Fe y Alegría
Fe y Alegría is a federation of local organizations in 19 countries. It focuses on the impoverished and excluded and promotes the values of participation, fraternity, respect for diversity, and solidarity, with a view toward developing a more just society.[1] It is guided by an international board of directors and advances the tradition of Jesuit education in the Catholic church.[2]
History
Fe y Alegría was founded in 1955 by Fr. José María Vélaz, S.J. Jose's first collaborator was a man who gave up his own home for a school, from his belief in education, and that sense of determination at the grass-roots level has characterized the spread of the movement. It spread rapidly in Venezuela, where it encompassed 10,000 students by 1964. By 1966 Ecuador, Panama, Peru, Bolivia, Central America, and Colombia were a part of the network. It remains a movement among the rural poor, a well-known description being: “Fe y Alegría starts where the pavement ends, where drinking water does not drip, where the city loses its name.”[3] The movement drew on the Jesuits' long history of humanistic education, to which was added the increased social justice emphasis of recent times.[4] The poorest would be empowered to be agents of their own transformation, a notion Paulo Freire would later embellish upon.
In 1987 the Fe y Alegría International Federation was formed to keep the movement faithful to its origins, with 930 religious people assisting the Jesuits in this effort. Transformation of a community through education is the common theme, neighborhoods working together to express their human dignity and achieve a better quality of life.[3]
Locations
About one million students are registered in over one thousand campuses with 38,000 workers (plus volunteers) and over fifty radio stations. Country organizations[5] and year of founding are:
- Argentina 1996
- Bolivia 1966
- Brasil 1980
- Chad 2007
- Chile 2005
- Colombia 1971
- Dominican Republic 1991
- Ecuador 1964
- El Salvador 1968
- Guatemala 1976
- Haiti 2006
- Honduras 2000
- Italy 2001
- Nicaragua 1974
- Panama 1965
- Paraguay 1992
- Peru 1966
- Spain 1985
- Uruguay 2009
- Venezuela 1955
Cooperators
Fe y Alegría also cooperates with organizations having similar goals, including:
- The main partner of "Fe y Alegría" is the Spanish NGO Entreculturas.
- AECID (Agencia Española de Cooperacion Internacional para el Desarrollo)
- ALBOAN