Achievements, successes, and valuable lessons, 2021 was a year during which various Wiese Foundation projects were solidified
The organization, which has been boosting the development of the country since its creation in 1960, and which has among its goals the achievement of individual and collective welfare through support to education, health, culture, and scientific investigation, has carried out, over this time, diverse projects that have left their mark on thousands of Peruvians. Despite adversities, this work has never stopped.
This is an account of the activities carried out in 2021 through all the programs of the Wiese Foundation. From projects to benefit the education of children in Peru, to valuable partnerships with various national and international organizations.
Better School Atmosphere, Better Learning
One of the principal projects of the Educational Quality Program of the Wiese Foundation ended this year after 5 years of intervention and uninterrupted work with teachers, pedagogical mentors, and parents.
In 2016, the Wiese Foundation implemented the project, “Better School Atmosphere, Better Learning”, as part of its Educational Quality Program, seeking to contribute to a better emotional and cognitive environment, to optimize the learning process in public schools for basic education in the country.
The spaces where this project was carried out were schools in the districts of Pachacamac and Lurín, in the region of Lima. The objective was to promote a positive school environment through values such as respect, empathy, good treatment, and non-violence in the pedagogical experience.
Entrepreneurship Fund
This year, the financing for Empanacombi, Llama Pack, Pixed, and Estrafalario, the four social businesses that formed the first cohort of the Entrepreneurship Fund, the Wiese Foundation’s program for social innovation, was completed.
Empanacombi, Estrafalario, Llama Pack, and Pixed are Peruvian social businesses that are thriving in the pandemic thanks to a significant amount of strength, creativity, and support from the Entrepreneurship Fund.
The Entrepreneurship Fund is a platform for Impactful Investment that seeks to identify and boost formal businesses in Peru that have been created with the mission of addressing a relevant social problem in the country through their commercial operations; that are in the early stages of their operation; and that can, furthermore, show some proof of success in their business models.
OxI El Brujo
The Wiese Foundation carried out the first project financed through the mechanism of Projects for Taxes (OxI) in the cultural sector through the El Brujo Archaeological Complex in February of 2021.
In this respect, the Wiese Foundation successfully turned in, in 2021, its first project for archaeological research and socialization of knowledge financed through the Projects for Taxes (OxI) mechanism.
The Projects for Taxes mechanism is an opportunity for the public and private sectors to work together to reduce the gaps in infrastructure in the country. Through this mechanism, private businesses get advances on the payment of their income tax to finance and execute directly, in a rapid and efficient manner, projects of public investment that the subnational governments and the entities of the national government prioritize.
Wayrachis
As part of its Humanitarian Aid Program, and in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic that hit the world, the Wiese Foundation gave 100 Wayrachi machines to various hospitals in the country, machines that help to administer medicinal oxygen at a high rate to patients affected by the virus.
The objective of this donation was to keep patients with problems caused by COVID-19 from arriving at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) in urgent need of a mechanical ventilator.
In addition to this donation, the Wiese Foundation also provided FiO2 measurement devices that connect to the Wayrachis, so that health care staff could better manage the flow of oxygen that their patients received. These devices allow for the exact measurement of the fraction, concentration, or proportion of oxygen that a patient receives.
This technology is used in various countries throughout the world and is frequently employed for the treatment of people with COVID-19 who require a high administration of oxygen.
Oxygen Plant
This year, Cañete and Yauyos had a medicinal oxygen plant, necessary for treatment of patients affected by COVID-19, thanks to the support of the Wiese Foundation, together with the civil society of that area, journalists, and institutions.
Cañete’s oxygen plan is working to this day and allows for the generation of 96 cylinders per day, thanks to its two generators that produce 20 cubic meters per hour.
We Are Working Together for Your Wellbeing
In 2021, one of the most beautiful campaigns carried out in the region of La Libertad ended: “We Are Working Together for Your Wellbeing”, an initiative that gave aid to more than 1,000 vulnerable households in eight districts of the province of Ascope, thanks to the collaborative work of the Wiese Foundation with the Montpelier Foundation, ADRA Peru, and the Red Sum Association.
The beneficiaries of this important initiative of the Wiese Foundation’s Humanitarian Aid Program received food assistance, medical attention, and counselling regarding integral healthcare.
With respect to the food assistance, non-perishable food items were delivered to the more than 1,000 beneficiary families, enough to feed them for at least 14 days.
With respect to the medical attention and the counselling for integral healthcare, a team of 30 health professionals and technicians, as well as an additional brigade of volunteers, travelled to different districts in the province of Ascope, with the goal of offering 1,000 medical consultations, in the specializations of general medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics, triage, preventative COVID-19 counselling, and pharmacy services.
Chavín, Mother Culture of Andean Civilization
The Wiese Foundation led the editorial project that concluded with the reedition of the iconic book of Peruvian archaeology entitled “Chavín, Mother Culture of Andean Civilization”.
The Wiese Foundation, together with the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos (UNMSM) and the Antamina Mining Company, in commemoration of the centennial anniversary of the first archaeological expedition to Chavín de Huántar, icon of Peruvian culture, reedited one of the magnum opera of the father of Peruvian archaeology, Julio C. Tello.
This edition displays the Bicentennial Stamp for the Independence of Peru, greatly improves the diagraming, corrects various errors in the original edition, and includes new graphic evidence from the Tello Archive, housed at UNMSM.
Peru in the British Museum
The Wiese Foundation was part of one of the most important museographic projects that have been organized with the purpose of showing pre-Incan Peruvian history to the world: “Peru: A Journey in Time”.
This exhibition has been presented at the British Museum, in the United Kingdom, where part of the beautiful collection of nose ornaments of the Lady of Cao can be appreciated by the whole world.
The Wiese Foundation’s role in this activity is focused on technical assistance to the British Museum. In other words, collaborating in the process of selection of the pieces to exhibit, indicating the conservation conditions required during the exhibition, providing the exit documents for leaving the country, offering technical advice about the mounting of these pieces in the British Museum’s exhibition room, and other logistics related to the care and conservation of the pieces from the El Brujo Archaeological Complex.
“Peru: A Journey in Time” is an exhibit that has been on display since November 11 at the British Museum in London, in the United Kingdom, thanks to an agreement signed between this institution and the Ministry of Culture of Peru. This exhibition explores the thousands of years that human beings have lived in the extraordinary landscapes of the Andes Mountains and beyond.
It is important to mention that this is the first large-scale exhibition that the British Museum has organized about Peru, and it was developed in correspondence with the bicentennial of Peruvian independence. The display can be visited until February 20, 2022.
Piql
Another of the big milestones achieved this year by the Wiese Foundation was its alliance with Piql, one of the most important digital-security companies at the global level that even has the approval of the European Union.
Piql protects the Wiese Foundation’s digital data associated with the El Brujo Archaeological Complex, such as the inventory and photographs of its cultural objects, data about the archaeological research projects carried out at the site, and other documents with valuable contents.
The objective of Piql is to provide a holistic and innovative solution for the secure digital storage of valuable information, offline and long-term. Those invited to be a part of its pilot program benefit from an avant-garde service for saving digital data of up to 500 GB, using its technology, without any cost.
In Peru, the Wiese Foundation was recruited by Piql, along with three other organizations, to form a part of its pilot program. This invitation came as a product of the non-profit organization’s sharing of information about its work at El Brujo, through all its digital networks.
VII International Archaeology Conference
The Wiese Foundation held its VII International Archaeology Conference digitally due to the COVID-19 pandemic, an event that boasted the participation of renowned figures from the field and that had a large following through social media.
The objective of this encounter of professionals involved with archaeology was to make visible and to recognize the institutional efforts that for a long time have contributed, through their work at archaeological sites, to the investigation, sharing, and preservation of knowledge found in our invaluable cultural heritage.
Digital contents to strengthen education in the country
The Wiese Foundation, in its work to contribute to education in the country, and conscious of the consequences of the interruption to student work due to the pandemic, produced educational and cultural contents that were put at the disposition of the Ministry of Education and the general public, through its digital platforms.
These contents, adapted in infographics, videos, and podcasts, were directed at teachers, directors, parents, and students. The topics that were dealt with through these formats were related to distance learning, feelings, emotional intelligence, self-esteem, etc.
One of the most notable of these programs is Educational Quality, from the Wiese Foundation, which, over all the years of its existence, has been concerned with the proper formation of teachers, not only on a professional level, but also on an emotional one.
Lady of Cao, Legacy of Power
Under the watchful eye of the Wiese Foundation, Estrafalario, one of the ventures that participated in the organization’s Entrepreneurship Fund, presented its new fashion collection inspired by the Lady of Cao this year.
“Lady of Cao, Legacy of Power” is the name of the new collection of garments designed by Estrafalario, created by the hands of the artisans of Magdalena de Cao, in La Libertad. In this way, the Wiese Foundation returns the Moche’s ancestral textile knowledge to the women of the community.
I Hear You, Teacher
The Wiese Foundation’s commitment to education was strengthened this year, thanks to an interinstitutional partnership with the Ministry of Education, after working on various projects together.
One of the most important of these projects was the development of contents for its strategy, “I Hear You, Teacher”, focused on the promotion of wellbeing and self-care for teachers at the national level.
It produced a series of short videos about the development of socioemotional skills that clearly present situations and challenges identified in facing the COVID-19 health crisis, social isolation, and distance learning.
The materials produced by the Wiese Foundation can be viewed through the MINEDU’s portal, “I Hear You, Teacher”.
Educational Credit
This year, talented youth continued to be supported to successfully finish their professional and technical careers, through the granting of subsidized educational credits to help them pay for their studies.
The Educational Credit Program of the Wiese Foundation, operated by IPFE, is directed at students, to whom the financing of the second half of their college studies is offered. The Program works through social conditions of credit; in other words, it aims to adapt the cost of the monthly payments of its beneficiaries for their studies according to their real ability to pay.
The students also receive workshops on development of their socioemotional skills, as well as a system of mentoring and constant emotional support, until they finish their studies.
By this means, the Wiese Foundation contributes to the decrease in college dropouts by talented youth who are clear in their calling, and aids in their successful insertion into the labor market.
Wiñaypaq
This year, the Wiese Foundation strengthened its alliance with the Wiñaypaq Educational Association, an institution that offers bilingual intercultural education (EIB) at the kindergarten and primary school levels, at a school that is located in the district of Písac, in the province of Calca, in the region of Cusco.
Both institutions have signed a partnership to collaborate on the carrying out of a series of projects, scheduled to benefit the students of this school, in which the fair pay of the staff who work at Wiñaypaq is guaranteed, the provision of water to the school will be urgently addressed, and the Wiese Foundation will commit to carrying out the necessary actions regarding the legal situation of the property upon which the school operates.
The Wiese Foundation thanks all its allies and friends for having made possible each one of these stories. In 2022, we will continue working to transform Peru into a country forged by better citizens.
