As part of the Consuelo Foundation Life Skills Plus Program, representatives of the Youth Advocates through Theater Arts visited CF partners involved in children and youth-focused programs in Calauan, Laguna and at Paliparan, Cavite.
The group included executive director Dessa Quesada-Palm, project manager John Lumapay, CF Youth Council president Earnest Hope Tinambacan, together with Antonieta A. Cadeliña of GWAVE Teen Advocates and Kenneth Ozoa of Little Children of the Philippines.
Both communities in Calauan and Paliparan are resettlement areas which face socio-economic challenges brought by the dislocation of the families.
Consuelo Foundation supports the Paper Project in Southville in Calauan, which provides work and healing for abused and exploited girls and women.
It also helps run the food production system of aquaphonics that combines conventional aquaculture with hydroponics (cultivating plants in water) in a symbiotic environment. The food produced is utilized for the feeding of more than a thousand children in the site. One of the key movers in Southville is Don Bosto’s Fr. Salvador Pablo, who runs a training center for security services, and manages a vocational-technical school.
CF also supports the Sentrong Kabataan in Paliparan, Cavite that provides programs and services for more than 700 youth and children in their communities, and opens it center for creative, educational and counselling resources.
Reflecting on their visit, Quesada Palm muses, “The trip was very educational and informative in that we saw two communities with similar issues that resettlement areas are confronted with, and how important it is to create a holistic development plan that will address the children and communities’ need for healing, education, training and productive activities. There are no easy answers, but it takes concerted efforts and continuing dialogue among stakeholders to really cut the change.”
The exchange program aimed to provide additional input and exposure to Dumaguete’s youth leaders as they organize relevant programs and services for vulnerable and at-risk young people in Dumaguete city. (YATTA PR)
