Orchid Foundation

 

Orchid Foundation, Inc., is a non-profit corporation dedicated to the continued service and maintenance of the Armando Rosenberg Home and School. The orphanage, located in Sabana Perdida, the largest barrio in Santo Domingo, the capital of the Dominican Republic, currently houses one hundred and forty children from throughout the Dominican Republic. In addition, there are seven hundred students who walk to school from surrounding areas for education. Two new High School buildings have recently been completed with a daily occupancy of 1200.

    

Hogar Escuela Armando Rosenberg, which began in the early eighties as a home/school for orphaned, abandoned children, or children from severe poverty, is now a complex on fifteen acres of property. The complex provides a Christian education, a free, fully staffed medical clinic, a pharmacy, lab, and a dental facility. The new church provides moral and psychological guidance. More than a home, Hogar Escuela Armando Rosenberg has become an oasis of hope in a desert of wretched poverty.

    

It all began in 1983. A man named Harold S. Wooden (Woody) was offered a free ticket to the Dominican Republic. Woody accepted the gift from his family, who felt it was a much needed and well-earned vacation. A devoted Rotarian, Woody spent time with local Dominican Rotarians, who introduced him to some of the Community Service activities in progress. It was then that he came across the project that touched his heart and, unbeknownst to him, would take precedence in all that he did thereafter.

    

"The children were in a desperate situation. I was devastated. The small shacks that some of the children lived in were beyond description. The conditions of the orphanage, then call San Salvador, were horrific. An open-air kitchen with pots burning on firewood, kids sleeping on the ground and young girls unclothed, with no shelter, were some of the characteristics I can recall" said Woody. "I brought that story back to New Jersey and asked a local photographer to photograph the deplorable conditions. It became a major World Community Service project in the Caribbean between Rotary District 7640 in New Jersey and District 4060 in the Dominican Republic that took more than four years to complete."

       

In 1988 the dormitory was completed. The dedication ceremony took place with the Dominican flag, the Vatican Banner, and the Rotary flag, flying proudly. That was a very meaningful and proud moment for Woody. It was official; the project was a success! Woody went home and many people proclaimed: " You did the job. The dormitory is finished." But Woody soon realized that a dormitory for children is not complete if you just put children into it. The "project" had really only just begun. "Children are human beings. We need to maintain what we have given to them. Children are children - all God's children. It is not their fault they were born there. It would not be fair to walk away from them now." In 1989, Orchid Foundation, Inc. was founded to provide ongoing support and assistance to Hogar Escuela Armando Rosenberg.