A beacon of hope in the midst of adversity
Located in one of the most marginalized areas in southern Leon, the
San Juan de Abajo Community Center serves an informal community situated between the expressway and the railroad tracks. Families living in this area face extremely precarious conditions, lacking basic services such as sewage, potable water, paved roads, health centers, and schools.
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Many homes are built with scrap materials like sheet metal, cardboard, or other disposables. Access to water is limited, expensive, and risky: families often pay up to five times more for water, which is frequently stored in contaminated barrels—leading to recurring gastrointestinal illnesses. Malnutrition is also a daily reality, with many children eating only one or two meals a day.
A community that resists with dignity
The social context in San Juan de Abajo is complex. Illiteracy, school dropout, domestic violence, gang activity, drug use, and early pregnancies persist. Children face harsh realities from a very young age—many begin inhaling substances like celaste (solvent water) as early as eight years old.
Most men work as construction laborers, earning between 800 and 1,000 pesos per week. When formal work isn’t available, they collect PET plastic with their children to sell. Women, on the other hand, are often unable to leave their homes due to childcare responsibilities and the constant fear of theft.
Fundacion Leon: a transformative presence
In this challenging context,
Fundacion Leon has established the San Juan de Abajo Community Center as a space for support, learning, and opportunity. Here, individuals and families receive tools and experiences that foster personal, family, and community growth through courses, workshops, and comprehensive programs aimed at improving quality of life.
One of the most impactful initiatives is the
summer course, which serves
over 350 children daily for five weeks, providing meals, educational activities, and weekly field trips every Friday. These outings introduce children to the city’s history, culture, and recreational spaces—moments that not only enrich their knowledge, but also
strengthen their sense of belonging and dignity.
Results with a human face
Thanks to sustained efforts and the active participation of the community, we’ve seen significant improvements:
- Positive behavioral changes in children and adolescents.
- Increased assertive communication within households.
- Formation of support networks among neighbors.
- Greater involvement of mothers and fathers in community processes.
- Children and youth living in safer environments.
- Teens and young adults completing high school and accessing better job opportunities.
Each activity is designed to
strengthen self-esteem, develop life skills, and promote shared responsibility so that every person can build a more just and hopeful present. We are firmly convinced that with the right support, it is possible to transform complex realities and plant the seeds for new opportunities.
Social impact
- 27,000 families and 81,000 people have benefitted since the opening of Fundación León
- Successful fundraising campaigns securing 30 donors
- 30 donators
- Participation of educational institutions that provide the volunteer teaching or coordination in our various activities like computer science and English classes, homework clubs, legal consultations, workshops on nutrition, community brigades, raffles, field trips to swimming pools, children's day activities, summer camp, research into the neighborhood's needs, dental care, and campaigns for reforestation and garbage collection
- The educational institutions who participate are the Instituto Tecnologico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey-Campus Leon, Universidad De La Salle Bajio, Instituto Universitario del Centro de Mexico, Universidad Iberoamericana Leon, Universidad Franciscana and the Instituto Tepeyac
- Civil associations support the Community Center by giving medical services and supplies at low cost, (medicines, therapies, prosthetics and foot pads), food donations, funerary services, support for athletic programs, and coordination and rehearsal of orchestras and choirs
- The civil associations that support us are AFAPE, CARITAS, ALDIM, Fundacion Leonesa Servir, Un Angel al Cielo, Asociacion Mexicana de Diabetes, Fundacion del Dr. Simi, UNIGUA, and Fundacion TV Azteca
Do you want to be part of this change?
Your support can make a difference in a community that stands strong but needs helping hands to keep moving forward.
Join our cause and help us continue nurturing dreams, developing skills, and creating paths of hope.
Please read the testimonies of our residents who have benefited from the services of Fundacion Leon
I have attended the basic computer science class and it has helped me to overcome my fears and learn new things like the Word, Excel, Powerpoint and Publisher programs, as well as the use of the Internet in an educational way to do research or learn about new places, thanks to this, I have improved my grades because I can do my homework on the computer.
From the things I have learned here, my favorites are photo editing, creating presentations and videos with music, making calendars, doing publicity and I learned how to use One Draw to elaborate a document between two people.
We are very lucky for having these courses because they are free and wouldn´t have been able to pay. I am very lucky, my teacher is very patient and she explains very well and motivates us to keep studying, since she uses techniques to help us learn and work as a team. I like to come to the center because I have made new friends there.
Alma Delia Flores Blancarte (12 years old)
I have been living in San Juan de Abajo for 14 years now, and personally speaking I feel that my family and I are lucky because thanks to the different activities and seminars given to us in the workshops on human development, I have learned how to communicate better with my family and my neighbors. Participating in “Constelaciones” helped me to strengthen my self-esteem and made me feel confident and able to show the best in me. Thanks to the courses in bricklaying, plumbing, and electricity, I have acquired skills that have allowed me to work in the construction field for the past 3 years. With this job I have helped to improve the quality of life of my family and the most important thing is that little by little we are finishing the construction of my own house.
Norma Arredondo Rangel (36 years old)
I like coming to the Center because it is entertaining, I have been participating in soccer for five years now because I like playing with my new friends, it's an opportunity to have more friends, it's a good environment and I get to exercise. I like the summer camps because I have learned a lot of skills that I didn't have before, skills like Tae Kwon Do and handicrafts. Besides, they take us to the science museum Explora, to the Park Metropolitano, to the zoo, and for the first time I visited the state museum and the central library. We have gone to the Bicentennial Theater to see plays. In the music workshop we learned about the pentagram, the notes, and we assembled a guitar.
We are happy that this place exists, it keeps us off the streets away from the temptation of drugs and gangs, my parents are glad that I go to the Center because they are less worried about me. I have good friends that are not on drugs or in gangs and I am not on the streets.
Guadalupe Adilene Leon Ayala (16 years old)
I have benefited from many of the workshops that I have taken in the Center because I have learned many things: cooking, zumba, job training, I learned how to work as a team, I learned how to be a more confident person. Nowadays I am working in a factory making sheets and blankets. I have the dream of starting my own little company; that is why I motivated myself to design a project that I presented to the grant program Prospera to buy 10 machines and start a little factory. I would happily give jobs to my friends who were in the sewing workshop at the Fundación to help improve the quality of life of their families. Now my 7 year old daughter Valeria plays the violin as part of the ECOS orchestra and we are proud of her accomplishments.
Rosa Maria Cruces Vargas (39 years old)