Tag Archives: help children

Shelley Callahan | August 28, 2020En Español

Not unlike many of the other 21 countries in which we work, parents living in poverty in Bolivia are struggling to support their families while they are out of work. Many of Bolivia’s citizens live off of what they can sell daily in their communities, the COVID-19 lockdown has meant a lack of income — and an inability to buy vital resources for their children.

Many of Bolivia’s citizens live off of what they can sell daily in their communities, the COVID-19 lockdown has meant a lack of income — and an inability to buy vital resources for their children.

Thankfully, our COVID-19 Response Fund is supporting families during this time, making sure they are getting food and hygiene items on a regular basis while the nation patiently waits until it is safe to go back to work.

A Note from Cristo Rey Mission

We heard from our volunteer coordinator at our affiliated project, the Cristo Rey Mission, about the support our donors are providing to children and their families in our program:

“Good afternoon! I want to inform you that the Children Incorporated program is supporting children with the distribution of food and hygiene items. The situation of the pandemic in Bolivia is very complicated. Families suffer a lot because they are people with very low resources. They generally lived on what they earned from what little they sell. Now it is forbidden to go out to sell and they have nothing to subsist on.

As you can imagine the families are very grateful for the support they received. Thank you for your help!”

Parents of ous sponsored children in Bolivia are incredibly grateful for the support from our sponsors.

About Bolivia

The small, landlocked nation of Bolivia comprises rugged Andes Mountains and vast, high-altitude plateaus to the west (including a portion of Lake Titicaca, the largest high-altitude lake in the world) and lush, lowland plains of Amazon jungle to the east.

Despite its wealth of natural beauty and resources, Bolivia bears the scars of centuries of conflict, beginning with the Spanish conquistadors and followed by almost 200 years of wars and internal military coups. Political and economic instability have brought about considerable poverty, resulting in widespread malnutrition, crime, and disease.

Our work in Bolivia

Children Incorporated works with twelve projects in Bolivia: Colegio Don Bosco, Cristo Rey Mission, Gattorno School,Guarderia El Angel, La Inmaculada School, Lourdes School, Montero Home/School, Pedro Poveda School, Sagrado Corazon School, Santa Clotilde Home, Santa Rosa School, and Villa Emilia/San Juan.

La Inmaculada School
Sucre, Bolivia

Established in 1928, the La Inmaculada School offers support for girls from impoverished homes in Sucre. The school provides a refuge where young women can receive educational support from a caring and compassionate staff. The Children Incorporated sponsorship program also works within the community surrounding La Inmaculada School to help provide food baskets, uniforms, and other essentials to boys who attend local public schools.

Lourdes School
Santa Ana de Yacuma, Bolivia

Founded in 1950, the Lourdes School is dedicated to providing education, care, and safety for children in need in this troubled community. In a difficult world where families struggle with few employment opportunities and malnutrition is rampant among the children, the Lourdes School is vital to families’ survival.

La Recoleta School
Sucre, Bolivia

La Recoleta School has been serving Sucre’s impoverished children for more than 80 years. Many of these children live in slum conditions. Their homes often lacking running water, electricity and even the most rudimentary sanitation. Very few families in this area are able to pay for tuition or purchase school supplies. Children Incorporated works in conjunction with the La Recoleta School by assisting with tuition and basic necessities to help improve the lives of children in the area.

Montero Home/School
Okinawa, Bolivia

In 1976, the Montero Home/School was founded as a girls’ home by local religious leaders to assist children of Japanese settlers, as well as native Bolivians. Today, the school has expanded its mission, providing a safe refuge and learning center for impoverished girls and boys in the area. Some children who come to Montero Home/School have never experienced the comfort of a bed, a bath, or a nutritious meal — let alone an education. Here, children receive these basic needs, along with the opportunity to rise above the difficult socio-economic circumstances from which they have come.

Thankfully, our COVID-19 Response Fund is supporting families during this time, making sure they are getting food and hygiene items on a regular basis while the nation patiently waits until it is safe to go back to work.

