Staff Blog
Last October we entered the Support Give-Away Contest for Resource Mate, the library automation program we use at Cebu Children of Hope School. It doesn't sound too glamorous, but we thought it would be worth it to submit the required essay to see if we could win a year of free tech support. The essay had to describe how Resource Mate helps impact our community. Well, we just found out we won the contest!!! Woo Hoo!!!
Here's the essay we submitted:
It’s library day and Eugene wants to check out the next book in the Ranger’s Apprentice series. He looks at the spine label and heads to the “Fla” part of the Fiction section. Juliet wants to check out a Clifford book. She read one in her class and is excited there are more books about Clifford. I help her look in the Easy section and we hunt for the spine labels that have “Bri.” Mary Grace is ready to tackle chapter books and wants to know where to look for ones for girls. I point her in the direction of the Fiction section of books with spine labels that read “Ame” for American Girl books. Maybe she’d like to try a Junie B. Jones book too. The Level B reading class is studying about camouflage. A bunch of the kids ask where to find books about animals that use camouflage. We brainstorm about how to do that and someone remembers that we should search on the Resource Mate computer using the keyword camouflage. The Reading Challenge contest is in full swing. Kids race into the library each day to return their books and check out a new stack to read at home. Teacher Amanda comes into the library looking for books on the theme of risks and consequences. She searches and finds a number of books she can check out and keep in the classroom for the kids to read while they are working on this topic. Teacher Alfie stops in right before leaving for the day to check out some books to read to his girls at home. Sounds like a pretty normal day in the life of a library.
But the library at Cebu Children of Hope School is anything but normal or typical in this city of 866,000 people with one public library. Our library serves the community of children who reside at Children’s Shelter of Cebu, an orphanage in Cebu City, Philippines and the staff who work with the children. All of the children who come to live at Children’s Shelter of Cebu are from the surrounding communities on the island of Cebu or neighboring islands. The vast majority of the children have either never attended school or have attended very little. When the children start attending school at Children of Hope School, they often do not know the letters of the alphabet much less how to read. Usually it is safe to say no one has ever had a book read to them. Needless to say, they have never seen a library.
The children are thrilled to learn what a
library is. No one has to convince them
how cool it is to browse the shelves of books and check out books to take home
to the shelter. Teachers have also often
never been inside a proper library. To
have an automated system and thousands of books at their fingertips is pretty
unbelievable. The children and teachers
are taught how to look for books in the library. They learn what spine labels and bar codes
are and how the books are organized on the shelves. They are taught how to search for books by
title, author, subject, or keyword. The
children hover around the Resource Mate computer in the library eager to have
their books scanned so they can start reading their selections.
Most of the children who come through the doors
of the shelter and school are adopted either locally or internationally. Currently the children have been adopted into
families in fourteen different countries around the world. The experience and knowledge gained at our
school and in our library goes with them to their new countries, communities,
and families.
On the surface, the little library at Cebu Children of Hope School seems pretty normal, but every day really is a little bit miraculous in our slice of the world on the tiny island of Cebu in the Pacific Ocean.
Moving in
When children are admitted to CSC they almost always start their time with us in the infirmary. Most of them have parasites or need to be checked for tuberculosis. For some of the kids it isn't a lot of fun to be stuck in isolation when the kids are playing down on the playground. They are happy when the day comes that they can go down the steps and move into their new residence.
The other day our new sibling group of four made that move. Chosar, Marie, Charls Kyle and Stone had been in isolation for just a few days but were very anxious to say goodbye to the nursing staff and head for the Cherne Home. So when the time came they grabbed their stuff and headed out. Even though Stone, the youngest, was still asleep, the older three could not wait. Friends and aunties were waiting to greet them. Toys and Barbie dolls were also waiting. It was a grand day, and Auntie Tammy captured it on video.
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Graduation
I was going through some pictures the other day and I found these shots that were taken at the CCHS graduation last week. Although this is not the first blog post about graduation, I thought these pictures of our little ones at the graduation ceremony were still share-worthy. :) What a fun day!
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On the other side of the world
McDonald's, a cup of coffee, and a plastic chair.
Those are a few of the things that you would have seen if you were watching the CSC banquet on the other side of the world.
Some staff here in Cebu got up early on Sunday morning to watch the banquet via Skype. We all met at 7:30AM in the school library (hence the plastic chair), Tammy was kind enough to order McDonald's (yes, McDonald's delivers in the Philippines), and I had brought with a fresh mug of coffee from home. Needless to say, it was a really different experience compared to the CSC banquets that I attended while in Minnesota.
After the videos were played, the speeches made, and the donations collected, Lindsay and I headed down to the shelter to play with the kids for a little bit.
I was incredibly moved by experiencing these two things back-to-back. On one side of the world there were people learning about, praying for, and sacrificially supporting these precious children. On the other side of the world, these same children played with kites, laughed with their friends, and slept safely in their cribs.
Today, in a way that I've never been able to before, I saw how incredible connected these two places are.
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Invested
This past weekend was banquet weekend for CSC. We here in Cebu, the staff and children, were very much invested in all of this. We made a couple of videos for the events, a silly dance type video for the adoptive families party on Friday night, and a parade video for the banquet. It was a lot of work and everyone joined in and did a great job. I couldn't believe how hard the kids worked in extreme heat to do the parade video, and how they didn't complain or lose interest in the project.
We care a lot about the events and efforts that are extended to raise funds and promote this ministry. We are happy to pitch in and do our part, and to pray for those who work hard to be able to send money here to purchase food and medicine, and to pay the salaries of our workers. The children understand what it takes for them to be able to live at CSC. It takes lots of generous people and those to tell them about CSC.
I wish you could hear the children pray at night, always including our supporters. They pray blessings on each of you and your families. We are invested in all that goes on at CSC, for we are the benefiaries of your kindness. I hope the people who viewed the videos enjoyed them as much as we did making them. Here are a few pictures of the kids, captured from those videos. They aren't very clear because they aren't actual photographs but screen grabs. But I thought you might enjoy them anyway.
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Winning the Jackpot
Tonight Bjork and I had the honor of taking my student and her two siblings on an outing. I had promised each of my students that I would take them on an individual date, and this student wanted to share her date with her siblings. So off the mall we went!
We walked around, ate hamburgers and French fries, and played arcade games. There was so much laughter you wouldn't even believe it. These kids all have such a great sense of humor!
When we headed into the arcade, the girls immediately gravitated towards the game where you try to hit the jackpot as the light circles around on the board. They tried and tried, and tried, and tried some more. But they could not get that jackpot. I was starting to silently pray that they wouldn't be too disappointed if we had to leave without them ever getting the jackpot.
Finally, with the jackpot number well above 100 tickets (big time), she did it! She hit the jackpot! There was screaming, high fiving, jumping, and squealing. I tried to capture a little bit of the excitement as the tickets started pouring out of the machine.
As we drove home tonight, I couldn't help but feel like it was me who won the jackpot. To be able to spend time with such happy, fun-loving, and smart kids on a daily basis is such a privilege and a joy. Tonight it's hard to think of anything that could be more jackpot than that. :)
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