Photo by Dan Addison

Tyler Tuite

May 19, 2005

By Charlotte Crystal

Tyler Tuite just couldn’t get the orphans out of his mind.

He first traveled to Nicaragua in 1999 with his Virginia Beach church youth group. Spring Branch Community Church emphasizes service to others, “bringing faith and life together,” as part of members’ search for meaning, he said.

“These kids were abandoned, neglected, unloved,” Tuite said. “We tried to love them.”

As a high school student, Tuite took several more trips to Central America with the same group. The church members, aged 16 to 20, took orphaned Nicaraguan children to the beach, to movies and to amusement parks. For two weeks, they ate and played with them.

“Some of these kids did not have a chance,” Tuite said. “They didn’t smile or laugh. We told them they were loved. We played with them on the beach. We held them as they fell asleep. We tried to give them some of their childhood back.”

Arriving at U.Va. in the fall of 2001, Tuite began working with Young Life, a national, nondenominational Christian organization that seeks to make a positive impact on teenagers’ lives. For three years, he worked with local teens at The Covenant School in Charlottesville and continues to lead a group of young people at the Orange County High School.

At the same time, he kept up his ties with the orphanage, Casa Bernabe. In the summer of 2002, a number of U.Va. students, including Shannon Murphy, traveled with him to visit the orphanage.

“Shannon just fell in love with these kids,” Tuite said. “She came back and said she wanted to raise money to take other college students back on spring break the next spring.”

So, the group raised $11,000 in the following months and gathered a group of 39 interested students (27 from U.Va. and 12 from the College of William & Mary). For the one-week trip during spring break 2003, the students paid $750 each for airfare, food, lodging and activities — so that all the money raised could be turned over to the orphanage for needed projects.

“That trip was really incredible,” Tuite said. “You saw these privileged college students have their lives turned around by seeing the needs of these underprivileged kids and wanting to serve them. A movement started with college students who felt for these people hurting in Nicaragua.”

Upon their return, the group’s task evolved into one of creating a structure to support the movement, Tuite said, so that the energy and concern generated by the student trips could be channeled into a permanent organization. Interested students met and discussed the issues. They formed an organizing committee.

They created other committees. They raised money and worked on publicity. They organized three more trips and secured CIO (contracted independent organization) status from the University.

This past December, they incorporated as the Nicaraguan Orphan Fund, which is administered by the University of Virginia Foundation under the auspices of the University’s Alumni Association.

Tuite, now 22 and a fourth-year student with a double major in religious studies and economics, will graduate on May 22. He plans to stay in Charlottesville for the coming year and help launch the new organization.

Why the focus on Nicaragua?

It’s one of the poorer countries in the world, Tuite explained. Nicaragua’s estimated per capita Gross Domestic Product is only a fraction of that of the U.S. — $2,300 in 2004, compared with $40,100 in the United States, according to the CIA.

And there are a lot of social orphans in Nicaragua, Tuite said. “Most of these children were not orphaned by wars or natural disasters, but because their parents abandoned them. With the economy in such bad shape, many parents can’t support their children. The government’s resources are limited; that’s why churches and other nonprofit organizations have stepped in to help.”

It’s also a beautiful country that’s relatively close to the United States by plane, and it is a place where students can practice their Spanish. Tuite said that about half of the college students who have gone on the trips have been able to communicate at some level in Spanish.

For him, the appeal of the project is both altruistic and personal.

“We all want to help people,” he said. “We all enjoy seeing people smile and laugh. We want to be part of something significant. Our model is how Jesus cares for poor people. Doing this is helping me figure out what my faith is all about.”