This September marked an exciting milestone: the opening of our new 16,000-square-foot training center at the WAVS flagship campus in the capital of Guinea-Bissau. This is the largest infrastructure project in our history. Its completion marks the start of a new chapter — not only in the story of WAVS, but also in the stories […]
Author Archives: Chris Collins
Nonprofit & Charity, Spiritual Integration
What Holistic Ministry Looks Like: A Christian Nonprofit’s Guide to Sharing the Gospel While Serving the Poor
05
Aug
Aug
What Holistic Ministry Looks Like: How to Share the Good News While Serving the Poor In June, Pope Leo XIV shared a message on the 2025 World Day of the Poor that captured the twin callings of holistic ministry for how Christians (whether Catholic or Protestant) should serve the poor. “The worst discrimination which the […]
Nonprofit & Charity
A 4-Part Model for Running Sustainable Christian Vocational Schools in Poor Countries
26
Jun
Jun
WAVS’ 4-Part Model for Running Sustainable Christian Vocational Schools in Africa Recently, a report released jointly by the World Bank, the International Labor Organization, and UNESCO concluded that there will be “exponential” growth in skills training programs in low and middle-income countries over the next two decades. But the report also highlights all the ways […]
20
Mar
Mar
A Difficult Childhood Dalton Da Silva was forced to grow up quickly. As a young boy, his parents separated. His mom and baby sister moved out, and they had no one to care for them. Concerned for their survival, Dalton gathered dried grass and carefully tied it together to make traditional sweeping brooms. He sold […]
Graduate Stories, Welding
From Students to to Business Owners: How Learning Welding Transformed Ivanildo and Vanov’s Future
04
Mar
Mar
What happens when someone living in poverty is given the chance to learn a new job skill? Just ask Ivanildo and Vanov. They met last year while studying welding in the same class at a WAVS vocational school in Guinea-Bissau, a tiny country in West Africa. They discovered that they worked well together. In fact, […]
20
Feb
Feb
When we opened the new WAVS flagship campus in Bissau, the capital of Guinea-Bissau, we knew we were taking a risk. We were new to Bissau. People in the neighborhood weren’t familiar with us. And the campus wasn’t exactly easy to get to for anyone not living in the immediate vicinity. It’s located on 28 […]
06
Feb
Feb
From Learning to Leading: Augusto’s Journey Augusto is a young man living in Guinea-Bissau, West Africa, who grew up seeing a welder in action – his father. Even though his father had no formal training, he earned a meager income as a self-employed welder. Augusto idolized his father’s profession and dreamed of following in his […]
06
Aug
Aug
After pouring more than 10,000 cubic feet of reinforced concrete, the foundation is done! Now it’s time to call in the block masons. For the last several months, our contractor has been excavating, constructing concrete footings and foundation beams, laying down pipes and electrical installations, and pouring slab. Now, the new training center is finally […]
18
Jun
Jun
Many nonprofits, NGOs and donors want to see their projects and schools in Africa and elsewhere in the developing world become financially self-sustaining. They don’t want their efforts to be dependent on outside funding forever. But vocational training programs can be expensive, especially with the need for costly equipment and large facilities. And few students […]
10
Jun
Jun
Earlier this year, we broke ground on a brand-new 16,000-square-foot Training Center at our flagship campus in the capital of Guinea-Bissau. It’s scheduled to be completed by early next year. The Training Center will allow us to expand our welding program and launch new programs in carpentry and metalwork machining – skills that are in […]
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