Child Aid is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based in Portland, Oregon, working to promote literacy in Latin America.
According to Child Aid's mission statement, the organization works to "create opportunity for Latin America's rural and indigenous poor through childhood literacy and education programs.
"[1] Child Aid works primarily in Guatemala, as it is the country with the lowest literacy rate in Latin America.
[2] In 1987, founders Rick Carroll and Nancy Press spent time in southern Mexico where they discovered an absence of services for deaf and hard-of-hearing children.
In those areas, the organization works to improve libraries, train teachers and librarians, and bring reading programs to children who face the highest rate of illiteracy in Latin America.
Most rural teachers lack the education and training to teach children to read, as many have only the equivalent of a high school diploma.