Renée Ramirez
Renée Ramirez
Panama, 2022-2023
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My name is Renée and I’m spending a year in Panamá working with Fundación Calicanto. Calicanto is a Panamanian organization combatting gender-based violence through social and economic empowerment programs. I’m a Nashville girl and graduated from Belmont in 2021 with a double major in Entrepreneurship and Economics. This is such a privilege, thanks for following along! Read More About Renée →

It’s Finally August!

Hi everyone! Happy August! I’ve spent the last couple of days working remotely with a handful of friends near Palmar beach. We’ve been working throughout the day and taking pauses to surf when the waves are good. It’s been such a treat. I had visitors throughout most of July which was wonderful but also a little crazy! Have enjoyed getting back into my rhythm and weekly routines.

Highlights
  • Downloading Goodreads!
  • Leadership workshop with the Calicanto team
  • Cooking + surfing + remote working with friends
  • Spending time with my childhood best friend
  • Leading a French Fry Blind Taste Test at a birthday party

Current Projects

I am tying up final loose ends on the impact stories process this week! Will be translating an SOP (standard operating procedure) document from English to Spanish, creating a power-point, and writing a couple of other implementation guidelines for the Communications and Conexiones teams. Sharing the final process with our teams to start implementing this Monday. Que chevere!
I’ve made good progress developing our customer discovery process over the last couple of weeks. Have divided the process into three phases to measure our potential client’s wants + pain points, technical experience in the course, and the most engaging content and learning methods. My next steps here are to divide the plan into action points for our team to get started on. I am anticipating finding individuals and companies to participate in this customer discovery process to be relatively straightforward since Fundación Calicanto is so well established in Panama.
Calicanto just won a 6-month contract working with IOM, the UN’s International Organization of Migration. Starting in September we will begin training 6 cohorts with a concentrated CAPTA program. Winning this contract was exciting news to our team and very well deserved. I will be supporting the team by developing monthly reports for each cohort and a final report in February summarizing the length of the contract. Looking forward to working with IOM and equipping migrants in Panama in the coming months!

 

Something New

I finally got access to Libby through my sister’s library card (ha). My book list has gotten looong recently which is exciting! Currently reading, The Open Veins of Latin America by Eduardo Galeano, Misreading Scripture through Western Eyes by O’Brien and Richards, At Your Best by Carey Nieuwhof, Liturgy of the Ordinary by Tish Warren, and re-reading Boundaries by Drs. Cloud and Townsend. Too many haha. I found a digital pdf of the Gospel in Solentiname by Ernesto Cardenal that I am so excited to get into! Cardenal was a Nicaraguan priest and poet who took an active role in the Nicaraguan revolution in the 1980s. He founded an arts-based-monastic community on the archipelago of Solentiname and this book is a commentary on the gospels by the peasant community he lived with. I’ve been really interested in liberation and Hispanic theology over the last couple of years as I deeply respect how it integrates political participation and social justice. The faith community I grew up in shaped me in many positive ways but in my experience focused more on image, comfort, and growing a movement than caring for people. Grateful to be able to read about and learn from different expressions of Christianity these days.

 

Something I’m Grateful for

My childhood best friend spent a week with me in Panama which felt so normal and fun. I introduced her to my friends and showed her my favorite coffee shops, restaurants, and spots throughout the city. Her friendship has been such a gift to me these last 10 years. I’m so grateful for the history we share and to be able to walk through life together as adults.

That’s all for now. I hope you’re doing well!

Cuidense,
Renée

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