During our second week of Radio Christmas our attention will focus on children 'at risk' from becoming street kids or at risk because of the work they are forced to do or the conditions in which they live.

There are kids at risk not far from us but it seems that the risk factors in Latin America are far more acute and far more deadly.

According to the Consortium for Street Children a child is abandoned on the streets of Guatemala City every four days.  Once on the streets the children quickly get assimilated into street life.  Helping to prevent these children being abandoned takes time and effort.

One of the projects that Street Kids Direct is helping is the ‘Los Patitos’ (photo right) school in Guatemala City.  The school is run on voluntary donations and was the brainchild of the wife of the City Mayor, Patricia Arzu.  The school offers a first-class education to children who would normally spend their days on the streets because their parents work there as market traders.  Street Kids Direct has provided equipment for the school and is keen to continue supporting.

One of the biggest projects that we support is called AFE.  Amor, Fe y Esperanza is a project situated on the outskirts of the capital of Honduras, Tegucigalpa.  The AFE project reaches about 250 children who are working or have worked on the city rubbish dump.

Denis (photo left) is just 8-years-old and spends every day working at the rubbish dump, scavenging through the rubbish in order to feed himself and his family.  Denis comes to the AFE school after a few hours of work and then returns to the dump in the afternoon.  It is a tough life for these kids who work from dwan to dusk and never dream of anything apart from life at the dump.

In 2004 Jeony (photo right), a Honduran youth worker, visited the dump with his young daughter to drop off some rubbish.  He was so moved by the sight of 200 children working at the dump and pleas from his daughter to help that he founded the AFE project.

Street Kids Direct began to help Jeony in those early days when all he could do was to gather the children under the shade or a tree, give them something to eat and drink and teach them some very basic lessons.  The AFE project has developed so much over the years and it now runs a full-time school for 160 students through to High School.  This year will see the first students graduating from High School and progressing to College and University!

Jeony says that “when we first started working with the children I asked them what they wanted to be when they grow up.  They would always say that they wanted to be one of the bosses at the dump or drive the rubbish trucks.  Now they dream of being doctors, lawyers, teachers and all manner of people and I know that so many will now see their dreams become reality.  I feel very humbled”.

The money we raise from Radio Christmas will help the AFE project by providing two nursery nurses for the new nursery at the school, which is situated just across the road from the rubbish dump.  It will also fund a classroom including a salary for a teacher and help feed 160 kids a day throughout the year.

Your gift, however small, will make a massive difference to the lives of these children.  Thank you.