Gattorno School
Sucre, Bolivia

Founded in 1882 by the Catholic Order of the Daughters of St. Anne, this prestigious school has long been a place where impoverished children of Sucre receive an education in a safe and supportive environment. The Sisters here strive to provide for the children’s immediate basic and educational needs so that students may have the opportunity to break the cycle of poverty.

Cristo Rey Mission
Sucre, Bolivia

The Cristo Rey Mission serves as a safe haven for the children in the impoverished Sucre neighborhood that surrounds it. This social service center assists children, emphasizing education and skills training. At the center, children receive the encouragement and support necessary to help them excel in school.

Colegio Don Bosco
Sucre, Bolivia

Families are receiving bags of food and hygiene items on a regular basis during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Recognized as one of Sucre’s best schools, Colegio Don Bosco serves impoverished children in this troubled region. It has been operational for over 100 years, originally as a rectory for parish priests and then as a school for orphaned boys. Today, it serves boys and a growing number of girls from both affluent and poor families. For many of the impoverished children here, Colegio Don Bosco is their only hope for a future beyond the confines of poverty. Since many of the families that send their children to Colegio Don Bosco cannot afford the yearly tuition, your Children Incorporated sponsorship is vital in covering this and other basic needs.

Villa Emilia/San Juan
Santa Cruz, Bolivia

The History of Villa Emilia starts with the remote, jungle community of San Juan de Yapacaní, which was founded in the 1950s by Japanese immigrant farmers. Here, nuns from the Order of Adoratrices founded the San Juan Mission to provide support for the local impoverished families. Eventually, the population grew beyond the capacity of available work, and many families migrated some 75 miles to Santa Cruz. There, the same Adoratrices Order established Villa Emilia to provide continued assistance to these vulnerable families. Today, children enrolled at Villa Emilia receive counseling, community support, and housing in a beautiful complex of small units. Adults also participate in skills-training and job-placement programs.

Santa Clotilde Home
Santa Cruz, Bolivia

Founded in the late 19th century, the Santa Clotilde Home has long served as a safe haven for destitute and orphaned girls of Sucre. The nuns who operate the home provide the girls with accommodations, nutritious meals, and skills training. Thanks to the nuns’ dedication and the assistance of Children Incorporated sponsors, these children now lead pleasant and wholesome lives. Their immediate basic needs are met, allowing them to pursue an education.

Thanks to the nuns’ dedication and the assistance of Children Incorporated sponsors, these children now lead pleasant and wholesome lives.

Padilla School
Padilla, Bolivia

One of the nation’s poorest regions, located about 100 miles southeast of Sucre, is the town of Padilla. Most residents must rely upon subsistence farming for survival. Illiteracy was also widespread here until 1962, when nuns of the Daughters of Mercy established the Padilla School. This school continues to serve as a safe haven where children receive nutritious meals and an education that empowers them to rise above the difficult circumstances in which they live.

Pedro Poveda School
La Paz, Bolivia

At 12,000 feet above sea level, La Paz is the highest capital city in the world. One of the city’s most impoverished areas is its slum neighborhood Villa Armonía. With no sanitation or potable water, disease and malnutrition run rampant here. Moreover, this area is located in a “black zone,” where landslides capable of demolishing several residential blocks at a time are common. The school provides them with a clean, safe environment, where students receive a well-rounded education.

Guardería El Ángel
Santa Cruz, Bolivia

Founded in 1982, the Guardería El Ángel serves as a daycare center for the impoverished children of Santa Cruz. The vast majority of these children come from single-parent homes — or at least homes where there is no responsible father in the picture. Often, working mothers have no recourse but to leave their children at home to fend for themselves all day while the mothers themselves work for pitiful wages in the city. The nuns that run Guardería El Ángel strive to provide each child with much-needed food, medical attention, education, and love.

Sagrado Corazon School
Sucre, Bolivia

Founded in 1912, the Sagrado Corazon School serves as a beacon of hope for this community. In the early 1970s, the school sought Children Incorporated’s help for a number of children who could only attend class at night because they had to work during the day to help their families. Gradually, such students have been added to the day school program thanks to the generous assistance of Children Incorporated sponsors. Children Incorporated and Sagrado Corazon School continues to pursue our mission to place education within the reach of children in this part of Sucre.

