The Tripod

Two Trinity students have received funding to go to the San Pedro Prison in La Paz, Bolivia, and establish a youth technology and student center for the 211 children who currently live in the prison with their fathers. Daniela McFarren '09 and classmate Ezel Poslu '09 have been granted $10,000 from the Davis Projects for Peace program and are in the beginning stages of preparation for their project, which they will execute this summer.

The San Pedro prison houses children who live with their fathers, who rent cells according to their financial status. The children are not in prison because they have committed a crime, but rather their unlawful fathers are the only ones they have to care for them.

Poslu said that while the children go to a school outside of the prison, "They go back home to jail, where they are surrounded by criminals and have no place to reinforce their education."

Poslu and McFarren have partnered with Save the Children, which has experience in creating and establishing technology centers, and they hope to improve the children's community life with more diverse opportunities. The children currently lack resources and mentors to become upstanding citizens.

The project is expected to take eight weeks: three weeks to establish the technology center and five to train and mentor the children. Along with providing the technology center with 12 computers, they also plan on equipping the center with books, games and a reading area. They aim to extend this project into the future after the summer trip concludes.

"We hope to successfully establish a technology and study center," Poslu says, "and we will continue raising funds and creating events to maintain it." All of the winning Davis project proposals are supposed to propose plans that will have long-term effects.

McFarren and Poslu will mentor the children during their visit, and will also "create recreational activities, which will be sustained by interns from various Bolivian universities," Poslu says. They are currently in the process of providing the computers.

In their proposal, McFarren and Poslu wrote, "Hopefully, this project will encourage the San Pedro children to follow a path different from the one they see around them. Education empower and enlightens. It can be the decisive tool for the San Pedro children to attain peaceful lives, thus contributing their gifts to the world."

When the fall semester begins, McFarren and Poslu plan on holding a photo exhibition to present their project and to share their experiences with the Trinity community. They also hope to increase awareness of the issue. "We hope to inspire future projects for peace," Poslu explains.

In their proposal, Poslu and McFarren wrote that their project, "aims at creating and encouraging peace by granting the children living in the San Pedro Prison opportunities to broaden their knowledge and explore their hidden passions. Knowledge research and computer skills along with our mentoring will open up a new world to these children, who are now confined to a suffocating and dangerous environment." They hope for their project to be "a gateway for creative and productive stimulation."

McFarren and Poslu are grateful for the supportive Trinity community. "We want to thank all the Trinity staff, students, and our families who have been extremely supportive and believed in us. We couldn't have done it without them. We cannot wait to make this hopeful project happen," Poslu says. "We are honored to represent Trinity with a project that means so much to us and that will change these children's lives."

The Davis Projects for Peace program honors philanthropist Kathryn Wasserman Davis, who launched the program on her one hundredth birthday in 2007. One hundred projects each receive the $10,000 in funding. The winners hail from 81 colleges and universities in the Davis United World College (UWC) Scholar Program.

According to a press release on the Trinity College Web site, the program is "designed to encourage and support motivated youth to create and implement their ideas for building peace throughout the world in the 21st century."

Winners of the program this year will travel to more than 54 countries. The winning projects range from community building and youth empowerment to agrarian and water supply improvements.

Article Tools