For so long, we have wanted to walk a piece of closed road at the beginning of road 983. This morning, after Favorite Song Friday chapel time, Betsy drove the students and three staff members to the road and dropped them off.
What a beautiful walk from one end to the other! The students and staff enjoyed the small adventure and returned to class to their spelling test of the week. They all passed with flying colors.
We have 3 weeks left in this school year. Pray for the students and their attention spans and their teachers also. Pray that no time would be wasted but that each of us will be good stewards of the time God gives us together.
A great week is ending. We started on Monday with a group of signing (hearing and Deaf) visitors from Camuy PR. The rest of the week, we enjoyed the company of David and Mary Chase who are repeat visitors. It has been a refreshing and learning experience all around as we have enjoyed new and old friends.
Pray with us for the remaining 19 days of classes and our closing of the school year activities on May 21.
The LAST bit of paint has been painted (I hope) and our buildings are as blue and white as they will ever be thanks to the last efforts of our recent work team. How nice to look out and see the soffits and edges are white.
A work team of two came up with the idea of re-painting our street sign sign and used our new logo. Our own Rosa finished off the signs by adding SIGNS 🙂 announcing DEAF SCHOOL.
And finally on March 26, 2015, our sign guy came and installed our new sign on the front of the building. His instructions include trimming the tree on the right more regularly so that the sign is more visible.
Additionally, we received the document declaring Christian School and Chapel for the Deaf Inc to be a tax-exempt/charitable institution by the Puerto Rican government. We had received this notification by the USA Internal Revenue service previously and are thankful that we have been granted this status by Puerto Rico as well.
This week (March 30 to April 3) is Holy Week in Puerto Rico. We are closed for Easter Break and some time to rest and regroup before the last 35 days of classes. We are looking forward to a visit by a group of ASL students from Highpoint Christian Academy Saturday April 4 through Thursday April 9.
Pray for our students. Pray for the needs of the Deaf in Puerto Rico.
Check out other web pages as additions and changes have been made today! Thanks for praying and thanks for stopping by our website.
We have been blessed this week with a Spring Break group from Lancaster Bible College, Lancaster PA. Can I tell you – this group “complained” that they had three days of not WORKing on the front end of their mission trip!
What WORK they did once they got started. I think our TO DO list has diminished by 70%. Some things are just in need of skilled electricians and plumbers, eh?
But the paint has gone on. White trim that was overlooked last spring is now white for real and a classroom that had last been painted in 2005 was painted a lovely shade of lavender.
Some of the team are Phys. Ed. majors and they tortured us, I mean treated us with love and care and WORK OUTS and even made us our own 15 minute work out DVD! We did it on Monday for the first time and today, everyone is finally NOT stiff so we will have another go at it tomorrow.
The group was not afraid to sing at two churches. They were not afraid to go onto the roof. They were not afraid to tutor Deaf kids. They were great examples of what it means to be a Joshua 1:9 disciple of Christ:
Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.
Classes resumed on January 20, 2015 after a four week break for Christmas/New Years/Kings Day/DeHostos Day. The students came with their minds ready and smiles on their faces.
We welcomed Dawn and Jon O’Dell as our new snowbirds – Dawn is teaching math and Jon is making lunch, doing odd jobs and working with teaching the students some skills like fingerprinting. Rosa continues to be at Juan’s side – mostly in the classroom this semester.
Philip Tomlinson has joined us for the semester – he is helping in the dorm and handling maintenance for us. Carlos Motta continues to present a Bible lesson on Thursdays. Yvonne Yancy, retired reading specialist is with us part time again this year.
If you are on the island, send us an e-mail and let’s make a date for a visit!
Thursday, December 11, we will taking our guitar duo to the Playa Azul condos to sing our favorite Christmas Carols to the residents there. We are looking forward to also performing on Sunday at Iglesia Bautista Hermanos Unidos in Fajardo and on Friday 19 December at our Christmas Party in our chapel at 11 a.m. and again at 1 p.m.
If you are in the area, come by!
If you aren’t, WATCH! We will post photos and youtube videos later.
Pictured above is a group of young men and women from Hanover PA who came to serve with us November 2 – 8. Having them was a blessing as they came with three teachers who were able to substitute for Betsy so that she was able to attend a conference for educators of the Deaf.
In addition to cleaning, they painted a dorm room, scraped ceilings and enjoyed several inches of rain. The team was predominantly teens and their leaders were ever present faithful servants during the week. It was a joy to get to know them and to see how God used them in the lives of our staff and students.
Our next work team is not scheduled until March 2015. There will be lots for them to do!
Since we were having visitors from everywhere who had come a few days early to go on a Deaf Freedom Cruise leaving October 25, we had an open house and invited lots of Deaf from the island as well.
Here you see Juan – our youngest student at this time at 8 years old – and his Deaf distant cousin who was one of the first students here back in 1960. (to see any photos in a larger format, click on the pictures)
The string of people are students from the past lined up by date of departure. It was great to see them and to know that these folks are doing well in their adult lives thanks to the staff of missionaries who helped them along the way.
(Below left) The students did a little story telling prompted by Peppy – a Deaf visitor who was helping them to learn a Number Story in ASL.
(center) A Sprint representative whose name I never did catch shared some news from Sprint introduced several other famous deaf people like the iDeaf News guys.
(right) Super Deafy shared his story and moderated a time of celebrating success stories and encouraging my students to be all that they can be. Look for his movie – No Ordinary Hero! Let me know if you see it because we want to but it’s not around here.
We had lunch together. Some of the former students gathered in a classroom and shared stories. More visitors came. Our students showed them around and answered questions. It was great fun.
Even though we are a small ministry this year, we can see that God is using us for His glory. Our resident maintenance man and part-time cook pretty much ran the lunch program on Friday. Rosa, our dorm counselor, was all over the place keeping track of the 8 year old and helping with this and that. Betsy, our principal and teacher, was fielding questions, helping taxi drivers locate the school, delegating students to groups of visitors for tours and running her feet off.
We praise God for this little spot of time we had and pray that as our guests came and went they will have seen God’s hand at work here.
Next week there is a Deaf Cruise going out of San Juan. We get the pre-cruise visitors 🙂 how cool is this!?
Just had a phone call from a super hero! Super Deafy is coming to our school on Friday at 10 a.m.! And we are collecting Deaf people from the island and other places to join us for lunch 🙂
If you are around, COME ALONG! But do call or text to let Betsy know. She has to buy enough food for everyone.
We are back to classes! Well, we are doing our BACK FROM VACATION BIBLE SCHOOL brought to us by Calvary Bible Church of Hanover PA. The kids returned and the work team is doing great! Praise God!
