Corazón de Niña (Heart of the Girl) is a registered non-profit children’s shelter dedicated to providing a safe, loving home environment for girls and boys rescued from high risk situations including abuse, abandonment, and human trafficking. This amazing center was established five years ago by founders and now full-time house parents, Melissa Canez (President) and Juan Antonio Meza Gomez . Corazón de Niña is the only government approved home for teenage girls in the entire Bahia de Banderas area (covering both the states of Jalisco and Nayarit).
There are now over 100 children and teens living at Corazón de Niña, ranging in age from one to twenty-five. The younger children attend an in-house home school program daily; while the older teens go to a private high school or on to university or trade school classes. All attend school, English classes, and counseling, and also participate in cooking meals, housework, and sports. About two-thirds of the children are girls. They now have two homes in Puerto Vallarta — one for the girls and one next door for the boys.
THEIR APPROACH involves building self-esteem through moral, academic, and psychological support in a family, rather than institutional environment. Corazon de Niña offers a real home and a family. The girls and boys have access to all levels of education; medical and psychological attention; recreational and computer/English language training; and much more.
THEIR MISSION IS to provide a loving, nurturing and safe home for at-risk children where they can realize their full potential as happy, confident, fulfilled human beings.
THEIR PHILOSOPHY involves a steadfast belief that security, love, values and knowledge are essential to the development of a well-balanced adult. To this end, they provide a home in which the young people are appreciated and loved for who they are, and supported to be all they can be. Their job, like the job of every good parent, is to provide an environment in which a child can grow with security, love, values and knowledge to become a healthy, confident, self-reliant person and thus break the cycle of poverty and abuse.
Corazón de Niña is entirely dependent on its loyal supporters for funding. They receive no stipends from local, state and/or federal governments. Children’s Shelter of Hope Foundation is proud to currently be contributing $1500 US per month to this wonderful shelter, which covers the salaries of the four teachers involved in their homeschooling program. We need your help to increase this amount to reflect the total necessary.