My dad sent me this article by an economist, about whether it does any good to sponsor a child. Short answer for those of you who, like me, dislike clicking links or reading articles: yes.
I found myself convinced. And I’ve had that low-grade-fever feeling of wanting to DO something to HELP THE WORLD—but WHAT??? This seemed like a good answer.
The next step was to find an organization that met two requirements:
1. It should not be a religious organization; I’m on board with Feeding/Clothing The World, but not with Converting The World
2. It should score well on Charity Navigator
Several of you on Twitter recommended Plan International (I went specifically to PlanUSA.org, since I am in the USA), which has such a forgettable name I’m not surprised I’d never heard of it: maybe I DID hear of it, even MANY TIMES, but COMPLETELY FORGOT. They have four stars (out of four) on Charity Navigator, and they’re not religious. They also run Because I Am a Girl, which specifically works to improve the education and safety of women and girls. And they have a child sponsorship program (that’s the USA-specific one I’ve linked to; use the Plan International link above to see if they have it for your country), so I signed up.
You can select a child based on location, age, sex, and photo, which is both SUPER FUN and SUPER UPSETTING. I knew if I wasn’t careful, my “But how do I know I’ve chosen THE VERY MOST EVERYTHING child???” feelings would take over, and then I’d end up getting overwhelmed and not choosing anyone. (It took me, like, a YEAR to get going with Kiva.org, because I couldn’t chooooooooose.) I don’t know anything about The World, so I left location as “any.” But I wanted specifically to sponsor a girl, and I thought it would be fun if the girl were Elizabeth’s age (for Elizabeth to write letters, if she wanted to, but also just so I’d always be aware of the age our sponsor child was), so I chose “4-8” for age, and “girl” for sex.
Not only did I not want to get sucked into the CAN’T CHOOSE sinkhole, I’d also thought I couldn’t go back to a child if I hit the “search” button again. But right now, as I was trying out the search feature so I could describe it to you, I saw it actually just cycles between two girls in the 4-8 category—so I wonder if they are a bit short on children who need sponsors, or if it’s that they want to discourage browsing, or what? No, it must be the discouraging-browsing thing, because I see I get just two choices in ANY category I choose. You could keep changing locations, then, and get two choices from each. And maybe you get different choices if you go back another day, I haven’t checked.
But ANYWAY, I chose the very first 8-year-old girl presented to me, a girl from Cambodia, because I INSTANTLY liked the look of her. She had an Elizabeth look to her, I thought, even though they look quite different. The way she was looking at the camera like “Fine, I understand you have to take my picture, so I will stand here and allow you to get that over with.”
We got a big packet in the mail a few days later with more information about her, and that was fun too. I found myself a bit tongue-tied trying to write the first letter to her. “Hi! Our daughter your age just got back from a one-week camp where she really ROUGHED IT in living conditions way better than your usual ones! And it cost more than it will cost to support you for a WHOLE YEAR, isn’t that incredible?” No. “Hello! Do you like Hello Kitty and owning twelve pairs of sparkly shoes and going to the large public library and large public pool, like Elizabeth does?” No. “Here’s a picture of us, looking kind of fat and over-healthy in front of a house that’s roughly ten times the size of yours and also has central heating/cooling, running water, indoor toilets, and floors that aren’t made of dirt!” No.
I finally had to think to myself, “This is not the really crucial part of this whole program. Just say hello and it’s nice to meet you.” So I told her the ages and sexes and names of everyone in our family, and I said that Elizabeth and Edward were twins and that they were her age, and I said which country/state we lived in and what that state was known for, and I said how many people were in our city, and I said we had two cats, and then I wrapped it up. I put in some stickers and a couple of postcards that show our area.
For future letters, I’m planning to include those little Dover activity books—but those, too, were a little hard to choose. Would she prefer to put a pretty little white girl in a dress that cost more than her house and will be worn for part of a single day, or do kitchen activity stickers with electric appliances and no wood fire anywhere? Or perhaps she’d like to make her own sticker ice cream sundae! (Has she ever…HAD ice cream?) I went with decorating butterflies, baby animal stickers (cute baby animals seem like they’d translate well), wildflower stencils, and fairyland activity stickers. I’m also going to look around online for other ideas. The items need to be the sort of thing you can mail in an envelope, so maybe…fabric ribbons? That’s all I’ve got so far.
We’ve been sponsoring two little ones for several years and it’s been so fun to see them grow through pictures and their drawings! We tend to send photographs of our family in casual settings (meaning, not in front of piles of Christmas presents or our new car) and we send lots of pictures of our pets. One year we got a picture back of the little girl with the pig her family had bought with the extra money we’d sent at Christmas, and I had to explain to our younger daughter that wasn’t their PET pig . . . but it’s been a great experience for our whole family.
I am well known as a lame parent, but I think even just plain paper and markers or paint would be appreciated and perhaps novel to her. And maybe card games? Or mini puzzles? Just my first few thoughts of things that would fit in envelopes.
Thank you for this succinct post. This is something we think about too and I really appreciate the resources linked here in the post. Excellent! I will be very interested to hear how the kids, Elizabeth especially, like and deal with the experience too.
We have an arrangement with a friend. She has sponsored two children, but has asked my children to be the ones to write and receive letters. We just started last month. The program we’re involved with requires items to be flat, paper-type things, and I’m very excited to get ideas from you. When I sent the getting-to-know-you photograph, I used one in which my boys are crouched down in front of the house next to a couple plants they’re growing this summer. I thought the activity of growing food would translate nicely, and the bonus was that you could barely see any of the house–just a wee glimpse of the siding.
Anyway! Thank you for sharing stuff like this.
