 60 students, preventative and emergency medical care for 77 children and 3 adults, and we partnered with one of our communities to build a kitchen for the community's schools.
In Central Texas, we served 477 families - nearly 2000 people. We provided 13,000 meals to children experiencing food insecurity, and bought 54 pairs of shoes for middle school athletes who could not afford proper footwear.

For 2022, we committed to 2 new communities in Guatemala, and tripled the number of children we support through local food programs.
Guatemala Impact for 2022: We provided nearly 65,000 meals to almost 2200 families and brought clean water into a mountain village of 200 people for the first time ever. Total impact in Guatemala, including medical treatment, food and nutrition programs, clean water, community education/training programs, was 4200 people served in 10 communities.
In Central Texas, we launched a food security program in Dripping Springs, TX, and doubled the number of children served in the Hays CISD (Kyle & Buda, TX). We provided over 35,500 meals to 6200 people in Central Texas in 2022.

In 2023, we have launched new community partnerships in Guatemala. We are currently serving 450 children in 15 different community feeding and nutrition programs. We've also launched an economic development program in San Miguel, Petapa, to train women in launching their own microbusinesses. Everything we do is aimed at improved nutrition and health, and self-reliance.
In Central Texas we've increased the number of children in our food insecurity programs from 250 at the end of 2022 to 350 in the spring semester. These 350 children receive food every week.