Camino al Cambio Homepage

Camino al Cambio is a not-for-profit organization with roots in the United States that
works to improve the quality of life of street children and young adults in Ecuador.
Promoting health and education as basic human rights, we strive to fill the gaps in
the disparities of health education and healthcare available and accessible to
vulnerable and marginalized children and youth in and of the street. We concentrate
our efforts on street children, who are typically ineligible for services from other
providers, including children and youth with substance abuse issues, youth over the
age of fourteen, children or youth with challenging behavioral histories, and children
and youth with chronic or severe medical conditions.

Children and youth that live in the scene of the street in Ecuador experience a range
of physical, sexual, and emotional abuses as well as other innumerable human rights
violations. The masses of children that manage to continually escape death in the
streets are left hardened and stigmatized by their means of survival: doing menial
tasks, exchanging sex, stealing, and abusing substances. Yet, the repeated violation
of their human rights contributes to both their behavior and the stigma they endure.
The family that should love them, physically and sexually abuses, sells or abandons
them. The authorities that should protect them, rob, beat and humiliate them. The
social services that should help them, deny them services, compassion and dignity,
and the communities that should include them, alienate, objectify and defile them.
They are often seen one-dimensionally as either victims or villains. We strive to break
the paradigm and interact with children and youth living on the streets as unique and
complex individuals, who have as much insight and experience to offer us as human
beings and as an organization as we have to offer them.

We believe that street youth have the potential to transform their lives and the lives
of their peers when given opportunities to learn, develop and work in a non-
judgmental environment of mutual respect and shared responsibility. We strive to
provide street youth with the education, skills, choices and opportunities necessary
for improving and protecting their health and for transitioning to healthier, more
productive lifestyles. We do not see our work as “saving” children, but rather as
empowering children to “save” themselves. Our projects include a range of
prevention and treatment activities that to promote and protect the health and well-
being of the children and youth in the streets. While the crux of our projects focus
on the prevention of ill health, the treatment activities we engage in function to
prevent the continuation of the cycle of poor health and well-being—the cycle of
illness, illiteracy, violence, addiction, and desperation.

We fulfill our mission by directly engaging street children and youth in all aspects of
programming, from conducting research and evaluations to program design and
implementation. We also maintain contact and communication with other service
providers to bolster the pool of opportunities and services available to street youth
and to facilitate the exchange of knowledge and programs directed at the
population. When appropriate and evidence-based, we advocate for the rights of
street children and youth within local and international communities.

ENGAGE: To engage children and youth not yet involved with or accessing available services in all
aspects of the organization—from program planning and evaluation to peer-education and participation,
thereby filling the gaps in the spectrum of services available to street youth throughout the country.

EDUCATE: To educate and enhance the skill capacity of street children and young adults as well as
those working with them, particularly in the realm of healthcare and basic education; To conduct
research to further the understanding of the plight and lifestyle of street youth and to better inform
the design of interventions targeting them.

EMPOWER: To empower street youth to take advantage of available services and to transition to
healthier, more stable and productive lifestyles; To promote relationships based on mutual respect and
shared initiative between all groups involved in organization activities; To empower youth to live healthy,
independent, self-sustainable lives without creating youth dependency on organization staff or services.

ESTABLISH: To advocate for and establish health as a basic human right; To establish a network of
providers to link services and improve communication amongst those working with—or with the
potential to work with—street children and youth, creating a system for accessing non-judgmental basic
health care and health and hygiene products.