Paul and Laura Manship, Author at Shoulder to Shoulder, Inc.

May 7, 2019June 20, 2023

Climbing Mt Denali to Nourish Children

Climbing Mt. Denali to Support Shoulder to Shoulder

Written by Ronald Quintero

On May 14, 2019 I will be embarking on my fourth summit climb in the Alaska range. Standing at 20,310 ft / 6,190 meters of elevation, Mount Denali is the highest mountain peak in North America and the third most prominent and isolated peak of the world’s 7 summits. I will be climbing to raise funds to make health and nutrition accessible for the children living in Intibuca Honduras! Intibuca is the most mountainous and one of the most underdeveloped regions in Honduras. Transportation to remote villages is challenging and children walk miles to access schools and health centers. Shoulder to Shoulder is a non-profit dedicated to helping people of this rural area live longer and healthier lives. Shoulder to Shoulder runs health programs in 7 villages and has also established the only bilingual public school in the town of Camasca.

This project is near and dear to my heart. I was born and raised in one of these villages and have personal accounts of how difficult life can be when resources are scarce. As a mountaineer, I owe my mental strength to the challenges I faced as a child in Intibucá. I want to give hope to the children of Intibuca and give them an opportunity to grow healthy and strong.During my visit to Honduras in 2018, I had the chance to meet with StS’s local directors and learn more about the organization. Soon after, I committed myself to helping children living in poverty to access education and improve their health. I had the chance to organize a running event for the students attending the public bilingual school of Camasca, Intibuca.

With your help, this project will be a success and will make a positive impact. I want to thank you beforehand for your support and for standing shoulder to shoulder with the children of Intibuca.

To learn about Shoulder to Shoulder visit https://www.shouldertoshoulder.org

Thank you,

Ronald Quintero

My goal is to raise $5,000 for the StS nutritional program. This would allow them to operate their nutrition programs in three villages and supply 3,000 infants and children, ages 0-5, with the nutritional supplements needed to prevent malnutrition.

All funds will go directly to Shoulder to Shoulder non-profit organization. My expedition to Mount Denali is fully funded by my personal investment.

April 20, 2019August 4, 2023

Robotics Inspires Learning

By Richard Buten, PhD – President, Board of Directors

2018 Honduran Robotics Team Arriving in Mexico

Dear Supporters of Shoulder to Shoulder’s Educational Initiative:By way of introduction, I have been involved with Shoulder to Shoulder since 2001. In 2018, I became president of Board of Directors. I also sponsor the overall education program including our efforts in robotics.

In early 2017, Shoulder to Shoulder was contacted by FIRST to help them create a Honduran National Team for their new international robotics event. We were concerned that given the lack of overall technology exposure of the children from southern Intibucá, we would not be able to field a credible team. We tried unsuccessfully to partner with a private school in the capitol city, but they had no interest. So, we went ahead and got lucky in obtaining an experienced coach mentor, Alan Ostrow (a High School physics teacher from Philadelphia). With his help, the local math teacher coached our team to a 40^th place finish in a field of 160+ teams.

In the 2018 global robotics competition, we did even better, placing 16^th. See https://first.global/.

In parallel with the First Global effort, we began putting robotics into our bilingual school. Last year, we expanded Lego Robotics to three area high schools and held a “coopertition” among seven municipalities. We are expanding the robotics program to other schools in our service area where we can find local coaches willing to run the teams.

The robotics program falls within our emphasis on STEM. Also in this program is our project to deliver Khan Academy math and science first to our bilingual school and then to 23 additional schools in our service area. We are using technology from https://learningequality.org/kolibri that delivers Khan, CK-12, and other curriculum locally without internet. We are working to expand this program substantially this year and have recently obtained the Honduran textbooks in digital form.

In addition to our main web site, we also maintain another dedicated to the education efforts: http://hondurasrobot.org/. This contains more detail on robotics and other education technology efforts.

In closing, I want to thank you for your long-term significant support of education.

Very sincerely yours,

Dick Buten

Children using technology at elementary school

March 28, 2019August 4, 2023

Delays & Challenges in Getting Micronutrients to 2800 Children

By Laura Failla Manship – Executive Director

Mother and 3 children January 2019

The MANI 5 Extension grant started on September 1, 2018. It was designed as a 12 month project, with an ending date of August 30, 2019.Starting at the beginning of September, Shoulder to Shoulder worked with the Mathile Institute to place an order of Chispuditos with Alimentos (the company in Guatemala that produces the product). The order was meant to provide enough Chispuditos for the October 2018 and January 2019 distributions. Unfortunately, due to a problem with the testing of the product, the delivery of the product was delayed for two months. This meant that there was NO DISTRIBUTION of Chispuditos in October 2018, as should have happened.

Once the testing problem was resolved, a new problem arose – due to changes in the Honduran government, Alimentos was not allowed to transport the product into Honduras. The problem was finally resolved in January 2019, with Alimentos contracting with another company to bring the product into Honduras. The Chispuditos arrived at StS’s clinic the 3^rd week of January. Our staff worked hard, and by the first week of Feb, all families received their 3 bags of Chispuditos.

We were succesfully able to get the micronutrient product delivered to the 2800 children due to the collaboration between our 2 MANI project staff and 23 Community Health Workers. This project is truly a “community effort.”

Mother and youngest child January 2019