LIDÈ Haiti

Empowering Haitian Girls To Strengthen Mental Health In Their Communities
 
Please help LIDÈ raise $49,655 to educate adolescent girls in Haiti about how to strengthen their own mental health and support the mental health of their peers and community.

What does LIDÈ do?

LIDÈ contributes to creating a world where girls have equal access to quality education, a sense of their own voices and their innate gifts, are resilient, and feel empowered to use those strengths to achieve their educational goals, support one another, and contribute positively to the betterment of their local and global communities.

Working in eight communities in rural Haiti, LIDÈ takes a whole-person approach to building capacity, empowerment and resiliency among at-risk adolescent girls and differently abled youth who have been denied equal access to education. Our creative arts programs help girls increase their resiliency, hope, creativity, motivation, problem-solving capacities and self-confidence. Our academic support programs offer school scholarships, training in literacy, numeracy, and computer skills, and academic support to strengthen girls' educational attainment. Our health programming includes daily nutritious meals, family planning education, psychosocial support services, individualized counseling and medical services. And, our transitions program helps prepare participants for adulthood through workshops on career counseling, social entrepreneurship training, and parenting education. Combined, these provide a system of support while empowering participants with the tools to better understand themselves, and their world.

What is this project all about?

LIDÈ is raising funds for a program to educate our adolescent girl participants, staff, parents, and other community leaders in Les Coteaux, Haiti to understand the mental health and psychosocial support needs after emergencies and to develop skills to foster long-term psychological resilience and well-being within their community.

 What problem are we trying to solve?

Haiti is vulnerable to different natural disasters including devastating earthquakes and hurricanes. In response to these events, many organizations and communities focus on the physical needs of people-food, water, shelter, and physical health care. However, these disasters also leave behind emotional trauma that often remains unattended. If unaddressed, this trauma can negatively impact people's mental health, livelihoods, and relationships.

Unfortunately, in rural communities in Haiti, psychosocial support is often seen as a luxury and even looked down upon due to many misperceptions and negative associations around the practice of psychology. Training adolescent girls and community members will be important in dispelling these myths and allowing mental health support to gain more acceptance in the community.

Trainings for our adolescent girl participants and staff will address the following topics:

 - Emotional and Social Impacts of Disasters: Understanding Psychosocial Support
 - Importance of Psychosocial First Aid
 - Activities to Promote Psychosocial Wellness
 - Psychosocial Support Needs of Children and Adolescents
 - Ethical Dos and Don'ts for Psychosocial Support in Rural Contexts
 - Self-Care for Caregivers
 
We will also offer community leader and teacher training workshops, which will focus on building awareness of the importance of psychosocial support and gaining their support for this initiative in the community. And, LIDÈ staff will accompany parents to create monthly support groups to help the parents understand not only how to support their children but how to care for themselves.

What impact do we expect the project to have?

This program, conducted in collaboration with psychologists from the Haitian Association of Psychologists, will empower adolescent girls to lead conversations with family members and peers in support of strengthening psychological resilience. We expect to reach 200 girls currently participating in our programs and hundreds more that will be positively impacted by the outreach and education our girls offer to their peers. In addition, strengthening the girls' knowledge of how to foster mental health should positively impact their school attendance, concentration in school, ability to complete assignments, their academic performance, and their uninterrupted continuation of their studies.


Please join us by donating to this effort and share the campaign with your networks on social media.

Learn more about LIDÈ at: our website 
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This project is supported by the Girls Opportunity Alliance .

Your donation to benefit this campaign/project will be allocated to the Girls Opportunity Alliance Fund (“GOA Fund”), a project of GoFundMe.org (a U.S. public charity). The Girls Opportunity Alliance Fund may grant a refund in limited circumstances at its sole and absolute discretion, however, donations are not refundable after the GoFundMe payment platform has transferred your donation to the Girls Opportunity Alliance Fund. Transfers from GoFundMe to Girls Opportunity Alliance fund typically occur once monthly. All donations are subject to the variance power of GoFundMe.org, as stated in the applicable GoFundMe.org policies (https://www.gofundme.org/policies/). Subject to applicable law, donations may be tax-deductible.

The GOA Fund is restricted to supporting girls' education and your donation is made for the support of the above described project. Notwithstanding that the campaign description may name a specific organization that is anticipated to engage in the projects, GoFundMe.org retains variance power, that is, discretion and control over how funds are disbursed within the purposes of the GOA Fund generally, and within the purpose of the project specifically. For example, if the project does not reach its minimum fundraising goal, GoFundMe.org may re-assign money raised to another campaign within the GOA Fund.

As of April 11, 2019, the Direct Impact Fund operates as GoFundMe.org.