Congratulations to our Hero, Elena! Vote now!

UPDATE – See original post below this important message!

Project founder Elena Durón Miranda of PETISOS in Bariloche, Argentina was featured earlier this year on CNN Heroes. The Top 10 Heroes of 2011 were announced last night, and Elena is among them! We are so proud of her and the work she does for children and families in her community.

Now it’s up to you to help her get the recognition she deserves! You can vote 10 times per day per email address until December 7, 2011.

Click HERE to vote for Elena, and don’t forget to check your email afterwards to verify your address. We need everyone to vote as much as possible - make the voting page your home page online so you remember to vote every time you open the internet, and share the link with friends on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, billboards, skywriting… you get the idea!

Wishing you could meet Elena in person to learn more about her remarkable project? She will be the featured guest speaker at our annual Luncheon Event this year on November 18th. For more information and to reserve your spot, write to rsvp@owcf.org!

For more information about PETISOS and other One World Projects, check out our new and improved website!

Finally, none of this incredible work would be possible without support from generous people around the world. Help Elena continue to serve the children of Bariloche by making a congratulatory donation to PETISOS!

Original text:

San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina, perched on the mountains facing a magnificent fjord-like lake, is an international tourist destination. On the backside of the mountain, unseen by the tourists, is a rapidly growing slum of squatters.

Eight years ago, psychologist Elena Duron Miranda discovered that many families in this neighborhood were living off the money their children could provide by scavenging the huge, open city dump. These children do not go to school, they do not spend time playing with their friends; they spend their lives in the dump looking for items to sell in order to have money for food. Elena did the unthinkable—she approached the children (known to be belligerent and violent), befriended some of them and gained their confidence.  She then raised money so that she could pay the families the amount of money the children were earning so they would let their children go to school instead of to the dump. This was the beginning of the PETISOS (Prevención y Erradicación del Trabajo Infantil SOS) (AKA Fundacion Gente Nueva), which Luis Trabb Pardo champions through One World. 

Today, PETISOS has a club house where the children can hang-out and also participate in programs of art, music, dance, and cooking. Much-needed medical and psychological services are provided for the children as well.  More than 200 children have benefited from PETISOS. Founder, Elena Duron Miranda says, ”The most important part of the work is to help the children have faith in themselves. This starts to happen when they see that someone believes in them, that they are valuable.”  From the first group of twenty who left the dump to go to school, six now have their high school degrees and are working in the community.  “Our goal is to give children back their childhood; they have a right to be children.” 

 --By Champion, Sharmon Hilfinger

A young boy within PETISOS in Argentina

To see P.E.T.I.S.O.S Blog, please click here.

To see their Facebook page, please click here.

To donate to P.E.T.I.S.O.S please click below: