Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) Project

Encouraging healthy habits in healthy school environments

Our Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) project is creating healthy environments in primary schools around Santiago Atitlan. Many school children here have little access to clean water and must use inadequate bathroom facilities that sometimes have no doors or sinks. Until recently, one of our schools had no bathroom at all. Dirty drinking water and poor hygiene habits lead to diarrheal diseases, which not only keep children out of school, but can also be life-threatening. Poor sanitary conditions also lead girls to drop out of school, either to care for sick younger siblings, or because school bathroom facilities lack privacy.

Healthy habits learned and practiced early on, combined with clean water, sanitation facilities, and hygiene programs in schools, promote health and education now and for generations to come. With WASH programs:

Fewer children become ill or die due to waterborne and contagious diseases.
Healthy children can focus on their school work.
Girls stay in school longer.
Children develop respect for themselves and their school environment.
Early practice of good hygiene leads to lifelong positive hygiene behaviors.
Children serve as health messengers to their families, bringing home the lessons they learn at school about good health practices.

Depending on the needs of each school, our WASH program will provide access to safe drinking water; teach children a sanitation and hygiene curriculum that emphasizes caring for themselves, their environment, and their school facilities; and construct or renovate hand-washing stations and gender-segregated bathrooms.

WASH works in conjunction with our Organic School Gardens and School Nutrition projects to ensure that we are not only combating malnutrition through nutrient-rich meals, but also by preventing waterborne diseases through the practice of sanitary behaviors.

Help Pueblo a Pueblo WASH away childhood illness and create clean, healthy learning environments.

Please support Pueblo a Pueblo’s WASH program today.