Annual financial budgets, approved by the Board, are allocated to various causes.
We have strong personal and financial connections with those we help:
Requests made by groups or organizations:
If these criteria are not being met, a decision by the committee is made to discontinue funding.
IFC has been operation in Puerto Vallarta since 1985. We have taken over 50,000 passengers on the Home Tours. We have dispersed millions of pesos to help thousands of Mexicans with their health, education and culture. It happened because the management of IFC knows that “if we watch the pennies, the pounds will look after themselves.”
What would your life be like if your child couldn’t smile? Or couldn’t eat? That’s what happens to children born with a cleft palate or cleft lip. No smiles!
Infants born with a cleft palate or cleft lip can be faced with a cascade of possible problems that further impede their development. They can develop middle ear infections, hearing loss, and loss of their ability to speak.
If cleft palates and cleft lips are not treated, children affected may also face a severe impact on their self-esteem, social skills and behavior as they grow into teenagers.
Since 1985 IFC has been providing solutions to such children and their families. It was then that we began offering free assessments, surgeries and follow-up treatments to children from poor families.
Three or four times a year, a team of caring, compassionate medical personnel fly from Guadalajara to Puerto Vallarta. They donate their time, and CMQ Hospital donates its operating theatre, but the travel costs and the medical supplies must all be paid for by IFC. We co-ordinate everything.
Nearly 900 surgeries later, we can look back on the success of enabling those children and their families to smile again.
To help reduce someone’s chronic pain, please
Angels en Libertad provides dental cleaning, therapeutic pedicures, haircuts and health checks to people in outlying communities surrounding Puerto Vallarta. Centred in Las Juntas, they have a van that allows them to take their team where help is most needed. In addition to healthcare services this group provides despensas and health education programmes.
Bennu was an ancient Egyptian symbol for rebirth.
What an appropriate name for a group of women helping other women to have a second chance after being diagnosed with breast cancer.
Bennu needs special bras, pressure sleeves, prosthetic devices, scarves and wigs. Because their clients are poor, they can’t afford to have reconstructive surgery. Bennu also covers transportation costs for treatments in Guadalajara and provides despensas for families of cancer patients.
Bennu needs our support and we can help. After all, everyone knows someone who has had breast cancer.
Susan Davalos, a volunteer with IFC for many years, knows poor and malnourished people who live in the streets and alleys away from the bright lights of P.V.
The support given to these people varies from month to month and year to year. Some of the beneficiaries of Susan’s help recover from their bad health and bad luck, but, unfortunately, others don’t.
IFC provides Susan with the funds to buy these individual and families food and supplies to help them survive.
Susan also works with community churches, community centers, food banks, providers of medicines and youth drop-in facilities. These include:
Although we cannot help everyone, we can help some!
If you would like to help someone impoverished and/or malnourished, please
RISE was founded in 2001 and has been home to hundreds of children since then.
The professional, dedicated staff and volunteers provide love, shelter, food and education for each child who would, otherwise, be living on the streets.
Children and infants come to RISE from local social services agencies, DIF (the Mexican social services department), and families experiencing a crisis at home.
RISE ensures that each girl and boy receives a good academic and spiritual education.
RISE can provide a home for as many as 50 children.
Most operating funds come from donations by Americans and Canadians. DIF pays for emergency medical care.The president is Padre Luis Alcarez. They are supported by a board of directors and seven committees.
Dives en Misericordia (Rich in Mercy) is a community centre which provides regular daycare to a dozen pre-school children. It provides bi-weekly despenses to two dozen families. On Saturday mornings they run English classes for adults. Currently, there are 12 students.
This year, 2023, they will initiate a program, preparing 17 meals per day Monday – Friday for those community members who have a disabled member in their family and and only one caregiver.
The Wixárika Scholarship Fund (WSF) gives awards to university students from Jalisco’s largest Indigenous group, the Wixárika. The scholarships assist students to overcome the many barriers they face and complete their undergraduate university studies. In 2021/22, the fund provided financial assistance to twenty students.
Each summer, the WSF must turn down fully qualified applicants because of a lack of funds. A scholarship for one student for a year is $7,000 pesos, about $350 USD. Since the program started in 2018/19, we have celebrated eight graduations and expect ten more in 2022.