Santa Rosa School
Yotala, Bolivia

Yotala is an agricultural suburb of Sucre that is prone to drought, which not only diminishes the crop yield, but also forces families to purchase water for drinking and bathing. Many in this community are very poor. They rarely manage to grow enough food to feed their families and to sell at the market. It was founded to assist the children of Yotala’s subsistence-farming families, encouraging them to stay in school to receive the skills necessary to gain employment.

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HOW DO I SPONSOR A CHILD IN BOLIVIA?

You can sponsor a child in Bolivia in one of three ways: call our office at 1-800-538-5381 and speak with one of our staff members; email us at sponsorship@children-inc.org; or go online to our donation portal, create an account, and search for a child in Brazil that is available for sponsorship.

SPONSOR A CHILD

Shelley Callahan | August 26, 2020

We are pleased to invite you to a very special fundraising event to be held virtually on September 12, 2020 at 3:30 p.m. EST.

Themes from Childhood: A Classic Concert for All Ages will feature Children Incorporated Board Member Theresa P. Steward along with special guests and will benefit our COVID-19 Response Fund.

We hear from Children Incorporated President and CEO, Ronald H. Carter, who discusses more about the event:

“Theresa P. Steward is a member of the Children Incorporated Board of Directors. She is a classically trained musician; she holds a Ph.D. in Musicology from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.

Theresa also serves as pianist and organist at Grace (American) Baptist Church in Richmond, Virginia, which is also the church that I attend.

Grace Baptist has been a loyal supporter of Children Incorporated for more than a decade, supporting our work each December with funds raised from their mission market. They have also partnered with us on our work to support families in need in Puerto Rico.

Theresa and various other musicians have staged four previous concerts at Grace Baptist for charitable purposes. Those concerts, which were held in person, have been great successes, raising thousands of dollars in support of various missions and ministries. Themes from Childhood is the first of these concerts to be held virtually, and Theresa has designated that all profits from it will be donated to Children Incorporated in support of our COVID-19 Response Fund.

I have had the pleasure of attending all of Theresa’s concerts at Grace Baptist Church, and I have been astounded by the talent she and the other musician’s display. I have been blown away by what Theresa shares. She chooses music that is familiar, fun, and uplifting, and her performances are warm and welcoming. I encourage all fans of good music, whatever their tastes may be, to tune in and share in this event.”

Please plan on tuning in on Saturday, September 12th at what will surely be an unforgettable event!

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How to attend the event

Please visit either the following Facebook or YouTube link on Saturday, September 12th to watch live:

https://www.facebook.com/gbcrichmond

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChAd9AwM8gzX7Tc6_oT6jCw

Shelley Callahan | August 26, 2020

Dear Friends,

People often ask me how the Children Incorporated sponsorship program works.

I love having the opportunity to share with them, for it’s my belief that our operation is one of the best. For more than half a century, we have been addressing the most basic and immediate needs of children in the United States and in numerous other countries.

I love having the opportunity to share with them, for it’s my belief that our operation is one of the best. For more than half a century, we have been addressing the most basic and immediate needs of children in the United States and in numerous other countries, and our work has been honored with superb ratings from all of the major charitable monitoring groups as a result.

One thing that I value is that, unlike other child sponsorship programs, Children Incorporated does not pay our coordinators who work directly with our sponsored children. We work with a network of caring individuals, already employed by the schools and centers with which we are affiliated, and they include our program in their targeted efforts to improve the lives of those in their communities. This allows us to keep the portion of funds that go directly to helping children as high as possible, and for nearly 55 years, due to our system of using volunteer coordinators, we have succeeded in this effort.

Without your help, unsponsored children go without life-changing basic needs.

