Amigos de Educacion de Alamos

Welcome to Amigos de Educación de Alamos

Who We Are

Amigos de Educación de Alamos is a nonprofit, voluntary organization dedicated to providing financial and other assistance to needy and academically qualified students who live in Alamos, Sonora, Mexico. The organization has provided this assistance for over 15 years. Currently, we are assisting nearly 300 young people, one third of all middle and high school students in town.The first funds were raised through tours of historical homes and gardens of Alamos. Association membership fees, donations and fundraising events now supplement these funds.

Education in Mexico, especially at the high school level, is not fully funded by the government. As a result, the students assisted by Amigos de Educación might not otherwise be able to attend school. Assistance is first available in secundaria or middle school and continues through prepa (high school) for the most qualified and needy. The success stories are numerous, varied and heart-warming. Many former students are examples for a younger generation.

Amigos de Educación is governed by an elected Board of Directors. Volunteers carry out all of its activities. All U.S. participants live part or full time in Alamos and include numerous individuals with extensive experience in business, government and education. A number of Mexican citizens are also involved in the work of the organization. The fund is a broad-based effort to help promote better education for the children of Alamos.

Donations to Amigos de Educación can be sent to:

In the US: c/o Lorna Acosta, 7739 E. Broadway, PMB 342, Tucson, AZ 85710

In Mexico: Contact Membership Chairman Ray Auckerman @ 647-428-0267.

All donations are tax-deductible. Amigos has been offically recognized as a 501c.3 charitable organization by the U.S. Internal Revenue Service since 1999.

Ten Ways You Can Support Amigos de Educacion

The children of Alamos are one of its many treasures. Watching them walk to school in the early morning with their uniforms neat, their hair braided or gelled, it is easy to feel hope for the future of our little town. As the Chinese proverb goes, "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." Providing scholarships to financially needy students is a way to enable them to reach their future dreams.

You can support their dreams by contributing in the following ways:

1) Become a member of Amigos de Educacion de Alamos by attending the annual membership meeting and paying your dues of $25. The meeting will be held on Sunday, January 16th at Paulina Verjan school at 2pm.

2) Donate your (gently) used household goods, furniture, books, appliances, jewelry, artwork, tools, etc, to our upcoming fundraising Bazaar to be held March 5th and 6th. Call Betsy Maier at 428-0809 to arrange for a pick-up.

3) Pledge to support a student for a year by donation $300 USD for a high school (prepatoria) student or $75 for a middle school (secundaria) student. Donations from the US can be mailed directly to our Treasurer, Lorna Acosta, at the address at the beginning of this blog. Larger donations are gratefully accepted.

4) Volunteer your time to serve on the Board of Directors or a standing committee, to design a brochure or poster, or to help out at one of our fundraisers.

5) Buy one of the lovely books, Pollinators of the Sonoran Desert,  generously donated to Amigos by Teri Markow and available for purchase at the upcoming membership meeting. This book, in English and Spanish, contains beautiful photographs and fascinating information about some of the birds, insects, and bats of our region.

6) Volunteer to lead one of our house tours or to have your house and garden open to visitors who want to experience the history and grandeur of Alamos

7) Pledge 10% of the sales of your jewelry or other arts and crafts to Amigos, as Linda Adams so generously did during her holiday jewelry sale this past December.

8) Buy a copy of Good Deeds, heartwarming stories (in English and Spanish) about the generosity of the Mexican people compiled and published by Elizabeth Dale, the proceeds going to Amigos de Educacion. This is the perfect book to give to friends and family back home who have succumbed to the scare stories about Mexico.

9) Attend our fundraising bazaar on March 5th and 6th and buy something fabulous that has been donated by one of your neighbors.

10) Come up with a new idea for a project to raise funds that would be fun for the whole community.

Support a Scholarship Student

These scholarship students from Paulita Verjan Middle school are representative of the deserving young people supported by your contributions to Amigos de Educacion de Alamos (L to R):

Cecilia Alejandra Ju Rosas, lives in La Campana, loves to play volleyball and wants to be a kindergarten teacher or a doctor.

Andrea Alejandra Esquer Ju, lives in La Campana, plays soccer and favorite subjects are English and Physics.

