Fresh from the Field

By Lunise Jules Cerin ~ February 2012

Working with CRWRC in Haiti is an everyday challenge. The interventions of our different partners seem to work together for the benefit of us all as members of the Haitian population. Between field visits to our community development projects, and planning with the Mayor’s office to relocate the population living under tents just outside our office, we can experience first-hand the difficulties of the transition from relief to sustainable development. We are working with the Mayor’s office to help this group of people find a place to live by the end of March. We pray that they will be able to face the future with greater dignity after this terrible earthquake changed everyone’s life in Haiti.

During the past quarter we concentrated our efforts on an important project run by our partner, the Christian Center for Wholistic Development (in Creole, Sant Kretyen Pou Devlopman Entegre or SKDE). This gave me the opportunity to get to know the partner staff and appreciate their long and interesting journey with CRWRC. SKDE became a partner of CRWRC eighteen years ago. They had a total annual budget of $20,000 then.

“We were small in size,” says Rev. Herode Guillometre, “but our vision was big.” Today, they are managing a budget many times more than that, have built an office space, and have just built a new training center with the capacity to welcome more than 100 participants.

“When we joined CRWRC,” says Pastor Guillometre, “we had three institutions supporting us while we were training our beneficiaries and grassroots associations in leadership development and consciousness-raising. With CRWRC, our approach became more wholistic. Mark Vanderwees, our CRWRC coach, started our involvements in literacy, microfinance, and cooperatives in northwestern Haiti, and then in the Central Plateau.

“Today, SKDE has to its credit the development of 31 cooperatives throughout the country. Thanks to CRWRC support, we reinforced our management capacity and learned more skills.

“What attracted us to CRWRC was this institution’s main concern for the reinforcement of local partners.” said Pastor Guillometre. “To this day, our relationship with CRWRC is a horizontal one: hand in hand we are working for the coming of God’s kingdom on earth.”

Blessings from Haiti, Lunise

One of the most important events that I felt thankful to God for at the end of 2011 is the formal entry of my two younger children, Nathalie and Tina, into the professional world. It is fun to imagine them going to bed and waking up early to report to work--and mostly sitting in an office for eight hours straight. They both seem to be great financial managers. Jean Bernard is enjoying his music classes at University of Michigan, and Melodie seems to have a bigger place in her heart every day for international development. These two have not visited Haiti yet after the earthquake; I pray that God will help them accept all changes that took place in our lives and grant them the wisdom to discern what will not change. Another reason to be happy was the announcement of the coming of a new grandchild! We are all just as excited as Marie Jo and Weibert, the proud parents, and we can’t wait to meet this wonderful new addition to our family… June seems to be so far off.

Prayer Requests:

• My family.
• Pray for a refugee relocation project being done with the Mayor’s office in Delmas.
• Pray for CRWRC office staff in Haiti.
• Pray for PWOFOD’s building reconstruction project. (PWOFOD is one our local partners whose office building collapsed during the earthquake)

About Lunise Jules Cerin

Lunise Jules Cerin, a resident of Haiti, joined CRWRC in April 2011 as Country Consultant.

Lunise is an alumnus of Haitian State University and Eastern University in Pennsylvania, USA. With a M.S in Economic Development she has developed, over the past 25 years, a career in Economic Growth, Education and Community Development. Lunise is familiar with both the rural and urban settings of Haiti, and has worked for both non-governmental, local institutions and the public administration of Haiti. From 2001-2010 she served as Executive Director and President of the Board of the Haitian Foundation for Private Education, which is the largest school federation in Haiti. Her work involved regrouping the three main operators within the education systems in Haiti which includes the Catholic and the Protestant churches. Her most recent position was with the Ministry of National Education in Haiti.

Lunise has previously worked as a consultant for CRWRC, evaluating various programs which included training for deacons, literacy and microfinance. She also worked as a consultant, assisting World Missions in the process of transferring leadership to the national staff to what has now become MDK.

Lunise has five children and one grandson.

Email:  lcerin-jules@crwrc.org