St. Boniface Supports Haitian School, Chicken Program

Jim Schroeder, St. Boniface parishioner, visits Haiti regularly and has established a great relationship with teachers and principals at the sister parish. 70 Haitian children attend Dominique Savio Elementary School tuition-free and all 107 students that attend the school are provided with textbooks and free lunches of rice and beans. Also, teachers there are being paid. This is all due to support from sponsors.

The school was described as a building with concrete walls and floors, roofed with tin, and void of electricity. A shallow well with a metal bucket provides water for washing and cooking. Local women often come to the school to cook school lunches are not paid, but help willingly with the hopes that there will be leftover food to take home to their families.

During his visit to Haiti in November, 2015, Jim was present for the “First-Ever Chicken Give-away,” a joint project involving students from St. Boniface and Corpus Christi Schools. While school children raised money to purchase 151 chickens for their brothers and sisters in Haiti, they prayed daily for a specific child at their twinned parish. In November, all 107 students, as well as staff were each given a live chicken. This project is just one example of the combined efforts of a developing micro-financed chicken project in Haiti, Evansville diocesan school children, and St. Boniface’s ministry outreach team. “One of the highlights of our Haiti mission work,” Jim said, “has been to empower our fellow brothers and sisters with the opportunity to use their God given talents to work and take more pride in themselves.”