Additionally, our volunteer coordinators know the children and families we serve, often on a personal basis. They usually live within the same communities, and in many instances, have known or been familiar with the children included in our sponsorship program for a number of years. Many of the communities remain small and either church- or school-centered, so our coordinators develop a keen awareness of the families’ struggles and observe these struggles on a first-hand basis. In many of our international programs, as well as at some of our Native American sites, the children attend boarding-type schools where they actually live with those who work as Children Incorporated volunteer coordinators. This personal knowledge adds a special layer of uniqueness to the type of services we provide, for rather than dolling out cookie-cutter benefits to the youngsters, Children Incorporated addresses the needs of each child individually.

When we connect with a school or child-care center, we ask the coordinators to identify a group of their most needy or most at-risk children for enrollment in our sponsorship program. The coordinators work with the children’s parents and guardians to get them added to our roster of children who become available for sponsorship, and we then begin seeking caring individuals and groups to meet the needs of the children and families. Sometimes it takes months or longer for us to find enough sponsors for each child, so we created the Shared Hope Fund so that all of the children begin receiving the assistance they need as quickly as possible. The Shared Hope Fund is now one of our most important funds because it allows us to provide for those children enrolled in our sponsorship program, though not yet linked to individual sponsors, as they wait. The dollars raised for Shared Hope make it possible for unsponsored children to receive the very same benefits as sponsored children, sometimes for months on end.

Will you please help us by supporting the Shared Hope Fund today? It truly makes a difference in the lives of children whose needs would be unmet without Children Incorporated’s assistance.

Every donation today changes the life of a child tomorrow. Please consider donating to our Shared Hope Fund.

From the heart,

Ronald H Carter
President and Chief Executive Officer

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How you can donate to our shared hope fund

We enroll new children in our program every day, and finding enough sponsors for all of them is one of our greatest challenges. The global need is so profound that some children wait months for a sponsor. Donations made to our Shared Hope Fund provide immediate assistance to children awaiting sponsorship.

DONATE TODAY

Shelley Callahan | August 22, 2020En Español

Although much of the world is living in some type of isolation for the foreseeable future, the support from our sponsors helps our sponsored children and their families feel loved and taken care of in these uncertain times.

Our volunteer coordinator at our affiliated project, the Recanto Esperança Center in Brazil, writes to us about how the support of our donors is making an impact on children in need.

Although much of the world is still living in some type of isolation for the foreseeable future, the support from our sponsors helps our sponsored children and their families feel loved and taken care of in these uncertain times.

“We are fine, still in isolation. Thanks to you and the sponsors, we can buy food basket items and hygiene products for children. Many families are without income and are very grateful for this help.

Last week we launched a milk campaign, and we have already achieved a lot. We will continue to provide as much as we can for the families, as we probably need to help them for a long time to come.

Thank you so much for everything you are doing to help children in our program at this time.”

About Brazil

Brazil is the fifth-largest country in the world – both geographically and in terms of population. It is truly massive, sharing borders with every other country in South America except for Ecuador and Chile. The Amazon rain forest — recognized for having the greatest biological diversity on the planet — sprawls over the country’s northern half, with rugged mountains to the south. Despite its wealth of natural resources and beauty, Brazil suffers from staggering poverty, rising inflation, unemployment, and lack of social development.

About our affiliated projects

Recanto Esperança
Curitiba-Paraná, Brazil

Located in the Urebaba District of Curitiba, where many families lack the resources to provide for their children’s education and basic needs, Recanto Esperança is a non-profit organization whose mission is to support children and their families to rise above the difficult socio-economic circumstances from which they come.

CARITAS-Novo Milênio Center
Lages – Santa Catarina, Brazil

Thanks to donations to our COVID-19 Response Fund, sponsored children in Brazil are receiving food and hygiene items regularly.

In the city of Lages, located in the south of Brazil, many families are forced to live in urban developments like Novo Milênio, which lack electricity, drinking water, and even sewage service. Job opportunities here are extremely limited, and area public schools are ill-equipped to provide a quality education to the ever-increasing number of students. Children here roam the streets, sad, neglected, and vulnerable to the threats of crime, drug abuse, and worse. The plight of these children aroused the compassion of CARITAS, a non-profit organization run by the Catholic Church. As a result, the CARITAS Center in Novo Milênio was established to help these children and community members.