I LOVE this. I would love to do this with a child my daughter’s age – she’s just turned one. I have always been uncomfortable with the idea of charity being contingent on religious conversion (even as a Christian myself) and the non-religious aspect of Plan is very appealing.
Another thing our family hopes to do this year is “adopt” a local family in need at Christmas and buy them gifts, food, etc to provide them a better holiday. I wanted to do it last year but by the time I looked into it there were no families available. Which is great, really. I’ll have to be more on the ball this winter!
I once read a book by a woman working on economic development issues in developing countries and you know what she’d bring along to entertain the children? Pipe cleaners. Said they were a hit in every country, with every age. If they aren’t too bulky, that might be a fun thing to send. Perhaps also just some blank paper and colored pencils (again, if not too bulky). Depending on circumstances, paper to write/draw on may be hard to get.
Cherie is right, I think I heard it Rosie O’Donnell’s radio show but they said that pipe cleaners were a huge hit!
I think you’re on the right path: just the simple stuff. Balloons maybe?
I’ve been meaning to do Kiva since you wrote about it and now I’ll be meaning to do this as well. :)
Along the same lines as pipe cleaners are wikki stix, or bendaroos. It is actually yarn dipped in wax, but great for creating shapes, letters, and more complex creations. My students (Pre-K, K) have spent long periods of time just creating things.
This is amazing! Thanks for linking that article. I’ve sponsored a child through Compassion for over 10 years now – she’s bound to age out soon and I’m getting sad already.
Yes it is sad when they age out. We’ve had two through Compassion that aged out and now we have a young one so we have many years (I hope) with him!
Love this post. I, too, feel very uncomfortable about religious sponsorship programs, and I’m a practicing Muslim. I feel uneasy because I would hate to send cash to a program that worked to convince people to convert to ANY religion they weren’t already via the financial support they gave. It actually feels very cruel to me, as people are already in a vulnerable position, so to then tie much-needed assistance to any sort of religious program (ie, come to our church/mosque/temple to receive your goods! Or here is your food WITH a holy scripture of a faith you don’t belong to, so this act of generosity is clearly combined in your mind!). I don’t mind religious people RUNNING the programs – I just feel very uneasy about any sort of evangelical message (of any faith, including the one I belong to) tied to the giving if the people don’t already adhere to that faith. It feels so wrong. So thank you for the info on Plan. Would love to sign up too.
Chalk, markers, coloring books and stickers seem like a good idea. Any small stationery sets. Hair elastics/clips. Even bandaids with cute pictures on them? And as you start to know more about her, it will get easier, as her interests will help (ie, if she likes cooking, a small cookbook, likes art then tiny paint set, etc)
Sticker books are also fun (the kind where you peel off the stickers and put them into scenes), I think you can get reusable ones.
I send a lot of pictures of my kids and if we had pets, I’d send them too. I think I will do maybe some paper dolls, or sticker books in the future. The child whom I sponsor is in India, and her parents are farmers, and I never know what to send. I do it through Compassion and they recommend not talking about money at all so I never do, I mostly talk about the weather and the kids and school. I’m glad you found an agency you like!
How fun/wonderful! And yay Cambodia! My brother spent a couple of years there and has been back to visit. I have a friend in the military who spends time there on missions. They’d both say to send gum! The people there are crazy for it. :). I’ll have to ask about the kids in the orphanages. I’m sure they’d have some great ideas. They both spent time visiting and volunteering in them.
I have maybe a dumb question. If you write in English, does the program translate the letters for you into their native language? Also, if the child or parents of the child can’t read, does someone read it to them? Just curious how that works…
Yes, the charity translates the letters in both directions—and if necessary, one of the on-the-scene workers reads it to the child and/or takes dictation for the letter he/she wants to send back.
You (and the article your dad sent you) have totally convinced me. I just signed up to sponsor a child.
Hooray!!
I can see how it would be nerve wracking thinking of what to send and say! I’d always be worried about doing the wrong thing even though I get that that’s not really the point!
temp tattoos?
My husband and I are currently sponsoring a couple of kids (have for years) and it seems you did remarkably well for the first time! I still struggle with the whole letter writing thing. I have sent stickers and bookmarks and postcards and I would agree that baby animals do seem popular (they can find the animals they have in their country and then learn about the ones in ours). It is so much fun to sponsor. We had one girl we sponsored from the time she was quite young to when she got married. Now the two we have are the same age as the one you are sponsoring. This is so cool!
Thank you for this! I have wanted to do this since I read the book “Oh Honestly, Angela!” in like first grade but have always been turned off by the religious aspect. This is excellent information, I will seriously consider this program!
Love the pipe cleaners suggestion above. Plus have you ever seen those little kits that are kind of like paint by numbers but you are putting the stickers in the right place instead? Beads would probably also be fun. Keep us posted!
Thank you SO MUCH for this post. This finally pushed me to finally sponsor a child as well… as a nonreligious, two-mom family, we really didn’t want to be supporting an organization with a religious agenda that is not inclusive of our family, and the having to sift through charities aspect was sort of paralyzing.
Like you, I picked based on wanting a child close in age to our own children (4, 1.75 and due-in-two months = average 1), and we picked a little boy because we have two little boys, and because he had great big squishy baby cheeks that reminded me of my own sons. We searched Central and South America because we have Spanish skills, however atrophied, and I think it will be fun to try writing some Spanish. We just fired off our first letter in English, though, just to get it sent off. Our sponsored child is still a little guy so we don’t have as much pressure to write more complex letters, which is helpful, too. I’m really excited!
Oh hooray, how fun!
Hi Swistle- because of this post, we’ve been sponsoring M. for about 3 or 4 years now. Keep up the good work, you being you. And thanks for sharing! Peace, Kristi