Birthday: August 12, 2003 Sponsorship #: 2017-00-091JHC

Ijena is a fourteen year old with a kind spirit and strong work ethic. She lives with her mother, four sisters, and two brothers in the village of Gros Balance. Their father died three years ago, and after he died, she made the choice to stop going to school so that she could help her mother as a vendor in the market to try to support the family. Every morning, while her friends are going to school, Ijena is helping her mother get water, tend to her siblings, clean, then she prepares to go to market with her mother. Her favorite thing to do in her spare time is clean the house. She dreams of one day becoming a nurse, but for now she knows that she must help her mother. She makes the most of her situation right now by trying to teach her younger siblings how to read in the evenings when they are all home. Her favorite subject when she was in school was history, so she loves to tell her siblings stories about what she’s learned about Haiti’s past. She has faith that one day she will get a sponsor and be able to return to school. Until then, she just trusts that God is going to bless her for helping her mother by helping her return to school.