COAF was founded in 2004 to provide children and their families in the rural communities of Armenia with opportunities to reach their full potential.
“What we do is very comprehensive and holistic. We do infrastructure improvements in about 64 villages throughout Armenia, in addition to that, we have programs in education, health care, social services and economic development,” said @Haig Boyadjian, Senior Director of Development.
Since 2018 COAF’S Smart Center in the Northern Armenia Lori Region has offered free programs and transportation for children in surrounding villages.
But everything for the time being has been shut down. And now because of the war and the aftermath, COAF has shifted to crisis mode.
“We have been settling these displaced people throughout our villages, providing host families and displaced people with humanitarian supplies and things like that just to get them acclimated.”
Meanwhile, the COAF family has been mourning the loss of its students.
“I have seen a lot of these children in our villages grow up. What’s heartbreaking for me is we’ve lost kids from our villages who happen to be serving in the military when the attack started.”
One young man Haig can’t forget is 18 -year-old Vahe Mkrtchyan from the small village of Lernagog.
“Vahe was a shining example of our organization’s mission to give these children opportunities to advance themselves and he would run with them. Whatever extra curricular club we would put in, he would enroll in each one and would excel. Vahe was on the course of pursuing his dreams, to see an 18-year-old’s life come to a stop like that is heartbreaking.”
Right now COAF’S mission is to focus on helping those who need it the most and to continue to invest in the future.
COAF’s Moving Mountains fundraiser will be held on December 5 and will be televised and virtual this year.
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The Children of Armenia Fund (COAF) is a non-profit, non-governmental organization that employs community-led approaches aimed at improving the quality of life in rural Armenia, with a particular focus on children and youth. COAF’s target development areas are education, health, social and economic development. 100% of your donation goes directly towards resources we are providing to Armenia’s rural population.
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