Following the 1988 Spitak Earthquake, thousands of people were left homeless in the city of Gyumri. Many of these families took refuge in the overseas shipping containers (domiks) that were shipped into Armenia loaded with humanitarian relief supplies. Although more than a quarter century has passed since the earthquake, this depressive reality still remains. Currently, more than 1,800 families still live in domiks scattered throughout Gyumri in extreme poverty. Many of them are unable to provide for their familys’ needs including warm clothes, nutritious food, heat and electricity for their homes and other basic necessities.

During his visit to Armenia several summers ago Dustin Hochmuth, one of the SERVICE Armenia 2017 participants, and several of his peers, witnessed these horrible conditions and decided to assemble packets for 10 families in dire need of everyday necessities and non-perishable food items. This effort was led by one of the SERVICE Armenia 2017 coordinators, Stephanie Nersesyan. Following the success of that effort, Paros has continued implementing this project on a regular basis. 

Our goal is to help 200 families in need over the course of the next two years. Each packet will cost $40 and will include basic staples including personal hygiene products, non-perishable food items such as rice, flour, sugar, salt, oil, and pasta. The packets will also include fresh fruits, vegetables, dairy products and canned meats.  Donations in any amount will help this important cause.

The Ghoghanj Children’s Center located in the Kentron of Yerevan provides afterschool and summer school programs for approximately 85 children every month. Children who attend the Center are loosely defined as “at risk.” These children typically come from very poor households, often times with a single head of household, who cannot pay for such assistance. The goal of the Ghoghanj Children’s Center is to provide the necessary academic, psychological and social support to ensure that the children attending mature to well adjusted, successful, young adults.

In order to further impact more “at-risk” children, the Center has identified a need for this model to be replicated and offered to other communities in Armenia. Through the generous support of the Dadourian Foundation, a second center for “at-risk” children was opened in 2014 in the Nor Nork neighborhood of Yerevan to provide support to 85 additional children annually. The new center has provided students the same core classes daily (English, Russian, Computer, Design, Painting, Theater and Dance) as the Ghoghanj Children’s Center – Kentron. The goal of this project is to broaden the services offered to socially vulnerable children and families in other communities and provide them with the proper support and guidance needed to excel in school and become self-confident and respectful young adults.

Amount will include rent, utilities, teacher salaries, maintenance and additional improvements, and supplies.

The villages of Jajur, Keti and Marmarashen do not have functioning kindergartens for their children.  Not only does this place these children at a disadvantage when they start school, but it also makes it more difficult for parents who wish to use kindergarten time to work and earn money to help their families.  

The local consolidated community has completed the renovations necessary to launch the operation of these three kindergartens.  Once open, these villages will also benefit from added job opportunities for cooks, teachers and aids.  The kindergartens are each in need of their kitchens being installed and their appliances and supplies being purchased. The Paros Foundation will raise the funds necessary through this project to equip these kindergarten kitchens and allow them to begin operations.  

The village of Aygedzor is located within the Berd Consolidated Community of Armenia’s Tavush Region.  The village is home to more than 2,000 residents.  The community operates two kindergartens to serve the children in the village, however one of them is located in a building in terrible condition.  The Berd Consolidated Community has asked The Paros Foundation to renovate and expand this kindergarten for the Aygedzor Village. Once completed, two groups of kindergartens will be able to benefit from this work.  

The municipality of Yerevan is providing approximately $12,200 towards this important project.  

The Akunk village is located in Armenia’s Geghagunik Region and home to more than 4,500 people.  The community is located in the more isolated portion of the Geghagunik Region to the east of Lake Sevan.  The economy of this village is primarily agriculture based, however some of the villagers work in the city of Vardenis as Akunk is located immediately outside of Vardenis.  

In 2020, the governor’s office supported the creation of a new medical center for the community in an existing building.  Unfortunately, the funds provided were not enough to complete the full renovation and the medical center continues to operate from a single room in one of the village’s schools.  

To resolve this issue and to help create a functioning medical center for the community, The Paros Foundation will complete the remodel of the five room medical center and equip the building with proper heat and some furniture if funding provides.  The work to complete the center should take approximately two months.  

Choratan is a village of 900 residents located in the Berd Consolidated Community within Armenia’s Tavush Region.  Choratan is located in an isolated section along the Armenian border with Azerbaijan.  

