Computer Coding Update
As many of you know, a major aspect of the current ministry of All Things New is trying to figure out what our kids can do when they finish school and move into the work force. There is so much upheaval in Haiti right now, and for many the future looks fairly bleak, but that is not the case for our kids and for our ministry!
As many of you know, 14 of the 22 kids that live with us are teenagers. For many people, that is both a nightmare (I can't even imagine having 3 in a few years) and a very sobering thought. To know that our kids are on the cusp of moving out into a life and culture that is very tumultuous and where jobs are few and very difficult to come by. This thought keeps me up at night and the challenge to try and figure out how to help our kids is as difficult as anything I have ever faced.
We have a few different ideas that we are working on. I am working with a friend in LaGrange who wants to help some of our kids who are interested in agriculture. We have had some conversations with a company here in Jacksonville about how our kids could get involved in waste management. We have even discussed the possibility of remote cell phone charging or setting up Xbox tournaments in local areas. These ideas are all still on the table, but with things in the country like they are now, most of these ideas are in the "wait and see" phase.
That leaves us with what I believe is our best job creation idea, and one that has already seen some success...Computer Coding. We have Mackenson, one of our translators and tutors, who has already gone through the training along with 3 other guys in the community. Mackenson has been working with Arlington Baptist Church to help with their social media posts and emails to their congregation and he has built 2 websites over the past few months as well (thank you Carrie Bedard and Soar 2 Success Consulting and Christy Elder and Peter Robinson Insurance Agency).
The bottom line is that the idea has the potential to work, and now it is time for me, along with a small team that we are putting together, to figure out how to make this program work.
Our focus to begin with is going to be finding smaller churches that need help maintaining their website and social media pages. Churches with 1 or 2 staff members that may have the best of intentions when it comes to keeping their electronic presence up-to-date, but we all know that these things can easily fall through the cracks, especially for pastors who are not as tech savvy as they would like.
We believe that this service would be a win-win. It would give our kids and our coders a chance to do meaningful work and to be paid for it. It would also give the church the ability to both support a mission in Haiti for a very small monthly cost while also receiving what we hope is a valuable service in return.
Please keep All Things New in your prayers as we continue to move forward with these ideas. Also:
- If you attend a church that could use our help...Let us know!
- If you know of a church or a group of churches that have 2 or fewer full time staff and might benefit from having someone take something like social media and website maintenance off their plate...Let us know!
- If this is something that you may want to help us with...Let us know!
Thank you for your continued prayers and support. The past 2+ years in Haiti have been extremely difficult and very volatile. Covid seems to be ramping up even as I type. The cost of goods and services has skyrocketed due to inflation. And in general, things are just hard there right now. We are hoping that this idea will help our kids and even be reproducible for other areas and ministries in Haiti.