Charitable Purpose
General area of charitable purpose: To promote health by providing training programs to health care personnel and improving access to health care infrastructure to people in underserved areas and areas of social and economic deprivation.
Specific area: Tula supports a health promotion program in Guatemala, with a focus on nursing and public health in the country's rural Indigenous regions.
Theory of Change
A Theory of Change is essentially a comprehensive description and illustration of how and why a desired change is expected to happen in a particular context.
In the case of rural Indigenous Guatemala, our Theory of Change is as follows:
Significant positive change requires long-term commitment and consistent application. To that end, Tula has systematically developed, improved, and sustained the TulaSalud program for approximately 20 years, with no breaks in continuity.
Tula knows that success requires a combination of local knowledge, expertise, and organization, plus expertise, technology, and mentorship from Canada. Success requires mobilizing all local resources: the formal public health system (the Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance, MSPAS, at all levels); nursing schools; local governments; community organizations; Indigenous organizations and practitioners (midwives and traditional healers); NGOs; etc.
By virtue of its reliable presence, continuity, commitment, and expertise, TulaSalud is now recognized as an essential part of Guatemala's public health system. Among other things, TulaSalud is an important source of innovation within the public health system, having pioneered the effective use of technology for nursing education, in-service training, epidemiological monitoring, workforce collaboration, staff management, and data mobilization.
Success requires a stable local organization. Tula believes in providing sustaining funding for core operations, including finance, administration, project management, and technology, rather than forcing TulaSalud to live from grant to grant, project to project, which is the fate of many local NGOs dependent on foreign funding. This continuity has allowed TulaSalud to develop and maintain sophisticated capabilities such as the Kawok suite of applications.
TulaSalud's growing capabilities have enabled it to secure funding from national and international agencies for projects aligned with TulaSalud's and Tula's objectives. In all such cases, Tula has endorsed this support and actively worked to secure funding. These projects typically include a mix of project-specific support and support for TulaSalud's core operations. This third-party funding is highly desirable: it reduces Tula's funding needs and, more importantly, offers TulaSalud prospects for longer-term sustainability when Tula will need to discontinue support.