By Israel Ortega Carcamo; Edited by Leanna Cappiello
Glenda comes from a poor, hard-working family of field workers of two parents and eight siblings. She loves everything about her hometown: the people, the mountains, the streams, the timberlands. But there are very little resources, like clean water and electricity. For her family of famers, this means a small income. And for Glenda, this could mean the end of her studies.
Her father harvests corn, beans, onions and other vegetables. Her mother takes on the household chores and cares of her eight children. She also bakes bread to sell door to door in the community, earning 100 -120 lempiras ($22 USD) which goes toward her children's school supplies.
Glenda and her siblings will pass the time by helping her parents with their respective trades: the boys collect water and wood while the girls help with chores inside the house. None of the children have passed primary school because of their household responsibilities.
Glenda's family didn't have the financial resources to pay for her studies, so they sent her to work for a nearby landlord for a small income. "I lost two years in something I did not want, with little pay," she recalls, "I got verbally hurt, with people shouting. Most of the time I was invisible to my landlords."
Glenda's labour experience is a story of exploitation, resembled being alone and secluded with no schedule of when to begin or end the working day.
A study program sponsored by World Vision was created to help enroll children in free education or school supplies. "I felt very happy because I would be able to start studying," Glenda says. "Studies transform people."
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Life is very different for Glenda these days. The studies program paid for her secondary school tuition for the following three years, something Glenda never thought possible. "They even provided us with school supplies," she says.
"My life today is to study"| It makes us better people and better citizens," says a glowing Glenda.
The opportunity to study has been a great gift to Glenda and her family. She now dreams big for her parents, "I would like my mother to have a bread selling business"| [and for] my Dad to improve his plot of land."