Nielsen Educational Fund

IMG_2810“Yareli”

 

Louise Nielsen was blessed with a generous and compassionate heart, which played a significant role in the establishment of Winds of Peace.  Among her most fervent hopes was that the young people of Nicaragua–young women especially–would have greater access to learning.  In that spirit, this independent fund is administered by WPF.

The purpose of the initiative is to create and fund a research, development and implementation initiative, under the auspices of Winds of Peace Foundation, which will contribute to the transformation of Nicaraguan education by increasing practical access to and quality of education, and utilizing development of Nicaraguan ideas, programs, educators and strategies toward those ends.  Elements of this program may include scholarship funding, education research, collaboration with Nicaraguan entities engaged in education development, creation of seminars or workshops, teacher training or other related activities.

“We’re Going to Read, Reading Is Fun!”

 

Since 2012, WPF has been a funding partner for this campaign, which provides resources for “mini libraries” in rural schools.  An effort has been made to improve the quality of the books from their physical point of view, and in the selection more hard cover titles have been included. In the selection of the books to be distributed in recent years, the organizers have had the outstanding participation of the Books for Children Foundation, an organization that prepared a special supply that included books of national and Central American authors.  The identification of fun and interesting book titles has played a major role in increasing reading fluidity and comprehension since the inception of the program in 2010: both indicators increased by 6%, while increasing the number of classrooms and getting more than 80% of their students reading in accordance with the goals and responding correctly to the questions about the text that they read.

WPF - Education Funds“Education Funds”

The “Let´s Read, Reading is Fun” campaign is an important space for helping to raise the educational quality in the country. In these eleven years of work to improve comprehensive reading, the Nicaraguan educational community has shown its commitment to improve the future of children in homes in poverty, and in this commitment have come together non governmental organizations, donors and sectors of private enterprise.

The attached report summarizes the 2020 campaign, it’s successes and details.

Final Report of 2020 National Reading Campaign

  The Foundation has partnered with the University of Central America (UCA) in Nicaragua for several years to provide scholarships for Master’s in Education students who are active teachers in the school system.  In addition, the foundation has supported certificate programs aimed at improving the teaching and learning of reading and writing.