Only 10% of the estimated 140 million orphans around the world have actually lost both parents. Worldwide, orphanages are full of children who have families who love them, but cannot care for them. Whether that’s a single parent or extended family members or a community that they grew up in. However, as money – especially international money – is poured into orphanages instead of families, many families are forced into the decision to send their child to an orphanage where they can be fed and receive education and get medical care.
The local leaders we work with know the unique challenges these families and children face. Therefore, the approaches to helping them are contextualized and diverse. In some cases, children’s homes provide a temporary place for a child to safely live, study, and get the nutrition they need. We support three such children’s homes. These homes provide children not only with the food and shelter necessary for survival, but with emotional support, education, and a spiritual foundation to serve them throughout their lives. Children are always able to visit and communicate with their parents (or extended community, if they are true orphans), and also return home permanently.
However, the vast majority of children in poverty can stay with their families, if they receive assistance for their education. Asian nations are modernizing, creating new opportunities for well-educated and technologically savvy young people. But what about the poorest of the poor? Without schooling, these children face futures of hard manual labor at unlivable wages, begging, or crime.
For only $50, we can equip a child with remedial education, training in hygiene, and the school supplies they need to enter school and complete their first year. We’ve had the joy of seeing children replace low expectations with dreams of becoming engineers, businessmen, teachers and doctors. Many parents, seeing the benefits to their kids, are learning the value of education and making sacrifices to pay for children to continue schooling after the first year. Some children even come home and teach their parents what they’ve learned!
The children newly enrolled in school sometimes need help to succeed because they missed earlier grades, their parents are illiterate and cannot help them, and/or they live in conditions not conducive to studying. This led to our School Success program. For about $25 per month, churches are able to make their facilities available as study centers in the evening. Church members serve as tutors. On average, between 350-500 children attend these programs regularly each year.
Give directly to help families and children:
