Katalís was dreamed up while their founder was living in Haiti during high school. Melize hated science, as a child, but when she met with a great teacher for Electricity and Magnetism she saw how amazing science could be. She thought that everyone should have access to this field, but bad teaching and worldly circumstances tend to wean potential great minds out of the field. In August 2018, while attending the funeral of her uncle—who was a humanitarian figure—she thought a good way of combating the loss of his service to the country would be getting this project rolling, and so Katalís was born.
Knowledge, in all its forms, is essential to human life for it allows minds to grow and reach new horizons. This belief drives Katalís to want to spread their wings and teach the leaders of tomorrow. STEM is the most homogenous population in Western society, as it has always been dominated by straight, white men. Others are always told they can’t be due to background, orientation and gender. They want to give students internationally and locally the tools they need to succeed. Their goal is to mentor students approaching the university of under-represented background, to do demonstrations at high schools mostly in regions with a high immigrant percentage, and demonstrations targeted to women in areas with more exposure needed.
International Outreach is their oldest branch with the initial mission of tackling the lack of STEM education in Haiti. Unless you are of a privileged background, STEM is often not taught within the curriculum of public schools in Haiti. They have partnered with an organization, Here Am I Haiti, that makes education their mission with higher educational standards and meals for students. They will be going annually for as long as this club is intact to teach science, encourage locals with STEM education to continue their efforts in their lapse and eventually get the most enthusiastic minds to University one day with their help.
ERA is offering to any donation recipient, an expedited fulfillment of one of the items from their request in exchange for social media postings. To let people know how the donation will impact their organization and that others can dispose of their unwanted IT equipment with us so we can donate to more charities. We need help spreading the word about our mission and our services and appreciate when donation recipients share about the ERA on their social media, website, newsletter, etc. Katalís took advantage of this initiative and the ERA was happy to donate a laptop that will be used to give to kids in Haiti to keep in contact with Katalís through their YouTube learning channel and have access to learning materials online. To learn more about this amazing organization visit their website here.