Policy Plan 2020

Policy Plan 2020
Stichting Studiehulp Kay-Kok

Board: Mw. J. du Bois-Minholts, president

Mw. L.M. Kuijer, secretary

Mw. R. van der Kroef, treasurer

Website: http://ileavache.blogspot.com/

Email address: reinhildevdk@gmail.com

Bank : NL06TRIO 0391025457

Address: Jensemaheerd 147, 9736CK Groningen, The Netherlands

Postal address : Postbus 1485, 9701 BL Groningen, The Netherlands

Telephone: + 31 654786602

RSIN: 8555.41.143

The project in numbers

Tested in 2015	98
Qualified in group A	20
Group A (adjusted¹) by 2019	18
Admitted  2015/2016	6
Admitted 2016/2017	3
Admitted 2017/2018	4
Admitted 2018/2019	3
Admitted 2019/2020	2
Total admitted by December 2019	18
Still awaiting admittance group A	0
Graduates 2016	3
Graduates 2017	4
Graduates 2018	3
Graduated 2019	3
Total graduated by July 2018	13
Expected graduates 2020	3
Total graduates by 2020	16
2019 last 2 admitted of group A	2
Total to be graduated by 2021	18
Group B 2015 (not all qualified)	44
Group B adjusted by final 2018	29¹

  

 ¹ Due to migration, death, illness, not yet finished secondary school, study does not fit in our goals

Who, what, where, how?

1. Our goal is to fund as of 2015 during 5 years, the vocational schooling of maximum 10 students per year. We decided to open up our program for the academic year 2019/20 again for training courses that take maximum 2 years. This obliges us to use the academic year 2020/21 to let the last students in our program graduate. Funding is mainly found in our personal social network. Though we would be grateful to find also institutionalized sponsors (like schools and enterprises) that are willing to financially adopt one or more students, it appears that this is very difficult. We tried this several times, but failed so far. Of course we will grab any opportunity to broaden our financial basis, and we will keep on looking for this kind of sponsors, but on the other hand we have to be realistic about on what we spend our limited time and energy. So in the first place we focus on keeping those sponsors we have.
2. A second mission, that is directly connected to the first will get more attention in the years to come. We want to help our graduates to become self employed, which we consider with our actual knowledge of Haitian society, the only way for them to create a perspective on a more or less regular income and independency. The initiative of a general business plan has to come from themselves. We can help them subsequently to turn this into a real business plan, that will be used to find sponsors, loans and (micro-) credits for their project. The plan should be realistic (taking into account Haitian possibilities and limitations), it should be based on some kind of a marketing research to convince sponsors of its future creditworthiness, it should use skills they acquired during their training and it should lead to some sort of regular income. We will advise them in the development process and try to find sponsors and/or (micro-) credits. The first startup that is just to be launched in 2020 will function as our pilot in order to learn how to start a small business in Haiti. Some of our sponsors already committed themselves to this new branch of our project. 
3.  In order to make this aforementioned transition in the coming year we must adjust the goals of our foundation. The intention is to realize that in 2020. The change will include a formulation like: “The Foundation not only aims to offer young people from Ile a Vache vocational training,  but also to do everything (in the material sense and immaterially) that will be helpful to help them establish their own small business to enable them to earn a reasonable income with their acquired skills and become independent in due time.” The intention is to make this transition again work during 5 years.

Objectives 2020

A. Objective in 2020 is to continue with the 5 students from Kay-Kok, Ile a Vache to their vocational training courses in the city of Les Cayes. By the summer or autumn of 2020 3 of them will graduate. We will continue with the last 2 students for another academic year. This is especially targeted on the last 2 students from group A to enable them to finish their (2 year-) studies in 2021. Since we have some bigger sponsors that already committed themselves for a few more years, we are confident we will be able to accomplish our mission.

B. This means that in the academic year of 2020/2021 we will not start up a new group of students in order to close our educational program by 2021. Though in our original tests we had more groups formed, we believe that the achievement to help all suited people from the best tested group A will be the right moment to end the educational branch of our project.

