Education & nutrition for children in Peru

I hope all is well with you. As we enter the final month of a very successful year here in Latin America we are pleased to launch the 2025 Phoenix Appeal today to coincide with GlobalGiving’s part-matching campaign which is now live. This year’s Appeal aims to raise funds for our local teachers' salaries, secondary school and college scholarships, classroom materials and food programmes in Guatemala, Ecuador and Perú in 2026.

From now (2nd December) until 1200 EST, 1700 UK tomorrow, 3rd December (0400 Eastern Australia on 4th December) all individual donations up to US$2,500 (£1,900) will be enhanced with a proportional share of a half million dollar pot. Last year this proportional share equated to 25% extra on donations so it is an excellent opportunity for the projects.     

Donations to last year’s Appeal contributed to almost a third of the $50,000/£35,000 day-to-day spending on all our projects so far this year helping us provide access to education for over five hundred children in Latin America, including Peru.

With your generous donation to this year’s Appeal, we aim to increase the number of students to six hundred in 2026 across all our projects, including 50 in Peru. You can donate directly to this page and thank you so much in advance. 

In Peru we continued to fund one local teacher and daily fruit as well as celebrating cultural events. At the start of the new school year we handed out the personalised text and work books to the forty students in all grades for the whole year. These include maths and literacy. The school has one teacher for every two grades, one of whom is the head teacher who often has meetings with parents or the authorities, leaving their two classes unattended. Having personal text and work books allows the children to continue their work when they don’t have a teacher. 

Large parts of the government food programme were cancelled in July so we provided the shortfall for the rest of the year. With the vegetables from the garden the children weren’t affected as we know that the food they receive in the school is often their only meal of the day.

The annual Impington International College trip from Cambridge, UK, was a great success in October with so much achieved in the few days they were up at the school including resurfacing and extending the playground, one-on-one teaching in maths, English, art and language, a mural depicting the three geographical regions of the country and theatre when a group of students spent time designing and making costumes for the children to perform a short history of Peru, including the Incas, the Spanish colonisation and finally Independence.

Our 19th Anniversary working in Perú was celebrated in November with the big 20th Anniversary being celebrated next July with the Colca Canyon Charity Challenge and a big party in the school! More information about the challenge and getting involved can be found following the link below.  

Thank you so much for anything you can donate today to this page to take advantage of the part-matching. Your donation will help make a tangible difference for hundreds of families in 2026 and thank you so much in advance.

Have a great December. 

Cheers

Links:

• Peru 20th Anniversary Charity Challenge 2026

The annual Impington International College trip from Cambridge, UK, was a great success with so much achieved in the few days they were up at the school in October. Thirty one students and three teachers joined the team on the ground to undertake crucial work helping to improve the future of the school and the children.

The school’s playground was resurfaced and extended with a new wall put in place, as well as concrete benches built along one side. The extension will be covered to protect from the sun. Tonnes of cement, rocks and sand were shifted over the few days. In accordance to local tradition, a bottle of alcohol was broken on the floor to give thanks to Pachamama (Mother Earth).

This year all the children in the school received crucial one-on-one teaching in maths, English, art and language. We used the community sports centre near the school as it was better ventilated than the classrooms and has more space. The classroom that Impington built two years ago received a new paint-job with a mural depicting the three geographical regions of the country.

For the first time we also included theatre so a group of Impington students spent time designing and making costumes for the children to perform a short history of Peru, including the Incas, the Spanish colonisation and finally Independence. Dance (and food!) was also a main feature of the final day despedida (farewell party) as we paid for the dance teacher to teach the children new dances as well as hiring all of the traditional clothes. Lots of parents and grandparents were invited as well as ex-students, one of whom sang a couple of songs.

Thank you so much to everyone who donated to the individual students' fundraising pages to help make this happen this year and also to everyone who has donated to previous Impington trips over the years as well as to the project itself outside of the Impington involvement.

Your donations also go towards paying for our local teacher Edy Luz, the daily food and fruit programme, classroom materials and text books and the annual beach visit for the children and mothers. With extremely limited water in the community the children never get to submerge themselves in water so each year we take them to the beach in December so they can splash around in the sea!

Let's see what we can achieve in 2026 when we will be celebrating our 20th Anniversary working in Peru with a charity challenge hiking the Colca Canyon. 

Thanks so much for all your support and all the best for the rest of the year.

Cheers

Dom & Doreen

Links:

• Peru 20th Anniversary Charity Challenge 2026