Viridiane’s Hope for Children’s Health and Education, VHCHE Corp

Viridiane’s Hope for Children’s Health and Education (VHCHE) is a Virginia non-profit corporation and tax exempt under the Internal Revenue Service rules section 501(c)(3). It was established by Joe and Beatrice Tiago in 2019 in Springfield, Virginia, USA. VHCHE’s mission is to improve the lives of children in underserved and underprivileged communities locally and globally. VHCHE’s mission of bringing joy to other children was born out of sorrow, and the help VHCHE is providing to children in need was built out of desperation; it’s a nonprofit organization that was founded by grieving parents to celebrate and remember their daughter through health and education programs that support its mission.

On May 31, 2023, VHCHE received the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)’s approval for listing in the Office of Catholic Directory (OCD) as a Catholic Charity. Our current geographic focus is rural and very poor areas in Cameroon, Central West Africa. It is a country with wide areas of poverty. Family life in some of these areas is dramatically compounded by large numbers of internal refugees fleeing ongoing armed domestic unrest in the Northwest and Southwest Regions of the country. In these areas, young people suffer the most and VHCHE is currently working there the hardest.

Contributions received by VHCHE go directly to support its charitable projects. Since 2021, and through the generosity of our donors, VHCHE has awarded grants and completed a wide variety of projects in several impoverished villages. This includes the construction of a new building at a catholic school; the drilling of six drinking water wells powered by electricity along with a 1,000 to 3,000-gal reserved tank; the construction of four toilets; a major renovation of a catholic school, a chapel, and a presbytery; the construction of multi-student workstations (bench/desk sets); the funding for the purchase of instructional materials for teachers. The cost of each drinking water well project including the tower is between $10K and $16K, depending on hydrogeological conditions and the specifications of the associated tower.

In addition, VHCHE also donated medical equipment, school supplies, church vessels, and vestments to various beneficiaries. Thanks to the proceeds from a TAG Day held by students at Saint Louis Catholic School in Alexandria, VA, in 2024, VHCHE awarded scholarships to 38 students at Saint Anne Catholic School in rural New Melong, Cameroon. The scholarships will cover the costs of books, tuition, and fees to allow many students to benefit from a Catholic education.

Recent beneficiaries of VHCHE grants and mission work in Cameroon include the Diocese of Nkongsamba, the Diocese of Bafang, the Archdiocese of Douala, the Archdiocese of Bamenda, and the Archdiocese of Yaoundé.

Mission appeal donations will be used to supplement the work we’ve already done on the ground in Cameroon and expand our focus area to include other needed and impoverished communities where children suffer the most. Specifically, VHCHE plans to build an English speaking 1-6 grade school with a clinic and computer literacy center in the diocese of Nkongsamba, at Saint Anne Catholic School in New Melong. This village is located on the border province between the Francophone and Anglophone sections of Cameroon which is receiving many English-speaking families who are fleeing the war and have no local infrastructure to accommodate their learning curriculum in English. VHCHE has successfully carried out infrastructure projects that are sustainable in the area. VHCHE will also build a pastoral care center in the Archdiocese of Bamenda for victims of violence in the war, and drill additional drinking water wells in other villages of rural Cameroon so that children and families may have water to drink. For more information about the work of VHCHE in Cameroon, visit their website at www.vhche.org.