What do the children write about?

These are children, after all, so they write about their daily lives: chores, homework, how much they like chicken and soccer. But as they grow and mature, their letters reflect new horizons. An exciting new development is captured in this letter, written by Luz, (see translation, below.)

When 50 children live together there are always problems of community. Saturdays the children are allowed to watch one or two movies. On one Saturday the communal area was a mess and a plastic chair was broken. The staff met with the children with the inevitable, “We might have to suspend Saturday movies . . . “

The children responded with their own idea: let us meet and decide what to do. This led them to form a Leadership Committee, as Luz explains. This idea has worked so well at COAR that ISNA, El Salvador’s child care agency, has reproduced it. The COAR Leadership Committee members have been invited to several children’s facilities to explain how it works, including a convention on The Rights of the Child, a United Nations initiative, which included children from seven other Latin American countries.