Jesus Francisco Verdugo Villares, lives in El Chalaton, plays the guitar and wants to be a singer or a psychologist.

Leslie Fernanda Arias Castro, lives in El Centro, favorite subjects are Arts and English and wants to be a pediatrician.

Andrea Guadalupe Ju Armenta, lives in La Campana, plays volleyball and wants to be a teacher or psychologist.

Please consider a donation of $300 USD to Sponsor a Student, which covers the cost for an entire academic year for one high school student.  You can do this by raising your hand during the annual fundraiser when "Scholarship Sweeps" are announced, by mailing a donation to our Treasurer, Lorna Acosta or Linda Hellman in the US, or by contacting any of the Amigos board members in Alamos.

Your generous donations will enable these students to realize their future dreams.

December Scholarship Students of the Month

Andrea Guadelupe Ju Armenta is a student at the Paulita Verjan middle school. She lives with her family in the La Campana neighborhood. Her father, Refugio, is a farmworker and her mother, Enedina, is a housewife. Andrea loves to play volleyball and hang out with her friends in town. Her favorite subjects are English, art, and physical education and she hopes to one day have a career as a kindergarten teacher or a psychologist.

Guadalupe Balvanedo Medina Escalante is also a student at the Paulita Verjan secundaria. He lives in the Tacubaya neighborhood and his hobbies are playing soccer and watching TV. His father works on the city cleaning crew and his mother is a housewife. Science and Carpentry are his favorite subjects in school and he hopes to become a soldier in the future.

Your generous support of Amigos de Educacion de Alamos allows these students and more than 250 others to pursue their educational goals.

Scholarship Programs

Currently, Amigos de Educacion de Alamos supports 140 students at the high school level and 130 in middle-schools (or Secundaria). Since the Mexican government provides no financial support for students past the 6th grade, most of these young people would not be able to pursue further education without our assistance.

Of the 140 students supported at the high school level (Prepa), 110 attend the local Alamos COBACH pre-college facility. An additional 10 students are supported in each of the two outlying areas of Los Tanques and Basiroa. Students are expected to maintain an 8.5 (85%) grade point average to keep their scholarships. The cost for tuition and books paid for each of these students comes to 3,000 pesos per year.There are also 10 scholarships of 1000 pesos per year offered for Alamos students to attend technical schools such as nursing, electronics, mechanics, or hairstyling in Navajoa.

Support for each of the 130 students attending one of the two secundarias in Alamos totals 800 pesos per year and includes admission fees and uniforms, which are required to attend school. Students are selected for the program at the end of 6th grade based on need and motivation to succeed. They are carried through middle school and re-evaluated prior to entering the 9th grade at COBACH.

Pictured at the right is Linda Hellman, currently Treasurer on the Board of Amigos, along with some of the scholarship recipients from Paulita Verjan Middle School (photo courtesy of Martin Rosas).

Home and Garden Tours

Located in the Sierra Madre foothills of southern Sonora, Mexico, Alamos is an architectural delight. Founded in the late 17th century, Alamos was a major silver mining center for Spain for more than 200 years. Mine owners accumulated great wealth and built lavish homes in the Spanish Colonial style. But by the beginning of the 20th century the mines were depleted. After the Mexican revolution the mansions were left to fall into ruins.

In the 1940's and 50's, however, Alamos was rediscovered by visitors from north of the border who began to buy and restore some of the abandoned homes. This process has continued over the past half century until now Alamos has regained much of its original beauty and grandeur. It has been designated by the Mexican government as a "Pueblo Magico" and is being considered for World Heritage Site status. 

Since the early 1980s, members of the expatriate community of Alamos have opened their homes and gardens to the public for a small fee to benefit the local community. These funds were first used to establish a public library. After the state of Sonora took over responsibility for the library, the group began assisting local children with education. Now in its 26th year, Amigos de Educacion de Alamos provides financial support for nearly 300 students, most of whom would not be able to progress beyond the 6th grade without this aid. Critical support for this program comes in large part from these tours of homes and gardens in this historic community.

Tours leave from the Church Plaza in front of the Museum every Saturday morning at 10:00 am from mid-October through April. Suggested donation is $10, or the peso equivalent. Larger donations are gratefully accepted. Amigos de Alamos is a registered tax-deductible non-profit charitable organization in the United States.