Villagers in an impoverished area of northern Nicaragua near the Honduran border have a special Christmas gift for their children this year, thanks to the Denver-based non-profit, Namlo International -- a new school. When kids return to school in February after winter break, it will be to a brand new building their families constructed with donations and support from Namlo.

Denver residents, Magda and Hugh King, founders of Namlo, recently returned from Miraflor, Nicaragua, where they spent 8 weeks in the countryside overseeing the construction of Miraflor's new two-room school. How that school came to be illustrates their organization's commitment to building not just schools, but stronger communities and more hopeful lives.

By the time Magda and Hugh arrived in Nicaragua in early October 2007, they had already visted Miraflor twice and had completed the first step in Namlo's work with rural communities -- gathering a commitment from every family in the village that each would contribute to building and supporting their school. They had also arranged to partner with Familias Unidas, a Spanish NGO, which provided masons and construction oversight.Generous contributions they had solicited from the Longmont-Twin Peaks Rotary Clubs and other Rotarians financed a significant portion of the project.

Within days of their arrival, the people of Miraflor had cleared a construction site and begun the hard physical labor of building their school.Children, parents, and even grandparents, shoveled and moved soil, bent rebar, and carried cinder block bricks and other building materials. Despite an unusually rainy fall, the school was completed in just over 6 weeks.During construction, four Colorado volunteers arrived carryingschool supplies and teaching materials donated by Kyffin Elementary, Denver Center for International Studies, Stober Elementary, and Logan School,all Namlo sister schools in Colorado.They also delivered letters from Kyffin students to their sister school pen pals.

Magda says of this and all her organization's projects that, "Namlo is about helping people to help themselves.Our methodology is grounded in the personal relationships we establish with the communities where we work.We visit families and live in the villages before, during, and after school construction. Our work is focused on insuring that communities take ownership of their school and that they find - with our help - ways to keep it running successfully on their own."

Hugh adds, "We intentionally choose to work with people at 'the end of the road.' Our communities have few resources and all of the associated problems that come with poverty and isolation."

He goes on. "But, we believe that we have a model that results in true self-sufficiency. We help villagers start cottage industries that raise funds to support the school and increase personal income. Money from these projects goes towards school improvement and, in some cases, the hiring of an additional teacher. The key is that when we leave a community after a 5-year collaboration, the people know they can keep their school functioning on their own."

Prior to their time in Miraflor, the Kings were able in May 2007 to return to Nepal, where their organization built its first school in 1999. They had remained in contact with Yarmasing and a second school through a young man from the village, who they hired to oversee the scholarship program and help implement community development initiatives.

When they returned to Yarmasing, they saw how their previous work with villagers had transformed the people there.Among the things they had started and found more fully developed on their return: An active parent school committee, organized by Namlo during school construction, oversees teacher use of donated materials.A women's group that Namlo helped start raises goats and herbs, and had used the proceeds of sales to construct a concrete pathway to the school so children did not have to trek through mud.Namlo-sponsored scholarship students from Yarmasing - the top 2 students from graduating classes since the school was constructed -- are among the top performers in a local private school they attend. All of these accomplishments were nurtured by Namlo volunteers and donor contributions.

The community as a whole has prospered, because people have hope and new knowledge of how to make better lives for themselves.And it all began with the construction of their Namlo school.

Namlo's history started with Spanish native, Denver resident, and mountaineer Magda King.When she was summiting Nepal's peaks some years ago, she admired the strength and kindness of the Sherpa people who supported her expeditions.After her climbing career, she chose education - building and supporting schools in remote rural communities -- as a way to show her gratitude and continue her association with the Nepali people.

The symbol of the namlo - a leather or cloth strap that helps people in Nepal carry heavy loads. - inspired the name of the non-profit organization she founded in 1999 along with her husband, Dr. Hugh King. A namlo is wornacross the forehead, and enables even children and the elderly to tote cumbersome objects up steep mountainsides -- an apt metaphor for the kind of strength and self-sufficiency that the Kings hoped to inspire through education.

Namlo helped build two schools in Nepal, but when political turmoil there made safe travel unpredictable in 2002, the organization expanded its efforts to Central America and has now helped communitiesin remote rural areas of northern Nicaraguabuild 3 additional schools.

Namlo will return to Nepal in 2008 to construct a third school there, while continuingto work with schools and communities in Nicaragua and sister schools in Colorado and Spain.Namlo is funded entirely by private donations and sales of cottage industry products from Nicaragua and Nepal.

So, when villagers in Miraflor celebrate Christmas this season, they will do so with a renewed sense of hope for the future of their children because of a gift they have given themselves with help from Denver's Namlo International -- the gift of helping people to believe in themselves through education.

Interested in traveling as a Namlo volunteer? For more information about Namlo, visit their website at www.namlo.org.