PHILOSOPHY 

EDELAC

is a service organization serving children. Its work revolves around the human rights and children's rights established by the International Convention.

Principles

• We consider the family to be the primary group that provides a space for a child's general development.
• We value children's and adolescents' capabilities and potential to achieve their development.
• We respect the rights and responsibilities and girls, boys, and adolescents.
• We foster mutual cooperation, solidarity and help that can help counteract the conditions of poverty in families.
• We respect our identities and the economic, cultural, ethnic, gender-based and social differences among us.

ORGANIZATIONAL VISION

EDELAC is an institution with a purpose: to collaborate to decrease the number of children and adolescents on the street by reincorporating them into their families and society. We aim to prevent at-risk youth from turning to the street, to stimulate their development by strengthening their family relationships.

ORGANIZATIONAL MISSION

• To help with the problems of street life and its consequences for the children and adolescents in Quetzaltenango, working toward their reintegration into their families and society.
• To accompany and aid families with primary education and work training for children and adolescentes who are on the street or at risk.
• To establish a space that pays full attention to children's rights.
• To reestablish and strengthen the family relationships of children and adolescents who are on the street or at risk.
• To find new homes for children and adolescents who are not able to reestablish connections with their families.
• To coordinate with government and non-government organizations to provide complete aid to children in the city of Quetzaltenango.

GENERAL GOAL

To fully attend to the working and street children of Guatemala in order to contribute to creating a developed, humane, and just society.

BENEFICIARY POPULATION

• Working boys and girls
• Boys and girls at-risk of turning to the street
• Children in extreme poverty
• Street children
• Children referred by judge's orders