Our History

The Chiapas Children’s Project began modestly in the fall of 1999 in San Cristóbal de las Casas as a voluntary undertaking by an American educator, Steve Bachrach; a Mexican university student, Ana Molina; and a Dutch photographer, José Welbers. The idea was, and remains, to slowly build an institution and a network focused to keeping kids in school, encouraging them to construct a world for themselves larger in scope than their immediate surroundings, and aiding them in pursuing and attaining their dreams.

The program started with four kids, all young girls in grade school, all at that time engaged in the making and selling of artesanía (handcrafts), all residents of a neighborhood called La Hormiga (The Ant) a community of displaced indigenous Mayans. As is common with immigrant communities in many cities, the Hormiga is notorious within San Cristobal as the center of all sorts of illegal activity, from drugs to gangs to gun-running.

The basics of the present program were in place from start-up: afternoon tutoring sessions, school expense subsidies, medical expenses covered, and small stipends to participating students. The only thing that was asked of the families involved was that students be exempted from commercial activities of any kind within the school week and freed up to dedicate themselves to study.

Since its inception the program has grown steadily to its current size – fifteen children ranging in age from 10 to 15. Two of the original four students remain in the program. Having existed in a number of borrowed spaces the project now has its own premises dedicated to the after-school program. The after-school program now operates each weekday afternoon, plus saturday morning workshops, and has evolved an instructional format focused on building Spanish language and math skills. The program also offers weekly workshops in indigenous Mayan languages (all our students are bilingual, with Mayan languages spoken in their homes) and in creative arts. We now have three hearing-impaired students, and a specialist in oralization techniques and signing, Yolanda Hurtado Vingardi, works with them daily, along with her assistant, Susana Ruiz Dominguez.

In the process of growth we have developed strong links with two primary schools in San Cristobal who are our main source for students – Ignacio Allende in the Hormiga and 31 de Marzo. The latter is the only school in the city with state funding for tuition and assistance for deaf children.

In terms of staffing, we have grown steadily in number and breadth of scope. Three key members of our team, Concepción Suáres de la Cruz, Petul Hernández, and Martha Sántiz Díaz, come from local indigenous communities (Zinacantan, Tenejapa, and San Juan Chamula, respectively). Aida Popoca Nieto and Yolanda Hurtado Vingardi are both transplants from Mexico City. They join José and Steve to comprise the most complete and diverse group of educators we had to date.