1.     In the first place we come to this decision because it is according to the goals of the Foundation from the start the intention to run this program during 5 years.

2.     In the second place the rest of the list of candidates is not actualized anymore, so to continue there should be an entirely new round of testing.

3.     In the third place we encountered the problem that our graduates, in spite of their good diploma’s still don’t find suitable jobs. Since the last has been the underlying intention from the start of our program, we think, that instead of financing more young people to get a diploma with no perspective on work, we better start now to help the ones we invested already in to become independent.

C. As to the housing: we try to encourage the remaining 2 students to find their own places to stay, while the rented house is far too expensive to keep for 1 student (the other one already has found her own place). For those finding a place themselves we cover a fixed amount of expenses.

D. We are setting up an inventory of our (13) graduates about their actual employment situation.  So far the outcome is not very promising: nobody had found a fixed job.

E.  Set up the first startup (the cybercafé) of our graduates, to enable them to become self employed and financially independent. To learn how to do this in Haiti, what challenges you meet as a small entrepreneur, and how to solve problems that come up. To encourage other former students to follow the example.

F.  To prepare to set up more startups next year.

G. To explore the possibilities to set up our own small micro credit facility for our ex-students in order to enable them to start their own small businesses.

H. To explore the possibilities to transfer the small micro credit affair to become part of our first startup: the cybercafé, with which we hope the cybercafé to become in due time a kind of community service point (as already foreseen in the original business plan).  

Finance

For the academic year 2019/20, we had available + € 9200,-- from donations, of which by December 2019 we spent around € 5200,--. Based on our experiences so far the cost per person per year should be set on € 1600,-- (+ $ 1700, --), which leaves € 4000,-- for the second half of the academic year of which about 50% has already been paid for. The expenditures for the academic year 2019/2020 are thus covered.

We want to collect an amount of € 6.000,-- through the focused approach of individual supporters/sponsors (small businesses, Dutch schools and individuals) for the academic year of 2020/2021. This amount should be sufficient to cover the tuition, living, housing etcetera for the 2 remaining students ( €3200,--) in the academic year 2020/2021, to setup 1 or 2 startups  and to keep a reasonable buffer (together 2.800,--). 

Remuneration policy continued

The Board nor any other person in any way involved in the Stichting Studiehulp Kay-Kok receives remuneration or compensation for their work from the funds of the foundation. Our onsite collaborator or her representative receives for her work nor a reward or compensation of the Foundation (see also under "our local collaborator” in the Annual Report). She only gets $ 15,-- per month to cover the costs of data credit in order to keep up our regular and intensive communication.

Financial Report 2019

Winst & Verlies rekening 2019

(by clicking on the pictures you can enlarge them)

Balans 2019

Annual report 2019

Annual Report 2019
Stichting Studiehulp Kay-Kok

Board: Mw. J. du Bois-Minholts, president

Mw. L.M. Kuijer, secretary

Mw. R. van der Kroef, treasurer

Website: http://ileavache.blogspot.com/

Email adres: reinhildevdk@gmail.com

Bank : NL06TRIO 0391025457

Address: Jensemaheerd 147, 9736 CK Groningen, The Netherlands

Postal address : Postbus 1485, 9701 BL Groningen, The Netherlands

Telephone: + 31654786602

RSIN: 8555.41.143

The Foundation aims to raise money to offer adolescents from the village of Kay-Kok, Ile a Vache, Haiti the opportunity to attend to vocational training thus enabling them to earn an income.
Stichting Studiehulp Kay-Kok is enrolled in the Foundations and Associations Register of the Dutch Chamber of Commerce and is recognized by the Dutch tax authority as a charity organization (ANBI).

In this report you can read about the most important developments within our project in the year 2019.

Preface

Because of the riots in Haiti during the year 2019, several things that we had planned to accomplish in 2019 (see our Policy Plan 2019) have been delayed. There was a lot of patience asked from students, the startup that we planned to be up and running by the summer and from ourselves at a distance as well. Even more regretful: life in Haiti has become more difficult once more.

