At both Pilares de Esperanza and its sister school Carolina Springs we believe we would fail our parents and our students miserably if we didn't teach the students in our care the gift of work.

Recently there was a movie called "The Gift" wherein a wealthy grandparent upon passing away left 10 tasks for his grandson to complete before he could receive his ample inheritance. One of these tasks was learning to appreciate the value of hard work and the basic therapeutic nature of it in our lives.

Work is the foundation and basic building blocks of all success. Learning to do a job well regardless of what it is, is where true greatness lies. It is critical to the our students growth and essential to all of our personal maturation. All true self esteem is earned and the gift of work is the single most effective way to earn it. Work simply teaches habits that when properly nurtured set up our long term success. Conversely a failure to nurture such habits as the gift of work will almost always wreck incredible havoc in our lives and in those who are around us.

This is a common thread that seems to run through the fabric of all the students' lives we work with. They simply haven't learned the value of work and how to do it well and in a consistent way. Too often they seem to be well schooled in the ancient art of sophistry and manipulation and are deficient in the gift of work. As a result of this they have been allowed to not focus the self discipline that a job well done requires and promotes. Instead they have been over indulged and cuddled to death till their sense of entitlement overwhelms them and boils over in the form of behaviors that land them in the program as a last resort.

Regardless of how they come or how well they have learned how to work at that point it is our work to help them incorporate the virtue of work in the school room and around our campus.

The story was once told how a man spent every Saturday working with his sons building a car in their front drive way. A neighbor upon observing the project over a period of months remarked to the man that "wouldn't they be better off if they simply bought a car for the boys or took it to a garage where it could be built properly". To this the man replied to his neighbor that he was sorry if he had not understood for "He wasn't building a car in his front drive but rather was building boys to men through the process".

We at POH and CSA are in the business of building such boys to men and girls to young women. We seek to build character through the gift of work in the young ladies and young men we have the privilege to work with in our process. It is our passion and our lives work and we seek to do it well now and in the future.

As a result children at POH and CSA will consistently do work projects every day during their stay at Pilares de Esperanza and Carolina Springs.

Most of the time this work is done in the morning or during the weekend, such as gardening, helping the workers in the stables or keeping our green zones clean and nice. Again we seek to keep our facilities clean and nice but we are not building the facilities we are building the kids and are passionate in this pursuit.