University tuition

Hi, my name is Dawn, and I am fundraising for Flor Esmeralda Deleon to assist with her post secondary tuition fees for the University of Anahuac

We are into our 6th year of living in beautiful Belize. Little did we know that when we made the move here that the Belizean people would have such a positive impact on our lives. Their kindness and love has truly filled our hearts, we are so blessed to call them our friends and extended family.

I want to take a moment out to focus on one specific family that true means the world to us. Here is a little back story. As most of you are aware we purchase a 10 acre property here in Belize with the intention to open a veterans retreat. When we arrived and started working on the property we started looking for someone that could help us grow the property to the beautiful piece it is now. We were lucky enough to meet Edgar Deleon. A hard working man, trained as a tour guide here in Belize. We did not realize just how much of a positive impact that he would have on our lives, the knowledge and drive he has is absolutely amazing.

After sometime working with us, Edgar introduced us to his beautiful family, his wife Nidelvia has a heart of gold, then there are his amazing children, Flor(Esmeralda), Edgar Jr and little Amanda. They opened their home and hearts to us, as we did to them. Their family dynamic is amazing.

As some of you are aware 3 years ago we opened our home to Edgar’s daughter, Flor Esmeralda Deleon. At the age of ten when we met her she already knew what career path she wanted to take, she wanted to become a doctor. Esmeralda’s drive and determination is beyond amazing, she had the opportunity to go to Corozal Community College in Corozal to complete her last 4 years of schooling prior to following her career dream. So since her home is quite a long distance from the school, over 2 ferries and a not so good road at the time. We opened our home and invited her in to live with us during the week. It gave her the opportunity to focus solely on her studies and she absolutely excelled, even during the covid phase. For the past 4 years her cumulative gpa has been between 3.8-4.0, this year she finishes off her 4th form with a finally GPA of a 4.0.

She is graduating high school at the age of 16, already an amazing accomplishment. This is now where her dream of becoming a doctor becomes a reality. Early this year Esmeralda started applying for universities, the 2 main criteria we needed to focus on was a school that would accept her at the age of 16 as a lot will not accept unless they are 18 years of age, the second was one that would provide scholarships to help fund atleast a portion of her education. Esmeralda was accepted in to Anahuac University in Merida, Mexico, only 5 hours away from home. Esmeralda is in a unique situation because money for secondary education is not something that can be easily saved as the average Belizean work makes between 40-50bz dollars today, so $20-25US per day. We want to assist in Esmeralda getting the opportunity to move forward especially in such an important career choice.

Esmeralda’s medical program is a 6 years in duration and costs $19,000 US per year. Upto 65% will be covered for the scholarship. So approximately $7700 US is the remaining balance that we will be needing to be paid to make this dream a reality. This does not include the $750 US per month in accommodations/food fees that we will be covering out of our own pocket. We have been trying to find other sources of financial aid to assist but unfortunately that is something that does not happen here

So this is the point where I reach out to all our family and friends to see if you would open your hearts and assist us in donating to a go fund me on behalf of Esmeralda. Any donation would be so greatly appreciated. Our goal it to hopefully raise $7700 US for this year and then we can look at starting fundraisers for the remaining years.

I want to thank everyone that took a moment out to read this story, if you could please share it that would be greatly appreciated

Thank you