PHILIPSBURG, Sint Maarten – The St. Maarten Tzu Chi Foundation has stepped up to the plate to ensure that students have the best chances of making optimal use of the education being offered by providing a healthy breakfast to approximately 225 students at two schools.
The foundation has received requests from other schools for the breakfast program and Tzu Chi would like to invite the public to support the program. It costs only US $1 per day to help one student. “You can choose to support as many students as you would like.”
Following the devastation caused by Hurricane Irma in 2017, Tzu Chi had been involved in many activities to help ease the burden amongst families in the country and aid in the recovery process. One of these worthwhile activities had been a breakfast program, in which students were provided with a healthy breakfast in an effort to help them focus less on being hungry and more on their education.
The St. Maarten Academy (academic section), one of the schools assisted, had approached the St. Maarten Tzu Chi Foundation to resume the breakfast program at its school as a number of students were attending school hungry because their parents simply could not afford to provide them with a meal. While the situation of children going to school hungry had been prevalent since before the pandemic, unfortunately, COVID-19 has made the situation worse as many parents are still out of work and are unable to provide meals for their children.
As per the school’s request, the healthy breakfast program resumed at St. Maarten Academy’s academic section on September 13th, 2021, where between 100 to 125 students are served daily. As Tzu Chi focuses on healthy eating and the environment, the foundation provides healthy vegetarian and vegan items to these students, which is prepared fresh daily. On October 18, 2021, the program was extended to St. Maarten Academy’s Preparatory Secondary Vocational Education (PSVE) section, where approximately 100 students are fed daily. Additional requests have since been received for the program to further extend to other schools.
The breakfast program includes banana and apples; vegan burgers; veggie patties (vegan items made from lentil peas, chickpeas, tofu, vegetables); sweet bun; coconut drop made with oatmeal; vegan cupcake and iced lemon tea or hot tea.
Apart from the tea, which is available to everyone, students get to choose any three items from the list that they prefer. The array of healthy options means that students’ appetites will not be bored eating the same thing daily. Our volunteers (and, if needed, teachers) assist in distributing the meals.
“As we all realize, this is a much bigger problem in the community and together with the public, we can extend this healthy eating breakfast program to other schools,” said Tzu Chi Commissioner Sandra Cheung. She alluded to a quote by Master Cheng Yen which says: “The problems of the society have to be solved by the people in the society.”
Master Cheng Yen started the Tzu Chi Foundation 55 years ago with 30 poor housewives in the underprivileged Hualien City in Taiwan, by saving US $0.2 pennies of their grocery money daily, to help people who were suffering. From the 30 housewives sowing seeds of love daily, this blossomed and spread throughout the entire city. Today Hualien is one of the richest and most civilized cities, having some of the best schools and the best hospitals in Taiwan largely because the teachings are based on humanities and character training. Today, 55 years later, Tzu Chi has become one of the largest organizations reaching out to 126 countries during the pandemic . With millions of volunteers and members taking the same action daily around the world, countless families and individual’s lives are changed from poverty to prosperity daily.
“It is all about saving small coins daily to sow a good seed for ourselves and others. Above all, we invite all people with goodwill to cultivate a field of blessings and bring about a society of love,” Cheung said.
The intention is to map the program currently being executed at the two sections of St. Maarten Academy, hence the same healthy options will be provided. Students will be able to receive their breakfast without any barriers and the food items are always prepared fresh and healthy for their brain and body.
“A hungry child is unable to focus and unable to learn, which defeats the purpose of education. The consequences of not having a proper education is not just one for the child, but the society as a whole. As they are our future, we are obligated to help these vulnerable children as it, in essence, will be helping our society in the future,” Cheung remarked.
The St. Maarten Tzu Chi Foundation is built on the strength of its volunteers and in offering our love and care to those we assist including, in this case, students and teachers. The Foundation is therefore also inviting volunteers in the community who would like to assist in this effort.
“Your collective assistance will help not just brighten the day of the young minds in our society, but also help them to focus on what really matters most during these critical years of their lives – their education,” Cheung noted.
Donations can be made monthly with a minimum US $3 and up at Tzu Chi’s Windward Islands Bank (WIB) Charity Account # 21767402 or at the foundation’s office at L.B. Scott Road or call Tzu Chi Commissioner Sandra Cheung at tel +1-721-586-3019 or email: sxm_tzuchi2005@yahoo.com.
