Take-out dinners of catfish with all the trimmings plus a homemade dessert will be available from 5:30 to 7 pm at Good Shepherd Episcopal Church’s Outreach House, located at the corner of Kirkman and S. Division Streets in Lake Charles.
The school is a mission of the church. It is located in southern Haiti in the remote mountain village of Bégin. Education, health care and food are all available on the school’s campus, and enrollment has reached a record number of 500 students. Scholarships are also available. A $150 scholarship will fund one student for an entire year. Both Good Shepherd and committee members have forms to provide for the scholarships.
Saint Mathieu Ecole Episcopale was built by Good Shepherd 30 years ago. The church originally built just five classrooms. The need, and the enthusiastic response from the community, inspired the church to keep building its school in Haiti. The school was totally rebuilt in 2010 after an earthquake, followed by a hurricane, destroyed the school and devastated the surrounding countryside.
The success of the school is a miracle, according to Mother Boo Kay, Head of EDS school and a founding member of Tend My Lambs, Good Shepherd’s committee that oversees the school, because the country of Haiti is in crisis. Criminal gangs rule the cities and government has almost entirely been shut down. “Maybe it’s because our school is so remote and the people are poor, but the gangs have left us alone,” says Mother Boo, “We are just very grateful.”
From the beginning, Good Shepherd has partnered with the national organization Haiti Education Foundation (HEF), headquartered in Arkansas, to administer the funds sent to the school. HEF has “people on the ground” who can deliver monies safely through a bank located in a rural area, and also oversees day-to-day operations. HEF also ensures that 100 percent of designated donations go directly to Haiti, with nothing deducted for administrative fees.
In the past few years, HEF has leveraged the funds coming from Lake Charles to partner with two other organizations, Trinity Hope and Haiti Health Care Partners. Trinity Hope provides a daily meal, and the clinic provides health care through a mobile unit that parks right in the school’s yard.
“People know when the mobile unit is coming, and the number of people we serve has tripled,” says Susan Turberville, executive director of HEF. Partly because it isn’t safe to travel to Port au Prince, the number of people seeking medical help has grown from 300 per month to more than 1,000. “People of all ages line up, especially mothers with babies,” Turberville said.
“A successful school is a big deal!” Turberville says. “When you think of how this school in a little community in the middle of nowhere provides an education that allows students to go to a university or become a nurse – well, you can imagine the pride. People say, ‘That nurse was educated in our school!”
Tickets are $20 and are available at the church at 337-433-5244 or by emailing finance@goodshepherd-lc.com. Tend My Lambs committee members also have tickets (Dr. Ben Williams, Glenda Williams (chair), Martha Hoskins, Mother Boo Kay, Mary Richardson, Denise Rau, Jay Winters, Tausha Kordisch and Tom Sanders, Jr).
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