Casas Lares–ACRIDAS
Curitiba, Brazil

Curitiba’s city slum neighborhoods inspired ACRIDAS (Christian Association of Social Assistance), a non-profit organization of business and civic leaders, to establish several orphanages to assist these deserving young ones. Many children are placed in Casas Lares–ACRIDAS by court order, to protect them from the threats of abuse, drugs, violence, and malnutrition. Casas Lares–ACRIDAS serves as a safe haven, offering underprivileged and vulnerable children the opportunity to live in a safe home environment.

Nossa Senhora Das Graças
Lagas, Brazil

The plight of children living in Lagas aroused the compassion of a charitable civic organization called Nossa Senhora Das Graças (Our Lady of the Graces) who founded the Nossa Senhora Das Graças daycare center to provide assistance, support, and hope to the needy children in this region of Brazil.

CADI CENTER
Fazenda Rio Grande – Curitiba, Brazil

In Fazenda Rio Grande, a town on the outskirts of Curitiba in southern Brazil, many families struggle to afford even the most basic of needs, let alone education-related expenses for their children. What began in 1994 as a soccer school to motivate and assist the children of these low-income families has now become CADI (Centro de Assistência e Desenvolvimento Integral) – a national nonprofit that maintains a center of holistic development in Fazenda Rio Grande. The CADI center’s mission is to motivate and equip these deserving children with an education and the opportunity to break the cycle of poverty.

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HOW DO I SPONSOR A CHILD IN BRAZIL?

You can sponsor a child in Brazil in one of three ways: call our office at 1-800-538-5381 and speak with one of our staff members; email us at sponsorship@children-inc.org; or go online to our donation portal, create an account, and search for a child in Brazil that is available for sponsorship.

SPONSOR A CHILD

Shelley Callahan | July 26, 2020En Español

It’s hard for people to ask for help in many situations — especially when it involves a person’s ability to care for their own family. But for families living in poverty, it is often a necessity for them, which is why our Hope In Action Fund exists to provide support when they need it the most.

Today we hear from our volunteer coordinator, Genevieve, at Sebastian Elementary School in Eastern Kentucky, about how Children Incorporated has been able to help families through our Hope In Action Fund thanks to our donors:

“As director of the Sebastian Elementary School Family Resource Center for the past fourteen years, let me say that no program does so much to help so many as Children Incorporated.

I am so thankful I work at a school Children Incorporated serves. It is a blessing, especially for the aging 61-year old grandmother struggling after surgery to raise her 6 and 7-year-old grandchildren, who attend my school. Children Incorporated stepped in and sent them money for laundry along with food boxes just to help out, blessing them with basic needs until the grandmother could get back to work. In the past, a home was devastated by fire in the dead of winter leaving seven of our students with nothing. Again, Children Incorporated stepped in and gave them clothes, shoes, and coats.

In the past, a home was devastated by fire in the dead of winter leaving seven of our students with nothing.Children Incorporated stepped in and gave them clothes, shoes, and coats.

Recently, a struggling mother asked for help, as she could not provide her daughter with an Ipad for educational support. Children Incorporated gave the blessing for that to be made possible. Thank you for helping her provide that need for her child. Her daughter was so happy as she looked at the Ipad and was absolutely jumping for joy!”

About Sebastian Elementary School

Located in rural and mountainous eastern Kentucky, Breathitt County is one of the 100 poorest counties in the United States. The economic prospects of Breathitt County are, at best, bleak. The coal mining industry that once dominated this area and provided employment for the majority of its population has been declining.

Today, there are few job opportunities for the area: three small factories, a community college, a grocery store, a department store, a small medical center, a juvenile detention center, and the county education system. Many families who once relied upon mining jobs for income now depend upon part-time employment at minimum wages and/or federal assistance such as welfare checks and food stamps. Tragically, drug and alcohol abuse are common, both stemming from and further contributing to these difficult socioeconomic circumstances. Children here, therefore, not only struggle with lack of basic needs, such as food, clothing, and school supplies; they are also often in dire need of encouragement and positive interaction with adults — positive role models who teach them how to maintain strong moral values and to be and have friends of good character and caliber.

