Bridging the Border Bulletin

Bridging the Border

August 2022 | Issue 11

A US-Mexico collaboration providing factual news on Nogales region bi-national community development programs generating critical resources for migrant families sheltering in Nogales, Sonora.

What is FESAC?

Fundación del Empresariado Sonorense A.C. (FESAC), is an independent community foundation founded in 2003 by the Mexican state of Sonora’s business organizations and supported by a council formed by Sonoran businessmen. FESAC has formed lasting partnerships with local civil- society organizations on both sides of the border to address poverty, migration, and social inequality. FESAC works in close partnership with the Border Community Alliance (BCA), a US nonprofit in Arizona. FESAC uses university interns from both sides of the border to assist with its programs for local NGOs. The founding and current Executive Director of the Nogales chapter of FESAC is Alma Cota De Yanez.

FESAC board members are pictured above. Alma Cota de Yanez, FESAC Nogales Executive Director, is seated in the front row, on the left. Luis Torres Muñoz, FESAC Board Chair, is in the center of the back row.

Below is a story of a recent visit by volunteers to one of FESAC’s most important projects. Casa is a shelter for families seeking asylum and education for their children – it is a story about how the future can be built. Welcome to Casa de la Misericordia y de Todas las Naciones!

On the Rough Road to the Future

I admit to some anxiety as our taxi wound its way through the increasingly serpentine streets in the hills of eastern Nogales. The street we were on could be in some Afghani or Bangladeshi village. A third world forgotten town with ramshackle homes and corner stores clinging to steep and jumbled hills.

Then, there it is. A defiantly proud and colorful sign declaring that we have come, after one last jolting turn, to the Casa Misericordia de Todas las Naciones! To heighten the sense of entering a new dimension, a smiling gatekeeper suddenly appears and swings wide the imposing metal gate set in the high wall that encircles the place. We have arrived.

Above: Executive Director of Casa de la Misericordia, Angelica Macias, in front of the mural at the entrance of the asylum shelter.

Let me digress. This surreal moment is taking place in Nogales, Sonora. A Mexican border town that is seeing increasing numbers of migrants and families seeking asylum in the US as they flee violence, the devastating impacts of climate change and grinding poverty in their home countries. This sprawling city that was about 30,000 inhabitants when I traveled through here many years ago with my parents is now a dynamic city of over a half million.

The part of Nogales that we were driving through was known not only for its somewhat chaotic appearance with scores of small shops and partially paved rough streets but also as an area of the city where many seeking to cross the nearby border were held in houses by their coyotes or guides until the time was right to attempt the illegal crossing of this fortified and contested border. Not the safest part of town.

Above: A glimpse of the neighborhood landscape in Nogales, Sonora. Colorful houses are perched close together on the desert hills.

The trauma and desperation that characterize the most recent arrivals in this new city has also created a humanitarian crisis. No longer primarily single men seeking to cross the border in search of work, now it is families with young children seeking asylum in the US. Seeking to escape from places that that offer neither safety nor a future. No safe place to stay, no healthcare, no school for the children and no way for their parents to work. It was our task on this warm spring day to confront head on the consequences of this crisis as they played out in the lives of the families who in their flight from danger found themselves homeless strangers in a new and unfamiliar city.

We parked the car in front of a long low two-story building housing families. Stepping out of the car we realized that we were on top of a hill. Sprawled around and below us on all sides was the city. We turned, there to greet us, standing before a door on either side of which was painted the wings of a monarch butterfly, the symbol of long and arduous migration, was the smiling and warmly welcoming director of Casa, Angelica Macias - known simply and affectionately as Lika. Without ceremony, Lika launched us on a tour of this refuge and home for 100+ families.

Above, from left to right: FESAC Sr Advisor Bob Phillips, Director of Casa Angelica Macias, FESAC interns Kerry McCulloch and Nancy Lopez, FESAC Executive Director Alma Cota de Yanez pose by the shelter's front doors and hand-painted mural of a monarch butterfly.

