Why Orphan Sponsorship Programs work

We all get the letters and packets from various organizations pleading for money to help starving kids in a far away third world country. It’s the same story. So and so can’t go to school or doesn’t have access to food or clean water or is unable to_____ (fill in the blank). We get inundated with commercials and videos designed to stomp on heart strings. Now add the holiday season and this thing gets out of control. It gets to the point where we simply become numb to these campaigns that try to “get my money for some kid in a poor country”. We see the scandals and wrongdoing of large non-profits who do massive campaigns to stamp out HIV or hunger only to read articles published by whistleblowers informing the public that only something like 5% of the total donations were actually used to end or fight the very thing the campaign was designed to raise money for. The bulk of the money was used for salaries, expenses and “awareness”. It can easily make us sick to our stomachs and make us hold on even tighter to our money. The words waste, scams and inefficiencies among others flood our minds so much that even though we really want to help we often don’t because of our doubts. “Are the kids really getting help?”, “If I were to sponsor, how do I know my money is being used for my kid?”, “Can I trust this organization?”, “Can I swing the $35-50 bucks a month?”

We launched our version of a “sponsor an orphan” program this year. We started in Jan and are coming to the end of the first full year. Right now PfP has about 30 kids in our orphan program. Almost all of our sponsors have signed up again for 2011 and more are being added daily. Our goal for 2011 is to have 100 kids sponsored. This is one of those bitter sweet things. I would love not to have this program but I want it to grow as we have many kids on waiting lists that need help.

Here is why I am blogging today. I got an email from one of our team members in Benin who heads up the orphan program in Benin. A little girl named Dado (her picture is below) was on our orphan program waiting list to get a sponsor. She died 2 weeks ago from malaria. Her guardian could not come up with the 67 cents needed for the medicine that would have saved her life.

67 stinking cents. I am so mad and sad. I can’t save the world but this shouldn’t have happened. Hundreds of kids in Benin are going to die this week due to malaria or malnutrition. Right now, I can’t stop that. A rather disgusting pill I have to swallow at least for now. But the thing is, Dado signed MY list. Not Compassion’s list or Feed the Children’s list. She signed my list. I am mad at my PFP team, I am mad at you, I am mad at me. I am mad at the reality of it all. 67 cents. How do I wrap my head around that? Going forward, we will be having informational meetings with all guardians of those children who are on the list. We will inform them that a fund has been set aside for cases like Dado. While schooling, food and monthly medical care cannot be provided without assistance of a sponsor, we have money for things like malaria meds. It is up to the guardians to keep us informed of the health of the child so we can work together to ensure things like this don’t happen again. I just can't grasp it. How does this happen? It is 2010. How does a child die from not having 67 cents?

I get every counter point and doubt you have about helping a kid in a far off country. I know there have been accounts were people and organizations have taken advantage of your generosity but please don’t resign to the fact that nothing can be done or you have been “burned” and therefore are finished with helping. I can’t speak for Compassion Intl and Feed the Children etc personally but I know they have great reputations and have similar 67 cent stories.

I am not sugar coating this. Kids just like Dado are really dying. Sure, we don’t want to hear it. It makes us uncomfortable because after all we have grown accustomed to the “Us 4 and no more” mentality where it makes more sense to drown our own kids and families with more things they don’t need than to help someone you don’t know. Spend less money on Christmas this year. Adopt a kid through PFP. If not PFP, adopt one with Compassion, ICA, Feed the Children or one of the many out there both big and small. I am serious. If you don’t want to do it through PFP that is fine, just help out somewhere else. If you can’t spring the $35 a month on your own, then group up. Get 5 or 10 of your friends and adopt a kid together. If you are worried about where your money is going, call me or let’s grab a cup of coffee and talk. I will show you where every penny is going.

“Oh come on Jace, aren’t you doing the exact same thing as above? Aren’t you tugging on our heart strings and didn’t you write this blog with the purpose to get our money”.

Yes. But I don’t care about your money. I care about what your money can do. $35 a month x 12 months is $420. I see your $420 commitment as a life saved. I don’t have a great video and don’t consider myself to be a good writer but I need your help. Please be moved by this. Sit with me and talk. Ask me questions. Come to Benin with me. You tell me what assurances you need or what questions you need answered in order to help a kid. Again if $420 makes your budget too tight then let’s group up. Pull 10 friends together. I will come and we can all talk. Dado died on my watch. I can’t do anything about that but I can do everything to try to prevent that from happening again.

If you are upset with my plea for money and help and offended by asking for your money, I am sorry you feel that way. If my plea is only white noise to you then I cannot change your opinion but I hope you find something you can passionately stand behind and partner with. However, if this switched on a light for you, I need partners who will stand with us in this program. I need people who will live beyond themselves. Something has to be done.

