Month: March 2020

A safe, sustainable new school powered by coffee.

In the past two years, Eleva Coffee has grown from a simple subscription service to two full-service coffee shops, and a wholesale presence that has Eleva being served in restaurants and co-working spaces across the country. But our most satisfying accomplishment has been working with our small farming communities. Here’s what we’ve been up to—and what you’ve helped create in Peñas Blancas, Nicaragua, where our Nicaraguan beans are grown.

In 2017, Emilio Baltodano, Eleva’s founder, visited Peñas Blancas, and identified two pressing problems in the local school, which serves 300 students: (1) The bathrooms were dilapidated outhouses, and (2) The pre-school was a wooden shack with dirt floors. Eleva committed to tackling both of them.

First, in 2018, we built new, sanitary bathrooms, complete with a unique ecological bio-degassing system that converts waste into gas to power a new school kitchen. Today, not only do the students and teachers have access to cleaner, more hygienic bathrooms, but the gas line to the kitchen also enables students to participate in a free school lunch program for the first time.

Next, in 2019, Eleva partnered with Seeds for Progress, Mercon Coffee and Project Alianza to build a much safer, more modern building to house the pre-school, so that Peñas Blancas’s youngest students can start their education off comfortably and safely.

A GAME-CHANGING CURRICULUM

Construction on the Peñas Blancas preschool finished in January 2020. Now, having upgraded the physical structure of the school, Eleva is currently focused on improving the educational curriculum taking place within it. We’re partnering with Project Alianza, an educational NGO, to implement a tested curriculum that will ensure all 300 children receive a challenging, and comprehensive education, bridging the education gap which currently exists between small rural schools and larger, urban ones. 

With a focus on literacy, sustainability and environmental awareness, health and hygiene, and gender equality, it’s a curriculum that is offering Peñas Blancas students a whole new outlook. The project will be entirely funded by Eleva subscribers and customers who subscribe to our Care Package program. Ten percent of each subscription goes to fund the educational initiative; a single six-month subscription will support one student’s participation in the program for an entire year. 

On behalf of the students of Peñas Blancas and all of us at Eleva, thank you for making the future brighter for 300 children already, and for continuing to support the community. There’s never been a better time to show you care.