ACSI Haiti
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March 2006 Report An Open Letter to Our Viewers
Director, ACSI Eastern Canada			We invite your interest in helping the work in Haiti through ACSI Eastern Canada’s ministry there. Haiti is an absolutely unique country. Although it is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere and crippled by crime, political and social chaos and the mind-shackling religion of voodoo, there are now over a million students in its evangelical Christian schools. That is more than 60% of all the students in Haiti. There is a remarkable opportunity to be part of the Lord’s transformation of individual students and the nation as a whole. There are some significant challenges to which our organization has been responding: Most Christian school teachers have only a grade 8 education and no teacher training. For the past 10 years we have sent teams of North American Christian school leaders to do 3-5 day teacher training conferences throughout the country.
· Printed materials and basic supplies for teachers are in extremely short supply so we have teacher training materials translated into French and distributed at our conferences, and Canadian Christian school teachers collect and ship packages of teacher supplies.
· Most of the 1,000,000 Christian school students lack simple school supplies like the things listed in other links on this site.  For the past two years, students in Christian schools in Ontario and the Maritimes have collected and sent individual student supply bags to Haitian students. So far 1,135 bags have been sent.  It’s not many in light of the need but it is an important beginning. · Very few Haitian Christian school students own their own Bibles. To help change this we are working with The Bible League to provide three things: 1. Training for Christian school teachers on how to teach the Project Philip Course (presenting the essentials of Christianity). 2. Project Philip course booklets for students. 3. A free Bible when students complete the course booklet. All of this is paid by the $10 Canadian that students contribute with each student gift bag.
· There is a serious lack of books in Christian schools.  A typical Christian school of 200 to 300 students will have 10 to 12 books in its entire library.  We collect used French literature and resource books from French language schools in Ontario and ship them to the schools in Haiti.
The extent of the work depends on our financial resources.  Most of our support comes from offerings at our Canadian Christian school teachers' conventions but increasingly churches and individuals are helping, too. Each year the income for our Haiti work grows a bit, this past year to just under $50,000. We are encouraged by the growth but realize that compared to the opportunities opening up to us and the needs, it is pretty limiting. Our hope is that you will choose to be part of this important project. The potential is astounding. Yours in Christ, Mark Kennedy Director, ACSI Eastern Canada Here are the key financial policies for the Haiti mission: Ø All of the work that our ACSI office staff does for Haiti is strictly on a volunteer basis; no salaries are received.        Donated funds are spent directly for the ACSI ministry in Haiti. Ø ACSI  does not operate in a deficit position. That is, never is more money spent than is in the Haiti account. Ø Charitable receipts are provided for all donations of $10 or more.  ACSI Eastern Canada is a Canadian registered        charity under our incorporated name, Confederation of Canadian Christian Schools.
ACSI Eastern Canada Contact Information Regional Director: acsiec@sympatico.ca  Webmaster: admin@acsiec.org Phone:   705.728.7344 Fax:705. 728.4401 Mailing Address:  1 Wenden Crt. RR#2  Minesing, ON L0L 1Y2  Canada A member of the Independent School Associations of Ontario and the Canadian Council of Christian Charities