About Us
Where One Idea Became a Movement
When Cecilia Costa was a student at Carrollton School of the Sacred Heart, she began to ask a simple question:
What if helping others could go deeper?
For years, she had joined service trips where volunteers brought food, clothes, and toys to children in need. The days were joyful — full of laughter, games, and moments of connection.
But Cecilia couldn’t stop thinking about what happened after the volunteers left.
The children returned to the same worn spaces where they lived every day — dark TV rooms, tired dormitories, empty walls that felt forgotten.
And Cecilia realized something powerful.
While gifts and donations matter, dignity also lives in the environment around us.
A bright room can change how a child feels about themselves.
A welcoming space can remind someone that they matter.
So while still in high school, Cecilia decided to do something different.
Instead of simply visiting orphanages for a day of service, she began organizing projects that would transform the spaces where children actually lived. With friends and volunteers, she worked to redesign and restore rooms inside orphanages — turning neglected areas into places filled with color, warmth, and life.
But the idea of serving others was not something new for Cecilia.
It was something she had grown up with.
From a young age, service was simply part of family life. Each year, Cecilia and her siblings traveled with their parents on trips dedicated to helping communities in need. They packed donations, visited orphanages, and spent time with children whose lives looked very different from their own.
For Cecilia, these experiences were more than volunteer trips. They were lessons in empathy, perspective, and responsibility.
Much of that spirit came from her mother.
Growing up in the Dominican Republic, her mother witnessed daily the stark reality that while some people have opportunities, many others struggle simply to get by. She saw firsthand how difficult it can be for those without resources to change their circumstances or feel hopeful about the future.
Those early experiences shaped her deeply. Service became not just something she did, but something she believed in.
When she started her own family, she wanted her children to understand both gratitude and responsibility — to recognize how fortunate they were, and to feel called to help others whenever they could.
Those yearly trips quietly planted something in Cecilia.
And as she grew older, that seed began to take its own shape.
What began as one high school student’s idea has now grown into something much larger through Camino de Esperanza (CDE).
Today, Cecilia’s original vision has become a platform that empowers other young leaders to step forward and create their own projects of impact.
Through the guidance, mentorship, and experience of the CDE team, students are able to transform their ideas into meaningful initiatives — organizing projects, building teams, raising support, and learning to lead with compassion and purpose.
Because the mission of Camino de Esperanza is not only to serve communities in need.
It is also to cultivate a new generation of leaders who believe they have the power to make a difference.
What began with one student wanting to bring dignity and hope to a forgotten room has grown into something much bigger — a movement that inspires young people to lead, serve, and elevate the world around them.
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