Child Africa - Sponsoring a child

pinkkiss

Sorry, I'm new and cant post links ...
www. child africa . org (without the spaces)

I'm thinking of sposoring a child.
Now from this website, it appears that you can pick an individual child to sponsor, and pay their school fees, food etc. I'd love to do that, its such a worthwhile cause.

But from my research, it looks as though all other charities use the money for many children and projects, and it doesnt just help one child directly.

Has anyone any knowledge of childafrica? Do the payments genuinally go directly to the chosen child?
E.g. If a child doesnt currently attend school, then i choose them to sponsor ... will my money then pay their school fee's, so they can start school ?
Or if the child is already in school (which some of them are even though they dont have a sponsor), does this mean my payments would pay their school fees and their parents (currently paying them) have more money spare for the family ?

The website definately implies this is the case, but because all other charities use the money so differently, i just want to check ... it may just be cleverly worded to imply this

I'm still going to sponsor a child either way, but if by using childafrica i can pay directly for a childs need, i would prefer that

Thanks in advance for any help :T

BLT_2

i prefer to give my money direct to one of the homeless people sleeping on the streets in the UK. If I hadn't found one of those I would have given it to Age Concern for old people in the UK who are struggling to make ends meet.

The only advice I would give is that charity begins at home. There are enough needy children over here.

hadenmaiden

It is unusual to be able to do that, and if you look at the picture gallery, it's clear that some of the children have lost their sponsor, so in need of help pdq. I've sent a message with a couple of queries before deciding whether to t use this or another organisation. Thanks for the heads up :T

Catslovelycats

I used to sponsor 2 children in Zimbabwe (through 2 friends who run an orphanage) but they wrote recently to say they can no longer commit which child the money goes to. They do promise the money goes directly to meet children's needs but not necessarily the 2 who I orginally sponsored. Not sure if it's a 'who's in most need' issue or a legal one.

WolfSong2000

From a personal perspective I'd say you're better off sponsoring a school rather an a specific school. I know from our POV it may seem more attractive to sponsor an individual child, but this isn't necessarily the best way to utilise your donation. For instance if you just pay for one child, what about the other children in that family, or village? How do they choose which children will be able to get sponsorship, etc? Whereas if you donate directly to the school, the money can be used to help the children who need it most and will potentially go further. Only downside is you wont have the same "direct" link to an "individual" child, but it can be a lot more worthwhile. Am I making sense?

Savvy_Sue

You're making sense to me, WolfSong.

I can see how much more attractive it is when you have a 'special' relationship with a child, but restricting 'your' money to 'your' child must make it very very difficult.

For one thing, it must increase the administrative burden (and presumably costs!) considerably as well! When I give to charity, I actually don't mind that some of my gift goes on administration, because as someone who works for a small UK charity I know how vital excellent admin is, and believe it's worth paying for. But accounting for restricted gifts can take quite a while, whereas unrestricted ones which we can spend 'where most needed' need less input from our finance team!

pinkkiss

Thanks for your replys...

I sent an email asking whether the money goes directly to the chosen child, and what happens if a child has 2 sponsors, and had this reply;

We have only one sponsor per child. When one child is being sponsored the child disappear from the website.
Only if the child loses the sponsor we will put the child back at the website (with red letters). Sometimes we will pay for the child who loses the sponsor so at least they can stay at school until the semester ends. However, if they don’t get a new sponsor we will eventually have to remove them from school.

Non of the children we have can have 2 sponsors unless the sponsor herself want this to happen.
Our sponsors are the only one helping each child and nobody else. We do NOT put the money in a pot like most other organizations do and your money is dedicated to that particular child.


Makes sense; I think the parent/guardian choose to advertise their child on that board - some need help as they struggle to pay for school etc, and some cant afford school at all.
It states on the website that the administration costs are met by other means, and so the chosen child gets the full amount of money.

I do see what your saying above, about helping a school rather than 1 child.

But donating £30 to a school every month isnt going to make a major difference , whereas paying for a childs school fee's will change their life. And if everyone thought like that, the kids on this website will never get help.



Second question though - the charity is based in Norway I think - how do I check its a legitimate charity, and that the money goes where they say it will ?

I've googled but nothing much comes up (except a scam where somebody was fakin job advertisements (?) but they had no connection with the actual charity).

English charitys have charity numbers but Norway ones dont - they have an 'organisation number' on their website, but I dont know how to check if this is legit ?

Its not that I think they ARE a scam - but just obviously want official confirmation before giving my bank details !

Savvy_Sue

I would ask if they have plans to register in the UK as a charity: it's what most international charities would do, register in each of the places where they're raising funds.

oldtoolie

People with experience point out that individual child sponsorship is divisive to families and communities. There is discussion of this in this active thread:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/767119

Also, if you give to a UK registered charity, Gift Aid will increase your donation by nearly 20%.

WolfSong2000

If you give money to the school rather than an individual child, you're actually helping more children. What happens if you are unable to continue paying and that poor child has to drop out of school? How devastating must that be? Whereas if you pay the money to the school, an emergency fund can be put in place.

Also, as oldtoolie pointed out, it's very divisive. Can you imagine if you and your sibling were on the site, and your sibling was picked but you weren't? Why single out specific children when you can help an entire school?

Savvy Sue is also right about the increased admin costs. If you give money to a school, it's put into one pot and distributed as necessary, whereas if you sponsor a single child, more work has to go into making sure that the sponsorship money *only* benefits that child, that the child keeps in contact with the sponsor and vice versa, yada yada yada.

If you want to keep things more personal, why not agree with a few friends to sponsor a "class" at a school?