If anything I said above made sense to you and you are interested in sponsoring a kid, have ideas on how to make this program better or how you can get involved email our orphan program director at mary@projectsforprogress.com


Thanks for reading. Have a Merry Christmas!

Jace

pics from the days in the village

village days

one of my favorite things to do when we go to benin is to visit in the village of tourou. this is our first village that we "adopted" and it has a huge piece of my heart. for the past two years it is the only village that we have worked in, until now. this trip we added sanson and badekporou, so we had the opportunity to spend time in these villages as well. a foundational belief of PfP is that there is power in relationship and visiting these villages is a key in the development of that. when you walk through the village you are stepping directly into their lives and experiencing their culture, it is awesome. it is taking time to share life. although we don't speak the same language there is a connection that takes place that can not be described. for example, when we drove into tourou for the first time on this trip a group of kids ran out to greet us. a few of the boys ran up to us motioning the hang loose and i love you hand gestures that andrew taught them last summer, andrew had shared life with them and they had hung on to it. through out the week we painted faces, which they could not get enough of. some of them were getting their faces painted, wiping it off, and then waiting in line for 15 minutes to get it painted again, and to think i hate waiting in line for 5 minutes at target, no way would i sit in a cramped line while others pushed me in the hot african sun to have my face painted, but they did and would have done it all day. it is the small things that they love and appreciate and more importantly find satisfaction in. so it is the small things that we love to do that has a big impact. sorry, rabbit trail. so we did face painting, passed out stickers, and played games. there is a sense of freedom and joy that you feel in the air as if they don't always get play time, as if for that time the burden of poverty is gone and they get to be 100% kids.

we sat together cheering tourou on to victory in the soccer tournament, kids fighting to sit as close to us as possible, they were like little african heaters. as we walked back to homes we were visiting, we would have four or five kids holding each of our hands, they would each get a finger, they just wanted to be noticed, to be loved. one of the most difficult times of the trip is telling them good bye and this time was no different. one little boy stands out in my mind, mary and i were telling them all good bye and there was this little boy about four or so years old, cute as can be. he ran between mary and i, giving us these huge hugs one right after another. it was like he was trying to get as many as he could before we left, soaking them all in as if it were his last, he could not get enough love.

a cultural difference that is glaring is the lack of affection that is given to these kids. you do not see them getting hugs and little love pats from their mothers and especially not their fathers. i can not imagine having such a distant relationship with my parents, i have always loved spending time with them and their approval, love, and affection was and continues to mean the world to me, so knowing that those kids are missing out on such an experience is difficult to realize. it is heart breaking to see them watch their mom or dad walk all around them and never acknowledge them or show them affection. but that all changes while we are there, it is hugs and high fives all around. they soak up the affection like sponges and so you give them all you can in hope that it will last until the next time you see them.

Small Enterprise Development- Micro Finance

We have all heard the old proverb, “If you give a man a fish he eats for a day and if you teach him to fish he eats forever.” This guy must have dabbled in the arena of micro-finance. Micro-finance at its core is true community development. It’s true. If you want to really change a person, a village, a community and eventually a nation, I really believe business development is going to be the key. So, we started a new program aimed at investing seed money into individuals with the dream of starting their own businesses. This new program is called SED (Small Enterprise Development). Micro-finance has the power to truly change a community. However, we have taken our program one step farther. The typical micro-finance structure gives small loans to individuals to create or expand their small businesses. As a loan in the third world, these micro-finance institutions typically charge a high interest rate on the money that is borrowed. While the typical micro-finance model does work as small business is being developed with injections of small amounts of cash, it is our vision to provide interest free loans. Our interest free loan program works the same way as a typical micro-finance structure but our recipients keep more of the money for their families and business since they do not have to pay interest on the loans. In lieu of interest, we do require a percentage back from each participant through our SED program. This percentage goes towards a program that teaches skills to young girls. It is our vision to work with young girls to teach them to dream and aspire to great things. In our young girls program we teach them life skills, business skills and that they have a value, a plan and a purpose. It is a time to take the lid of the typical expectations of a woman in the Beninese culture and become the catalyst for them to begin to dream.
As of right now, we have 31 SED projects in our program. These 31 businesses are solely comprised of women-owned ventures. These ventures include selling yams and corn at the market to a processed cheese product called Wagasi. They range from a finished food product called Toubani which is like a bean cake to Kerosene as well as several other small ventures centered in agricultural items.
We plan to continue to grow this program and add new projects monthly. Loans are given on a 1-2 month term basis. With your help, we will continue to expand this program and change Benin through the power of business development.


Here are a few photos of one of our ladies. Her name is Zakari. She is married with 2 children. She sells yams at the market.


Zakari at her yam stand



Closing the sale!!!

snapshots from villages that we love