Guatamalan Youth Workers visit WIMPS

Tuesday 24 November 09

Grupo Ceiba from Guatamala, is an organization that works to prevent violence and drugs. They came to visit Northern Ireland, in which they visited the WIMPS group, attending our WIMPS cast session - so we were able to interview them. During the WIMPScast, they gave details of their work. They have three main programs, Street University, Alternative Education, and Educational Enterprise. They work with young people in the outskirts of Guatemala City. (You can find a link to their website in our links tab!) They say in Guatemala there are lots of different problems; for young people, the big issue is social segregation and the stigma these young people suffer from. The young people they work with include youngsters from slums, poor areas in Guatemala City, and rural areas. Most of these places lack real opportunities. According to them, in Guatamala, there is a huge gap between the rich and the poor, and poverty levels are increasing. It is the young people that are likely to suffer the most from this poverty. Grupo Ceiba’s work is aimed at broadening young people’s possibilities of breaking these harmful cycles. They came to visit Northern Ireland to experience different approaches to youth work within different places, to share experiences for learning and teaching from this exchange. It was a pleasure to have them amongst us. Hope to see them again…in warm Guatemala! The group were here as guests of the WAVE organisation who work with victims and survivors or our conflict