Without going into details, readily available in the Bridging the Border Bulletin FESAC produces, suffice it to say that in a whirlwind one hour visit we saw children in classrooms headed by the young teachers paid for by FESAC’s fundraising campaign learning math, creating art, reading books, doing online homework with the iPads also provided by FESAC, playing, singing and practicing yoga under the watchful eye of a volunteer instructor and, amazingly yet strangely normal in this magical place, tending a large garden on a terrace below the main part of the school.

School, yes there is a school or rather an Escuelika (little school in Spanish). The first in a Nogales shelter and just maybe the beginning of a way out of the crisis here on the border. The FESAC supported educational program at Casa de la Misericordia, provides in-person schooling to asylum-seeking children in Nogales, Sonora. Escuelika is the only program of its kind in Nogales. Two educators, graduated from Universidad Pedagógica Nacional (UPN) in Nogales, Sonora, teach children aged 3-17 in academic courses such as mathematics, Spanish, geography, and science. Additional educators are funded by Save the Children and BYTE.

And – typical of the innovative and entrepreneurial spirit that animates and sustains this work, Escuelika has added an adult education program by connecting with the existing vocational program, Centro de Capacitación para el Trabajo Industrial (CECATI) in Nogales. While the children are in school their parents take courses learning first aid, adult education, and barbering and other job training. There are more than 60 adults registered. The training cost is $10/month per person.

As we drove away from our head spinning visit, the excited conversation centered on how to get out the news that here in the most unlikely of places in the midst of all the bad news and hopelessness about the border was a shining light, a home as the proud sign in front declared “for all nations”, all people in search of a way forward, beyond borders.

It is just a start, but it is a good one, a strong foundation on which to build. With your support it will be the future these families and their children deserve.

Written by Bob Phillips

Children at Casa walk through the garden maintained by the people staying at the shelter.

Students at Casa's school for youth, Escuelika, paint for an art project.

A student at Escuelika practices arithmetic and digital literacy with an iPad funded by the Teachers and Tablets campaign.

Casa de la Misericordia currently coordinates two educational programs, one for youth and another for adults. Both programs serve the people seeking asylum and staying at the shelter. Some families stay up to 8 months, and these opportunities contribute immensely to the wellbeing of both children and adults.

Teachers & Tablets – The School at Casa

For a thorough description of the Teachers & Tablets program, view Issue 8 of Bridging the Border.

Click the button below to be redirected to it.

Bulletin 8

CECATI – Adult Courses at Casa

To learn more about the adult courses offered at Casa de la Misericordia, view Issue 10 of Bridging the Border.

Click the button below to be redirected to it.

Bulletin 10

How To Support FESAC's Social Investment Work

Given that this border migration crisis will go on for years, a regular monthly contribution will give FESAC a predictable income stream. If you know people interested in this cause, send them to the FESAC contact on this bulletin or direct them to FESAC Sr Advisor Bob Phillips at [email protected] for further information. Your contribution is tax deductible. It will make the families at the border know that they are not forgotten and that their lives matter!

To support the asylum seeker education program at Casa Misericordia , click "Donate Now" and review the instructions below. You will be directed to FESAC's partner organization, BCA. This IRS approved partnership allows donors to make tax-deductible contributions to Mexican organizations. We work closely with Border Community Alliance (BCA), a US Nonprofit based in Tubac, Arizona, to bring resources, education and hope to the Nogales community.

How to donate to the education program:

You do not need an account to donate through BCA, so you can close the pop-up window
Indicate "asylum seeker education program" in your donor note
Under Campaign, select "Mexican Pass Thru"
Under Mexico Pass Thru select "FESAC Sonoran Community Foundation"

Help us provide quality education to children in border communities so that they can recapture their future!

Donate Now

The bulletin is produced by FESAC volunteers dedicated to spreading awareness of the amazing human service work performed daily by local NGOs as the Nogales community responds to a growing crisis at the border. Click here to view our past issues.

FESAC Nogales | [email protected] | Website