I have been so excited to see how our student sponsorship program is growing and expanding! In the last two months we have grown from 68 sponsored students to 90. I love seeing more and more of our students have the chance to study consistently and rise above the poverty that surrounds them. We still have just over 200 children in need of sponsorship. If you're interested in sponsoring one of our students, you can do so through our new sponsorship website educatenica.org  We are still building our sponsorship website so currently it doesn't have all of our students listed. We will be expanding that database this spring.

    I wrote a blog post in December celebrating our graduates (Read: A Shout-Out to our Graduates). We have a few students who just graduated from high school and have big dreams for their futures. These young people really want to study at the university. We are in need of sponsors to help these amazing young people attend the university in Leon. You can sponsor a college student for $100/month.

Name: Yorleni de los Angeles Castro Cruz- ALREADY SPONSORED!!!

Birthday: September 9, 1994

Age: 18

Village: Candelaria

    Yorleni is an amazing young woman! She and her family have been involved here at New Song since the very beginning of the

church in 2002. She in an active part of our youth group, teaches the 9-10 year old girls' Sunday school class, and a dedicated student (Yor and I pictured right as she is being honored as a top student).

    Yorleni graduated from high school this December as one of the top students in her class. She longs to attend the university in Leon to study medicine and dreams to become a doctor of general medicine. You can help make her dreams come true through educational sponsorship.

Name: Oscar Lira- ALREADY SPONSORED!!!

Birthday: July 8, 1995

Age: 17

Village: La Isla

      Oscar lives in our outreach village of La Isla. He and his family are very involved in our church their in La Isla. His mom, Rosa, also works as the cook for the mission house in Candelaria. They are one of the most

loving, close-knit families that I have encountered here in Nicaragua. Oscar loves being a part of the church and learning more about the Bible. He has even begun biking an hour (each way) to attend Wednesday night Bible study at the church in Candelaria led by Pastor Alex. Oscar says, "It's a beautiful thing for us to not only be in service, but to be in small group Bible study where we can really sit and discuss the scriptures together. I really loved the Bible study the first time I came and want to continue to come. I don't mind biking over each week."

      Oscar is also an excellent student. He graduated from high school in December 2012. He longs to enter the university in March of this year and study medicine. Oscar would like to specialize in either general medicine or plastic surgery. He says that when he has finished school he would love to work at the New Song clinic in order to give back to his community.

     Please consider giving one of these incredible young people a chance to study in the university. They have big dreams and will do amazing things for their communities, but they need YOUR help to make their dreams come true! You can email me through this blog if you're interested.