About Us

Our Story

Co-founded in 2007 by Juan Velasco and Annie Boyd-Ramirez, PV continues to work in partnership with a local nonprofit, The New Dawn Associacion of El Salvador (ANADES), to financially support initiatives that increase enrollment and access to their child development center, educational opportunities, and mental health services for marginalized families impacted by poverty and social violence in an urban area of San Ramon.

Since 2014, Programa Velasco’s core service has been its Women’s Empowerment Project (WEP), which trains entrepreneurs to achieve more financial independence and increase gender equality in their families. We implement this project with entrepreneurs in San Ramon, and, since 2019, in the community of Tepecoyo.

In early 2022, we expanded our programs in Tepecoyo and launched Families United in Tepecoyo (FUTP), which addresses the lack of early childhood education (ECE) opportunities in rural El Salvador. This program provides training, resources and support to parents and caregivers to help them become educators and mentors in their children’s lives.

Our complementary, cross-generational interventions increase the engagement of women in public life and foster positive educational and social outcomes for their children.

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Our Mission

Educate and empower children and women entrepreneurs in El Salvador to build strong families and create better futures. 

Vision

Our vision is families that thrive; educated and emboldened to interrupt generational cycles of poverty and build peaceful community.

Values

Innovation

Innovation

We support the implementation of evidence-based programming that is not afraid of innovation. The populations we serve deserve the highest quality services possible, with the best chance of making an impact in their lives. We strive for continuous improvement in everything we do.

Sustentability: Privilege local knowledge

Privilege local knowledge

We privilege local knowledge to shape the interventions we support, in humble recognition of the lived experiences that must guide our work. This practice is also rooted in a commitment to sustainability, wherein our impact on the Salvadoran community we serve must ultimately be integrated into a long-term vision that can exist independently from our support.

Solidarity

Fostering solidarity with an option for the poor

The programming we support makes the intentional choice to offer opportunities and services with a principled option for the poor. Born out of a praxis of solidarity, we actively seek out the opportunity to connect individuals and groups within El Salvador and abroad to the community we serve. 

Inclusion

Inclusion: a way to empowerment

We support processes focused on the empowerment of women, children, and families, to confront and overcome the manifestations of oppression that limit their personal and professional growth. We promote opportunities that will leverage these experiences of empowerment to build community, which we consider both a key aspect of our vision for the future as well as our day-to-day interactions.

Transparency

Transparency

We operate with transparency in the stewardship of our resources. We are faithful to the mission and vision we have been entrusted with, while at the same time committing ourselves to adaptability in the face of changing circumstances and priorities as mediated by our local partners and stakeholders.

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