The project was conceptualized by Lars C. Jorgensen and Monica D. Ray during their first visit to the Philippines

The founders saved enough capital to move to the Philippines in May 1990 to begin the construction of the center

Construction of the center with help from friends and volunteers

We invited our first collaborating partner, Kaibigan Foundation, to bring their children for a camp. This camp became the beginning of a whole line of workshops, seminars and camps for hundreds of children over the next couple of years. Stairway became a resort for children and staff from our partners in Manila, where they could pick up inspiration and motivation for further development. With the abundant exposure to nature and a wide range of visual and performance arts activities, we had found our niche in the network of organizations working for street children

We further developed the creative camps and workshops and approximately 400 children benefit from the program. We expanded our network to another 5 Manila based street children agencies, and we established Stairway Foundation Inc. in collaboration with the chairman, Atty. Johannes Ignacio. 
Also this year, we founded our Danish sister organization, Stairway Denmark, and we formulated and submitted our first proposal to an international funding agency, namely the Danish International Development Assistance, DANIDA. 
We had our first advocacy presentation at Roedkilde Gymnasium in Denmark, which led to a long and still ongoing partnership between the school and Stairway

SFI instituted a formal partnership with the Bagiuo Arts Guild, from where we recruited young artists as facilitators for some of the many creative workshops we held. We also initiated a close partnership with a Manila based drop-in center, Tanglaw Ng Kabataan, TNK, and started to operate as a rupture center for particularly disadvantaged street children, who needed to be distanced from a life threatening street environment. 
In the middle of this year we received the first external funding for the programs from DANIDA. Prior to DANIDA's support the program had been solely financed by the founders. In that same year, SFI responded to a local natural disaster, when a strong earthquake hit Mindoro and killed about a hundred people and left tens of thousands homeless. Our focus was on play and art related therapeutic intervention for the many children survivors in the evacuation centers

For the benefit of the earthquake victims, SFI organized a major fund raising concert in Manila with participation of some of the best musicians and artists in the country. To respond to the high prevalence of disease in some of the victims' relocation sites, the overhead was invested in materials for building toilets and septic tanks for 67 families

The program continued with creative workshops and camps for hundreds of children from Manila, and the rupture center was running with a population around 8-10 children at the time. The activities were low during this year due to the absence of the program coordinator and the director, who spent most of the year in Denmark as a result of a serious illness

SFI received license and accreditation from the Department of Social Welfare and Development.
The script and the lyrics to the songs in "Goldtooth, A Street Children's Musical" were written, and 17 more or less hard core children/youth from the streets were recruited as the cast. The initial phase of the project was merely drama therapy, and as the children and the quality developed, the idea of TASK, Talented Ambitious Street Kids, was conceptualized. 
Over the next year and a half the musical grew into a remarkable piece of creative advocacy

SFI now held a population of around 20-25 children and the drama therapy, as an integrated part of the development of the musical, is ongoing. SFI hosted a television crew from the Danish National Television for 2 months, and the program was featured in a film broadcast nationwide, called "Drengen der ikke ville vaskes". The director of the film, Katrine Nyholm, became a staunch supporter of Stairway and is presently the chairperson of Stairway Denmark.
"Goldtooth, A Street Children's Musical" had 2 preview performances in a theatre in Manila, and with an overwhelming response from both audiences, the pillars were laid for planning a local as well as and international tour for the musical

With the musical "Goldtooth" as the main element, SFI launched an international advocacy campaign promoting children's rights. The TASK group consisting of 17 former street children, performed for more than 20.000 people in 5 different countries. One of these performances was at the UN headquarter in Geneva, Switzerland, in the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the UN's Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Through a very authentic performance, TASK clearly illustrated the worlds that still lie in between the words and promises of the convention and the reality of millions of children around the world

Everybody experienced "a hard landing" after the "Goldtooth" tour. Almost the entire TASK group was passed on to jobs or further education. We constructed a new building with dormitory and school rooms. We opened SFI non-formal education school, and received recognition from the Department of Education. 
We had the first group of students from the International School coming to Stairway for a week of exposure and education on street children and children's rights.
22 endangered street children were admitted into SFI for therapy and non-formal education

The writing of the 11 short stories compiled in "Black Angels, Street Children Realities" was completed. Testing of the stories' in classrooms in Denmark, Canada and Egypt. Developing the teachers' manual. 
The non-formal education classes at SFI were ongoing. More workshops and seminars were held on issues relevant for the survival and growth of street children. SFI was a founding member of a local network for the prevention of child sexual abuse

Based on one of the stories from "Black Angels, Street Children Realities", we developed the storyboard to the animation "Daughter", which was to be a main tool in a campaign against child sexual abuse. The story was tested on a large group of children and further by our partners from the Center for the Prevention and Treatment of Child Sexual Abuse.
The animator behind the creation of the characters in "Daughter" was Paw Ravn, who generously volunteered his time and talents at Stairway for 4 months. 
After seven years of financial support from DANIDA, we diversified our financial dependency and signed new partnership contracts with 2 new international funding agencies; Kindernothilfe from Germany and Leger Foundation from Canada. Further, the Embassy of Finland in Manila agreed to support the campaign against child sexual abuse

Based on more than a decade of experiences we decided to take an active part in the fight against child sexual abuse and commercial sexual exploitation of children here in the Philippines and globally. In 2003 we completed and released the 'Daughter, a Story of Incest' animation toolkit.
At the same time we facilitated a series of 14 children's rights/child sexual abuse prevention workshops for a total of 225 children and youth. Some of the workshops were facilitated for children in detention and revealed an urgent need to address the problem of sexual abuse in penitentiary institutions for children.
At the residential program we served a new group of 14 children. Eight of them we got out of jail and six were street children with tuberculosis. All the children with TB underwent medical therapy: the Directly Observed Treatment Short Course, DOTS, recommended by the WHO and have now recovered.

The animation film "Daughter, a Story of Incest" proved its worth during its first year of existence. It was distributed and used widely in the Philippines, and it was translated into Khmer and Bahasa to be used in Cambodia and Indonesia as well. The film also brought attention to the problem of child sexual abuse in other parts of the world, as it won a first price at the world's largest animation film festival in Annecy, France, where it also received a special award from UNICEF. To compliment the animation about incest, we embarked on a second animation film about pedophilia titled "A Good Boy". With substantial support from our international partners we expect to be able to launch "A Good Boy" by May or June 2005. Our local campaign against child sexual abuse was also further intensified with an expansion of our network and a long line of trainings and workshops for teachers, social workers, church members and other care givers. With more activity on the prevention side grew the need for more resources placed into the restoration of survivors of sexual abuse. We ended up with a full time psychologist, who had more than 50 children under counseling throughout the year. Towards the end of the year our efforts were rewarded with the promise from DANIDA to support our work on child sexual abuse prevention for the coming 2 years. In our temporary shelter program we assisted a total of 29 children and 7 youth. Amongst them there were 12 children with tuberculosis. Nine were fully cured while the remaining 3 are still on medication. For more information please go to Annual Report 2004