Through the support of FAR, a new heating system was installed throughout the school including new boilers, pipes and radiators, however the main gas connection to the school was not installed.  The Paros Foundation received a request from the Governor’s office in Tavush to help fund the installation of the gas pipeline to the school in Choratan.  

Once funded, the gas company will install a new gas connection to this remote village school to enable the heating system to operate.  In addition, this will allow the school to stop burning wood to keep the classrooms heated.  It is expected that it will take one month from the time of funding to complete the work.

Verin Tsakhavan is a village in Berd area of Armenia’s Tavush Region. It is home to more than 900 residents. To help provide drinking water to the village, their main water supply was augmented with an additional supply via pump.  This has caused increased pressure in the main distribution pipe to the village and is causing the existing pipe to continuously burst in several places.  The pipe needs to be replaced along a 200 meter section to fix this situation and provide water to the community.  

By using sport for social impact, Girls of Armenia Leadership Soccer (GOALS) aims to equip youth with confidence and resilience to face and resolve challenges both on and off the field.

Our goal is:

• To initiate and create a network of Soccer Leagues, After-School Clubs, and Summer Camps in different parts of Armenia and Artsakh
• To challenge and break down existing barriers of girls playing sports
• To build a culture of empathy, kindness, and respect
• To shape future leaders of change

The past couple of years have not been easy for Armenia and Artsakh. With the global pandemic and the war, we as a people have gone through many difficulties. But we are strong and we will persevere in the face of adversity. Through all of this GOALS has been able to maintain its social programming for girls and boys across Armenia and Artsakh. In 2021 we were able to engage and directly impact the lives of over 1000 girls across 8 regions in Armenia. With the launch of the Assarian Relief initiative we were able to provide sports programs to boys and girls that had been displaced because of the war both in Yerevan and across border villages in Syunik, we were even able to launch GOALS in Artsakh with 4 co-ed sports teams. 

As we look forward to 2022 our aim is to expand the quality of services we provide to our girls. This would include engaging our youth as leaders and coaches, providing in-depth trainings, frequent face to face on-site visits and most importantly the expansion of our reach especially in Artsakh. 

Your donations will be used towards obtaining and distributing sports gear, organizing after-school sports clubs, trainings, tournaments, and all sports-related operational costs. 

The Ghoghanj Children’s Center located in the Kentron of Yerevan provides afterschool and summer school programs for approximately 85 children every month. Children who attend the Center are loosely defined as “at risk.” These children typically come from very poor households, often times with a single head of household, who cannot pay for such assistance. The goal of the Ghoghanj Children’s Center is to provide the necessary academic, psychological and social support to ensure that the children attending mature to well adjusted, successful, young adults.

In order to further impact more “at-risk” children, the Center has identified a need for this model to be replicated and offered to other communities in Armenia. Through the generous support of the Dadourian Foundation, a second center for “at-risk” children was opened in 2014 in the Nor Nork neighborhood of Yerevan to provide support to 85 additional children annually. The new center has provided students the same core classes daily (English, Russian, Computer, Design, Painting, Theater and Dance) as the Ghoghanj Children’s Center – Kentron. The goal of this project is to broaden the services offered to socially vulnerable children and families in other communities and provide them with the proper support and guidance needed to excel in school and become self-confident and respectful young adults.

Amount will include rent, utilities, teacher salaries, maintenance and additional improvements, and supplies.

The National Agrarian University is a joint partner in this project. The greenhouse will be essential for the full training of the students during the course of the academic year. Further, the forestry professors and graduate students will conduct various research on part of the surface. The rest of the surface will be tended by our workers to grow various seedlings aimed for our reforestation projects.

We will build a 3,300 square foot greenhouse on the grounds of the National Agrarian University in Vanadzor. The greenhouse will have an automatic irrigation system. In addition, we will build 30 metal tables to support 1500 boxes for plant containers and develop our own design for a seedling container. Each table will support 3,000 containers containing one seedling each. The total capacity of the greenhouse is 90,000 seedlings. If the budget is fully raised, we would like to have two sets of 90.000 containers in order to allow two shifts per year.

The greenhouse will enable us to have a greater variety of forest tree seedlings including some rare and endangered species. This is very important in order to increase bio-diversity in the forests. It will also improve the success ratio of the plants in the afforestation areas as the saplings will go in the ground with soil around their roots.

The Greenhouse budget includes the construction of the actual greenhouse, the installation of an irrigation system, tables, containers and the required shading nets. Details are available upon request.