Since things in Haiti seem to have calmed down by the end of 2019, we are expecting that 2020 will see the startup running and the schools be reopened. We can only hope that prices for daily commodities will return to ‘normal’ levels again.

2019 in hindsight

• Three of our students graduated in 2019: Again a young lady became pastry cook and -decorator. A young man became diesel mechanic and another one electrician. Though because of the premature closure of the schools (because of the riots) they got their diplomas and there official graduation several months after they finished their school, they are now trying to find themselves jobs. We had 3 students in their first/second year and they wanted to continue their studies for the second/third years as of September. They are schooled in administrative science, accounting ( 2 young men) and agronomics (a young woman). Regretfully this was also delayed until December, but by the end of the year we were happy to understand that they were frequenting school again. From our tested group A we had still 2 students left to be taken into our program (see Policy Plan 2019). They have been admitted to the project in August 2019 and (because of the closure of the schools) belatedly started their studies in December. Their studies of choice are communications/journalism (a young man) and pedagogy (a young woman). By admitting them, we are happy to be able to add two entirely new and highly valuable professions to our group (and to the Haitian society). All together in 2019 3 students graduated, 3 continued their studies in their last year and 2 new students started their studies. The academic year 2019/20 sees 5 students in our project.
• Of course all this is only possible because we have a group of very loyal contributors, who continue to sustain our project. We also acquired some new contributors, who made up for those that stopped. So again we were able to collect € 9.200,00, which was nearly enough to cover the costs. We were still able to keep a small buffer intact.
• Since one of the goals of the Foundation is to offer vocational schooling to young people from Île a Vache during a period of 5 years this was the last year to take in new students. As we had already decided last year we have taken in 2 new students for another 2 years: since we have sufficient financial room to phase out (with those students still attending school) we can add for those that started their 2-years courses this year, an extra 6^th year (2021/2022)
• As to the housing, this year again the female students (2) found their own accommodations. The house we rent as usual houses the 3 young men.
• We had the intention to start this year with our startup: Cybercafé Websterline. We have been able to send all necessary equipment (a laser printer with extra ink cassettes, a generator, an alternator, 4 fully installed computers, a lamination device) to Haiti in the spring. Regretfully because of the riots in Haiti it took about 2 months extra to deliver the box with all the equipment. And then it appeared to be too dangerous to open the enterprise, since there was a lot of looting going on in town. Apart from that electricity was down altogether and gasoline had become too expensive to use the generator as a 100% alternative.  So we were obliged to be patient and wait for things calming down again and figure out a solution for the electricity problem.

Finance
For the academic year 2019/20, we had available  € 9200,-- from donations, of which by December 2019 we spent around € 5200,-- which leaves € 4000,-- for the second half of the academic year. Based on our experiences so far the cost per person per year could be maximized on € 1600,-- (+ $ 1700, --),  of which about 50% has already been paid for, leaving $ 4000,-- for the second half of the academic year 2019/20. The expenditures for the academic year 2019/2020 are thus covered, while the financial year 2019 had been closed with a negative result of € 1079,--. The buffer had therefore diminished bit but since we have paid already a large part of our expenses of the academic year 2019/2020 in advance,  there is still enough to cover the remaining expenses for the academic year 2019/2020.
The school fees for the six students amount for the course 2019/2020 to + $ 2510, -. This is averagely $ 40 more than the year before. In the academic year 2019-2020 an average of $ 50,- per person is being spent on schooling materials (books, copybooks, rucksack, tools, laptops, calculators, internships) until December, which is much less than the year before. Since the delay of the start of the schools we can expect this amount to rise before the end of the academic year: it is not precisely predictable how much still will be required, but we expect it to be less than last year ($ 200,--per person). Diplomas and graduations also cost money, the amounts varying considerably per school and type of course. So far the conclusion is we have to reckon with amounts of about € 250,-- per person. The graduation of a student in Haiti is supposed to go with some kind of a party (food and drinks), but we decided that to pay for this is not an aim of our project. All together we expect the total costs per student to stay a little bit below the aforementioned € 1600,--.

