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2009 Kaya Bethany Mission Team
Jim Hauptman, Lee Frye, and Scott Gray

In 2005 Bethany raised $60,000 to build Bethany House on the campus of the Bolivian Street Children Project in La Paz, Bolivia. Our goal is to raise enough money to support the 10 boys of Bethany House each year.

Please consider a financial gift to this project. Together we can change lives, one child at a time.

Read an informational brochure about the project.

What is Kaya Children International and why is Bethany supporting their mission?

Michelle Eggen (formerly Smith) is a life-long member of Bethany Lutheran Church. Michelle earned her B.A. in Biology and her M.A. in Medical Sciences from Boston University. John earned his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from UNL, and his Master of Divinity from Boston University School of Theology. John and Michelle heard God's call to work with Kaya Children International, originally named the Bolivian Street Children Project (BSCP), as short-term missionaries in 2003. In September 2004, they moved to La Paz for a three-year stint as Coordinators of Development for Kaya.

Kaya began in 1997 as a volunteer effort initiated by Dr. Chi Huang and sponsored by Park Street Church of Boston. Taking a year off before entering his medical residency, Dr. Huang spent a year in La Paz, Bolivia, coordinating volunteers from a local church to provide outreach services to children living on the streets. While their aim was to help children leave the streets and enter a local residential facility, this proved to be more difficult than expected. The children they successfully convinced to leave the streets returned to the streets in a matter of days. They simply would not stay in the various residential programs around the city, and returning home was not an option. Something was not working and a generation of children was about to be lost permanently to the streets.

Volunteers continued outreach efforts into 1998 and 1999. The growing group provided a variety of services on the streets to connect with the children, earn their trust, and help them make a premanent move off the streets. The children provided important insight and direction. They shared what did not work for them in other programs and they asked the volunteers for three things: "be present in our lives, share our stroies with others who will listen, and build us a home." So they did.

In 2008, armed with more experience and a deeper understanding of the various issues surrounding children on the streets, the current leaders of the BSCP, committed to taking this grassroots organization to the next level. As we asked ourselves what would be the most appropriate way to grow, the answer was not through building more and more homes. It was through engaging in more preventive interventions, and building creative partnerships with families and communities to enable them to better raise their own children.

To accommodate this expanded vision, and our increasing participation in activities around the world, we renamed BSCP to Kaya Children International. "Kaya" means "tomorrow" in Quechua, on of the indigenous languages of Bolivia. It reflects our desire to give children on the streets a better tomorrow, as well our focus on a future in which no child needs to live on the streets.

How can I support the Project?

Make a financial contribution to this ministry. Kaya has now been designated a 501(c)3 organization by the IRS, and is prepared to send out giving statements to donors. All donations are fully deductable to the extent
permitted by law. Checks made payable to Bethany Lutheran Church with "Kaya" on the note line.

Learn more about the Bolivian Street Children Project:

View a series of photographs from La Paz. Please note, some of these pictures graphically portray the brutality of the lives of the street children, and may not be appropriate for all audiences.