My wife Nancy and I first went to PAZAPA in Jacmel, Haiti, in 1997 when our son Jonathan E. Scholes worked there as a Peace Corps Volunteer for two years. The PAZAPA founders wisely recognized that the health and development of a child with disabilities is closely related to the family's economic status. Therefore Jonathan helped set up a mango-drying business for the mothers of children with disabilities. To this day PAZAPA continues to work with the families of its students by providing them small business loans which have had nearly a 100 % repayment success rate.
Pazapa has been around since the mid-1980's. Through hurricanes, flooding, political upheavals and the 2010 earthquake, Pazapa has stayed true to its mission of helping Haiti's neediest.
I may be biased, but I believe Pazapa is playing a very important role in Haiti as the only combined school/vocational training/health program for the disabled in the country. It is a model that deserves to be expanded and replicated further. I've known Pazapa since I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Haiti from 2000-2002. There would be a major gap in assistance without Pazapa, especially now in post earthquake Haiti. It is an organization well worth supporting.
In Haitian Creole, PAZAPA means “step by step,” and that is how our school in Jacmel continues to move forward. The Pazapa School provides educational and nutrition programs as well as essential medical and surgical treatments for the students. Special education as we know it in American schools does not exist in Haiti. There is no public source of help for children with disabilities, so it is no exaggeration to say that Pazapa is a lifeline for our students and their families. Last year Haiti was ravaged by hurricanes. Many families were already living in mud when the third storm hit the island. Then came the earthquake. The depth of poverty there is beyond what most of us can even imagine. Yet in this challenging environment, the strong spirit of the Haitian people does not waiver, and the families of Pazapa continue to value education for their children. Our school was destroyed, but we are rebuilding, and in the aftermath of the earthquake, we provided life saving assistance to the Pazapa families. Along with food, clean water, and housing assistance we assured them that their children would survive and continue to receive an education to allow them to fulfill their potential and live meaningful lives. Pazapa runs efficiently on a small budget, and the Board operates in a fiscally responsible manner to ensure that we can continue to help the children and families of Haiti move forward “step by step.”