Has anyone sponsored a child through world vision/others? I have sponsored education for others when I was in India and would like to do more. I don't know how though. Also, while world vision is legit and all, I have some reservations. Their communities in Africa came under the scanner for religious conversions a few years back. Also, they routinely call someone orphan, but that orphan child lives with parents and siblings. The way you engage with "your" (sponsored) child seems contrived. But maybe I am biased. Does anyone has more information on this is other ideas?
We had sponsored children in Spanish Latin America through a Christian Children network . After retirement, we had stopped. The children usually live with one parent. Usually a mother. You can choose the country. The children are required to write a letter to the sponsor once a month. The actual letter in the child's handwriting will come to you with a translation in English, French or German. Besides letter a month, you will also get some photos of the child with the stuff she had bought with the money you had sent through the organization -- usually clothes, toys or food. I would recommend this kind of program if you are learning Spanish, Portuguese or some other language. I have heard about Amharic recently. You are allowed to write letters back (through the organization), and the child will answer back to your specific letter. This is where you attempt to remove the "contrived" nature of the engagement with the sponsored child. If you are learning the language, your level of language will be similar to that of the child, and it will help both sides. Visiting the child will require some advance planning. Children usually live in slum areas, and you might need an escort to go there. The organization will provide you the escort. Chile, Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador have lots of single moms with girl children. If whichever organization you go with can offer you the kind of exchanges that I describe, that would be a good program. The child will call you Padrino or Madrina in her letters. This roughly translates to Godfather or Godmother. Most Spanish speaking countries are already plenty christian. However, many church groups will try to take Catholics to become some other denomination. This would be like converting a Brahacharanam to Vadama. Too silly for a kind sponsor to bother with when this converting is a minor activity in their total service. If they are offering useful language learning services for you, you can tolerate their side goals. Most poor latin countries stop girls' education at 8th grade; around age 14 to 16. Then the girls "graduate" and find jobs in services or manufacturing assembly, when they don't get pregnant. Children that age watch a lot of romantic telenovela, and that is not at all helping. It is tough for sponsors to go beyond that age; we may try to indoctrinate the children when they are writing letters to Querida Madrina (dear godmum), or Querido Padrino, about why it is important to complete highschool, and even go to the university. Higher education affordability is quite a complex thing. Even extremely wealthy sponsors can only support limited number of people. One basketball player in America LeBron James is taking children all the way from primary school to college, in the town of Akron OHIO, and this involves supporting the life of parents as well. Here are some of the children... you can see that one of them definitely has more "indian"ness in her than the others. Most of them are either from Chile or Bolivia. There were a couple of children from Ecuador (this is a country where half the population is indigenous - Inca indians). We had visited all those countries on many occasions, but only two of the children in person.
We donate to this as we believe that they truly make a difference in the kids lives. Aim For Seva | Educating Rural India