We have rented the house again where during the academic year of 2019/2020 3 boys live. Rent is $ 1000,-- per year and $ 10,-- for electricity monthly. The remuneration to the boarding houses of the (female) students who found a shelter on their own accord can be maximized on € 150,-- pp / py.
To these costs should be added the monthly cost of food and drink. This is set on $ 60,-- per person per month. Although the schools have been kept closed from September until November, we decided to pay the monthly costs nevertheless during these months as well, since the students have no other way of income and because of the riots the costs of daily life had risen considerably. Although as yet it is not clear if schools will add the lost months at the end of the course, this, even when that would be decided, will not cause a financial problem for the foundation.

In 2019, because of problems with the Haitian bank account, we have been obliged to start to transfer the money to Haiti with Western Union. This results in considerably  less favorable exchange rates than when we were able to use the bank. Still on yearly basis we have been able to keep up with the 1:1 $ to € rate as we had been used to. By 2020 we started again to open and use a (new) Haitian bank account on behalf of our collaborators in Haiti for the money transfers.

Remarks about our project

1.      We put the perspective on work high on our list. After 4 years running our project, in which 13 students graduated, we have to conclude that finding a job in Haiti, even with a good starting qualification in hand like our students have, is very hard. For this reason we started already during our last visit to Île a Vache in 2016 to raise consciousness about the option of becoming self employed. But that is not an easy path in Haiti either. Not only do most people lack money for investments, but they have to conquer many challenges regarding nearly everything as well. For example: nowadays current is hardly available anymore and the prices of gasoline have more than doubled the last year. Micro credit is widely mistrusted in Haiti, because costs (20 % interest) exceed the advantages for most people. To startup something of your own triggers often ‘jealousy’ in Haiti. Since voodoo practices are still more than common ‘jealousy’ means you are at great risk to become a victim of voodoo.  This is a reality which cannot be denied nor refuted and it has important consequences on the initiatives people dare to pick up. 

Since poverty in Haiti in very widespread (more than 40% of unemployment, 2/3 of the labor force is underemployed resulting in about 60% of the population living under the poverty line by accounts of 2016 and 2017, in the mean time these figures will have become even worse, because of the riots in 2019[2]), purchasing power is very low, so small businesses will always be quite vulnerable.

Certainly waiting for a job leads to nowhere. And starting up a small business is nearly the only way in Haiti to reach some kind of income. For this reason we decided to help our ex-students, who come up with a good plan, to set up a small business. For this we had available some earmarked money in 2018 with which we have been able to fund a substantial investment in our first startup.

After more than 1 ½ year of preparations and waiting for the society to calm down again, as we are writing this the first startup is ready to make her start with a so called cybercafé (copy shop, internet café, general service point for administrative activities and maybe in due time even more).

We hope that this first initiative will provide us with the knowledge and the experience to let more of these plans of our ex-students follow in due time.

And since using micro credit is too expensive and too complicated, we will use our own money as a foundation for the first startups. The intention is to start to give new startups small loans. When we are able to set up a system of providing for loans to these startups we have already at least one investor.  Because of the many delays and problems in the country, it is important to count with the fact that these loans can only function when they are long term loans: binding the people to tight repayment conditions will lead to big disappointments on both sides. For this reason everything has to be based on a solid and real business plan, learning from our first experience and a lot of trust.

2.      The Board nor any other person in any way involved in the Stichting Studiehulp Kay-Kok receives remuneration or compensation for their work from the funds of the foundation. Our onsite collaborator receives for her work nor a reward nor compensation from the Foundation. We only compensate the cost of data credit of our collaborator, in order to facilitate regular communication about the project.

We have an private financial arrangement with our local collaborator Mme Joleine Placide. This is organised entirely outside of the budget of the Stichting Studiehulp Kay-Kok.     

---

[2]https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ha.html