In 1993 while still employed fulltime Richard and Susan became lay associates of the Sisters of St Joseph in Pembroke Ontario. Their purpose was to discern their future contributions to a better world in a spiritual environment. From this beginning their commitment to the people of Guatemala grew. Both were uniquely equipped for the challenge, which awaited them.

Up until 1999, Richard held numerous positions in the field of education. Having worked both in the public and separate school systems, at the elementary and high school levels, Richard brings a myriad of experience to the Guatemalan school system. As an administrator for the last 27 years of his career, he has a number of skills that he willingly shares with the Guatemalan people. He is also skilled in the manual arts and his teaching and directing experience allows him to pass on his knowledge of construction and renovation to other volunteers.

In 1980 Susan graduated as an early childhood educator. Over the past 30 years she has established a number of preschools in Canada and Guatemala. She has also been a professor and faculty advisor in the Early Childhood Education Department at Algonquin College in Pembroke, Ontario, a government researcher, director of a Family Resource Center, and last but not least, an entrepreneur and professional clown for seven years. Her spirit and experience was animated by her passion to employ individual child-focused learning techniques so badly needed in the third world.

In the summer of 2000 the Schmaltzs attended a Third World orientation in Chicago - an interdenominational training program to prepare people for mission. They were sponsored by the Voluntary Missionary Movement (VMM) USA, which is an ecumenical, non-evangelizing organization based in Milwaukee.



In September 2000 the couple left for Guatemala, and began their 27-month commitment to the mission by attending language school. A short time later they started their assignment with God's Child Project in San Felipe, just outside Antigua, which was arranged by the Volunteer Missionary Movement co-coordinator for Central America. During that time, they carried out a variety of tasks in service to the poor.

Susan worked with the school in the God's Child project, called the Dreamer Center. Richard led teams of service, while Susan assisted in providing lunches and snacks to students. In a short time Susan was able to set up play-based, activity centred, pre-school programs and trained two Guatemalan teachers in the basic theories and practices of Early Childhood Education. They in turn trained two other Guatemalan teachers and set up two more classrooms based on the new method.

Soon both were working on a variety of projects initiated by the God's Child Project including helping the plight of children in the Patzun orphanage. Richard also worked with teams of volunteers to build basic homes and furniture for families which had previously survived in the most primitive and inhospitable shelters

Richard and Susan started a program to feed the homeless in Antigua where they were based by 2001. They also perceived great need in the rural areas devastated by a civil war of over 30 years duration. They visited the village of Sacala Los Lomas, where many women widowed by the war were struggling to support their children. The women were skilled in the art of traditional weaving and wanted to form a cooperative to make and sell their products. In support of this effort, Susan and Richard established a small preschool for children freeing the women to work and solicited donations for the purchase of three large looms and two sewing machines to enable them to increase their production.



By 2003, Susan and Richard had fulfilled their two-year commitment to the VMM mission in Guatemala and were scheduled to return home and begin retirement living. However, the plight of the dreadfully poor people of that country would not let them rest. There were so many new seeds to plant! So instead they formed Oneness. Initially, the new initiative was assisted by the Sisters of St Joseph of Pembroke.

In the next year, Oneness opened an important partnership with a Guatemalan organization called "Camino Seguro" ("Safe Passage"). This project served the poorest of the poor who lived at the municipal dump in Guatemala City. The people here barely existed by scrounging from the garbage in hopes of finding food and items which they could sell. The children appeared to have no hope of breaking out of a crippling cycle of poverty.

But Oneness and "Safe Passage" collaborated to set up a two room preschool pilot project followed by a six-room daycare. The furniture was designed by Susan and built by volunteers from Canada and the United States under the direction of Richard.

The Schmaltzs arranged major funding for their efforts at the dump through Acceso International, a charitable group based in Ottawa, and also received a generous donation from the Society for Third World Dental Care based in Alberta. But setbacks are inevitable with such taxing work and in 2005 qualified teachers trained by Susan quit because the dump was located in the most dangerous area of the city. Still Susan carried on and soon was training more teachers with the able assistance of her Guatemalan colleague, Madeli Samara Quinonez Gonzales, who, along with Susan as the executive Director, is now the president of Planting Seeds.

In 2004, Susan won an achievement award for her work with children from the Premier of Ontario and used the $5,000 monetary component to bring two students from Algonquin College in Pembroke to do a practicum in San Felipe, Antigua and Sacala.