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The MEF currently aids the Asociación de Amigos para el Desarrollo de Livingston "Marcos Sánchez Díaz" whose mission is to provide educational opportunities and cultural preservation activities for the Garinagu, the Q’eqchi’ and the Mopan, three indigenous minorities neglected by the Guatemalan government and by other NGOs supporting Maya groups in the Livingston area.
The Asociación is currently supporting scholarships for promising students and the community library "Beluba Luba Fürendei," a small library open to children in school and to those whose parents cannot afford school for them. The library is the only free resource for children not in school regularly, but it is struggling to survive financially and could easily disappear for lack of funds. In 2009, MEF provided four scholarships, one for a diversificado student attending school in Jalapa, and three for middle school students, as well as general support for the children’s library. MEF also provided books in Garífuna, Mopan, Q’eqchi’ and other Mayan languages to the library.
The students have been doing well this year, and the scholarships have encouraged them to continue. There are many more applicants in Livingston. As has been our custom, we start these programs small to see that they get firmly established and managed well before we expand them. The need is great, and as we begin to address it, we want to make sure that your support is in place, is well utilized, and gets to those communities where it makes the most effective impact.
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Livingston is the name of a town in Izabal Department, eastern Guatemala, at the mouth of the Río Dulce at the Gulf of Honduras. Livingston is noted for its unusual mix of Garífuna, Maya and Ladino people and culture.
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Livingston
