Monday’s (7/14) La Prensa (San Antonio, Texas) posts a report from the EFE news agency about the Don Bosco Youth symphony Orchestra, which debuted last year in San Salvador. “About 1,000 children, teenagers and young people living in high-crime areas in El Salvador” participate in the program, which aims to “prevent violence in a musical program promoted by the World Bank and financed by Japan.… Of the 1,000 students from different public schools in San Salvador province, some 470 make music, with 220 in the symphony orchestra and 250 in the chorus, while the rest are in training. The 25-year-old conductor of the orchestra, Bryan Cea, like his musicians, comes from a notoriously crime-ridden district. The youths live together … without problems at the Don Bosco Industrial Polygon, home of the project, despite belonging to communities ruled by rival street gangs.… The project has been financed with at least $1 million from the Japan Social Development Fund, administered by the World Bank…. The World Bank’s aid ends July 22, but the Spanish Salesian priest Jose Maria Moratalla Escudero ”—the president of the Salvadoran Foundation for Education and Labor—“said the project will continue and the foundation will try to integrate it into other cultural workshops they offer.”
Posted July 16, 2014
Pictured: In San Salvador, musicians of the Don Bosco Youth Symphony Orchestra practice at the Don Bosco Industrial Polygon. Photo by EFE
