The SEED Project Fundraiser Tournament
Doors Open: 8:30 am
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What is The SEED Project?SEED in 10 Questions: The Fastest Way to Understand the Mission, Method, and Impact
Q1) Why was the SEED Project (Self-Esteem Enrichment & Development) created? A) SEED (Self-Esteem Enrichment & Development) was created after serving in Guatemala from 2004–2020 through traditional mission work—short-term trips, feeding programs, and building homes—when it became clear that meeting needs did not produce permanent, structural change. COVID halted travel and forced an honest conclusion: activity alone does not create transformation. Q2) What caused you to fundamentally reassess traditional mission work? A) The COVID pause exposed that dependency cycles and leadership gaps remained despite sincere effort. Relief occurred, but systems did not. Q3) What changed your approach in 2020? A) A conversation with James Cook in 2020, following his doctoral dissertation A Wrap Around Poverty Intervention Model: Leveraging Social Capital Reduces Poverty (April 30, 2020), confirmed that lasting change comes from leveraging social capital, not services alone. Q4) What did you identify as your social capital? A) The combined force of decades of martial arts knowledge, international relationships, credibility across multi-style schools and federations, and the ability to mobilize funding and equipment for development and competition. Q5) What is VCTHR and how does it drive SEED? A) VCTHR—Voice, Collaboration, Trust, Hope, and Risk Management—is the relational framework that became SEED’s operating system, ensuring local ownership, shared leadership, credible future pathways, and disciplined growth. Q6) What happened in Bogotá, Colombia (July 2024)? A) SEED brought 12 Guatemalans and 8 Americans together as peers, proving that international exposure and shared competition build confidence, leadership, and trust—not dependency. Q7) What did hiring four full-time PE teachers in public schools accomplish? A) SEED embedded directly into four public schools, reaching approximately 1,200 students and shifting from a program to a permanent institutional partner. Q8) How has SEED changed Santo Domingo Xenacoj (SDX) and Cruz Aya Pan? A) SEED has changed SDX and Cruz Aya Pan by making education valuable in communities where schooling has traditionally led nowhere economically. In SDX, many Indigenous students stop around 9th grade because further education does not increase earning potential. Young men often become tuk-tuk drivers—small three-wheeled taxis—working 6 days a week, 12 hours a day, or enter other low-wage, dead-end jobs. In Cruz Aya Pan, just five miles away and facing more extreme poverty, most children finish 6th grade at best. Boys commonly work in flower fields for about $3 per day, a cycle that often leads to early fatherhood, alcoholism, and abuse. SEED interrupts these patterns by extending education, raising expectations, and connecting learning to dignity, leadership, and real future opportunity. Q9) How has hiring a fifth full-time teacher expanded SEED’s vision? A) Hiring a fifth full-time teacher allowed SEED to expand to seven schools serving over 1,650 students and to enforce higher standards tied to real outcomes. Although only about 12% of Indigenous Guatemalans finish high school, SEED requires a SEED PE Martial Arts Teacher to continue pursing their high-school diploma. One instructor, Jonny, completed his diploma to meet this requirement, moving from a tuk-tuk driver to an educator and role model. Alongside this, MYFEST25! provides a viable alternative pathway through sport—giving students the chance to compete internationally, represent Guatemala, build pride and discipline, and develop personal value. Together, SEED and MYFEST25! create a clear path away from poverty by replacing survival-only options with education, identity, and opportunity. Q10) How does hosting the World Sport Jujitsu League World Championships in October 2026 define SEED’s future? A) Only 1% of Indigenous Guatemalans begin college, yet Jonny will begin college in 2026 to become a PE teacher. When asked what changed, he said, “You showed me it was possible.” That belief—now scaled to hosting a world championship in Santo Domingo Xenacoj, Guatemala—defines SEED’s long-term vision: replacing limitation with possibility through systems, not charity. |