Financial commitment to the students is a serious responsibility. When the WSF commits to funding a new student, it supports them until their undergraduate program is completed. A recent WSF graduate, Isais (forestry), conveyed the spirit of the program when he said this: “In the future when I get a chance to be a donor, I will gladly make my contribution. This is how we change the world to make a better society of good people.” If you would like to change the life of one person, and an entire community, please…
Significance of a Dedicated School for Underprivileged Girls
1. Equal Opportunities: Ensures quality education, narrowing disparities and fostering inclusivity.
2. Breaking Poverty: Empowers girls to rise above limitations, using education as a ladder out of poverty.
3. Empowerment: Equips girls with knowledge for informed choices, nurturing self-reliance and confidence.
4. Gender Equality: Acts as a catalyst for balanced growth, enabling girls to access opportunities on par with boys.
5. Community Impact: Educated girls become agents of positive change, driving improvements in health, economy, and social progress within their communities.
The Mi Museo Program in the Education Section of ARTe VallARTa Museo is dedicated to expanding knowledge of the arts within the communities of Puerto Vallarta. The purpose of the museum is to collect, preserve, interpret, and display objects of artistic, cultural significance and to provide arts education for the Vallarta community. Mi Museo is a pilot program of the Education section of the museum to support bringing art into the local standard curriculum of kindergarten children with developmentally centered organized museum activities that are aligned with the standardized curriculum for these grades. This pilot program focuses on the beginning year of schooling to offer a foundation of art-based learning for the children. Exploring the museum through organized activities that connect to the standardized curriculum offers the kindergarten children the ability to develop and engage actively in the process of acquiring knowledge and to express thoughts and creativity. Effective use of the museum through the Mi Museo program can lead to multifaceted learning, development of critical thinking skills and acquisition of lifelong learning skills of the 21st century.
For several years, Free English classes have been offered by IFC volunteers to Mexican children and adults of limited financial means.
CURRENTLY WE ARE SEEKING A NEW DIRECTOR FOR THIS EXTRAORDINARY PROGRAM.
In January 2020, we had 86 registrants aged between 8 and 63.
At that time, we had 19 volunteers – a teacher/student ratio of 1 to 4.5
Some teachers have ESL certificates. Many are retired teachers.
Methods of learning vary:
2020 students included:
Hilda and her daughter Ana. Hilda has a catering business and needs to improve her English to get more English-speaking clients. Ana is a high school student whose ambition is to become a teacher of languages.
Erika is a receptionist. She and her two daughters ride the bus for over an hour from their home to classes. All three are in separate groups, but all enjoy the chance to improve their vocabulary, pronunciation, and the challenges of English grammar.
We applaud the volunteers and the students!
The Los Mangos Library is the only public library in Puerto Vallarta.
They have an extensive collection of books in Spanish and English and run literacy programmes for the community.
This year we were happy to donate funding for books in Braille, something that was sorely lacking at the library.
Victoria V was six months old when she entered our Cleft Palate Programme. She had to be fed with a syringe, because a section of her upper lip was missing so she couldn’t nurse. She also had difficulty breathing and suffered many ear infections.
When Dr. Fuentes performed the surgery to close her upper lip, he literally saved her life. Since then, she’s had three more surgeries with our Clinics, and a fourth with dentist Dra. Luz. Who saw her regularly until Victoria was nine years old. You can see what a difference the first surgery made!
Now Victoria is a happy, active twelve-year-old. She’s in her last year of Primary school. Dancing hip-hop is her passion, but she also enjoys playing video games with her friends, exercising, cooking, and helping around the house. She has an eight-year-old brother, Alejandro, who has never needed our Clinics.
Victoria’s surgeries are not over yet. There are three more pending when she’s fourteen, fifteen and sixteen years old. Currently she has braces to widen a gap so that a bone can be inserted into her mouth, and then she needs a surgery on her tongue and her nose.
Victoria’s mother, Marijose, is a nursery-school teacher, but she is also studying to become a speech therapist, and when she graduates, she wants to volunteer with our Clinics. She is so grateful for our help, not only for the surgeries and dental work, but also for Kiriam, the speech therapist that we recommended. Kiriam’s fees are a fraction of other therapists’, and the children respond well to her because she engages them with games and teaches with love.
Marijose says that without our Clinics, she and her husband could never have afforded the surgeries and subsequent therapies. If it hadn’t been for Pastor Miguel Angel, who told her about our Clinics, Victoria would have died. That’s why she and Victoria agreed to share their story about how our Clinics saved them. They truly are the faces of love.