For this reason, Sebastian Elementary School serves as a beacon of hope for the surrounding community. The school’s caring and dedicated staff is thrilled to partner with Children Incorporated sponsors to better equip students with the basic essentials, positive influence, and well-rounded education they need to break the cycle of poverty and rise above the difficult circumstances they face each day.

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HOW DO I SPONSOR A CHILD IN KENTUCKY?

You can sponsor a child in Kentucky in one of two ways: call our office at 1-800-538-5381 and speak with one of our staff members, or email us at sponsorship@children-inc.org.

SPONSOR A CHILD

Shelley Callahan | July 17, 2020En Español

At the end of every school year, our volunteer coordinators from all over the United States write to us to let us know about the power of sponsorship and what it has done for children at their respective schools.

We hear from Lara at Genoa Elementary School in Wayne County, West Virginia about how our sponsors have changed the lives of their sponsored children.

We hear from Lara at Genoa Elementary School in Wayne County, West Virginia about how our sponsors have changed the lives of their sponsored children.

“Dear Children Incorporated,

I am writing in appreciation of your continued dedication and generous contributions to the students of Genoa Elementary School. This year more than ever, our students have needed support, attention, and love from their sponsors. Our little school faced closure (and won) this year. The students at Genoa Elementary love their school. It was a very hard time for them. The gifts from the sponsors during that time reassured the students that no matter what, they are loved and cared for.

Students at Genoa Elementary School love their school — and their sponsors!

The support from the sponsors is invaluable to the Genoa Elementary students. They love getting new clothes to wear to school. They cannot wait for a gift to come. In addition to the excitement of getting a gift from their sponsors, students look forward to writing thank you letters. They enjoy telling the sponsors what they have been doing at school or activities they do over breaks. This correspondence makes the students feel special. They like the extra attention, which many of them need.

My favorite time of the year with the students is Christmas. The gifts from the sponsors make the students so happy. The students come to my room at school to open their gifts from the sponsors. We gather around the Christmas tree to open presents. I love to see their expressions when a sponsor gets exactly what they wanted. They will look at me and ask, ‘How did they know?’ with bright eyes and a huge smile on their faces. There is such joy in the air! This truly is a blessing for me. It fills my heart to see the students so delighted.

I want to express my gratitude and appreciation to all of the wonderful Children Incorporated staff members and the life-changing sponsor heroes! The world is a better place for children because of people like you. Thank you!

With my utmost respect,

Lara”

About Wayne County, West Virginia

For this reason, Genoa Elementary School serves as a beacon of hope and a safe haven, one of the few places where children from impoverished families can count on support, encouragement, and a warm nutritious meal each day.

Wayne County lies nestled amid the vast natural beauty of the Allegheny Mountains, which still conceal deposits of the coal that once made this a rich and populous area of the Mountaineer State. Automation of the mines and the ecological stigmas attached to coal as a fuel source has seriously damaged Wayne County’s economy. With coal mining almost shut down, all businesses that once depended upon mining (and the buying power of the miners) have closed. Unemployment continues to rise, and industry development remains at a crawl. Like many small towns in this rural part of West Virginia, Genoa is remote, located far from any sizeable town or city. A few strip mines still produce coal, and there are some sawmills that cut lumber. Overall, however, Genoa’s economy is struggling, with high unemployment and a lack of industry development. Many residents in this region live well below the poverty line.

For this reason, Genoa Elementary School serves as a beacon of hope and a safe haven, one of the few places where children from impoverished families can count on support, encouragement, and a warm nutritious meal each day. The caring teachers at Genoa Elementary strive to improve each child’s self-esteem and wellbeing through a well-rounded education – the key to breaking the cycle of poverty.

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HOW DO I SPONSOR A CHILD IN West Virginia?

You can sponsor a child in West Virginia in one of two ways: call our office at 1-800-538-5381 and speak with one of our staff members, or email us at sponsorship@children-inc.org.

SPONSOR A CHILD