This is from the time period of Jun 1, 2015 through June 30,2016. Thank you so much for choosing to bless her with your love and support! We appreciate your patience and understanding regarding the letter writing process. Social Shares. Ive contacted CI via email and phone but didnt get a satisfying enough answer. Thank you so very much Emily! Oh hey! On letter writing days, the staff put suggestions for topics and questions on the board for the kids to write to their sponsors. Please do let us know if you have any further questions or concerns. We updated our system in April and have seen a slow down of letters as we work through the kinks in the new system. I finally get a response via email and its automated! My concern is how are my funds helping him if he cannot attend the Centre? -Shannon. Since it takes about two to three months for gifts to be wired and delivered, Juliano likely just received the birthday gift in mid July. Our intention was certainly not to hang up on you as I see notes on your account that there was a bad connection and our representative actually lost their call with you :(. The system wont allow us to view the letters that are currently in translation, but they will show up on your account as soon as they are complete. Youre welcome however, to go on a custom visit or a group tour with us to meet your child and bring them special and personal gifts if you ever feel led to do so. but his birthday was different. The initial information that was given to me was that he lived with his mother. Hi Lindsay! You are doing a wonderful thing and we thank you for having faith in our program and choosing to sponsor with us! The 10% administrative fee is only on child, birthday, or family gifts. Her sponsor has not written to her for unknown reasons, I dont know him or her at all, so I cant say, and so I have been asked to write. Compassion International Go And Make Disciples Mission Work Travel Humor Human Connection Straight from the mouths of Compassion-assisted students in Rwanda, here's what children really want to hear in the letters from their sponsors. Was the money used for a Christmas gift?? Also, when I started sponsoring her, she was 9 and 1/2 years old. We understand that you are giving selflessly out of the goodness of your heart and that is why stewardship is so important and integrity is a high priority for Compassion. d.Sectors/Functions I pray for the people who work in this ministry and do good in Jesus name. Charitable Services $899M. With this new method of calculation, Compassion still receives a 4 Star rating specifically for Accountability and Transparency. Thank you for offering to do that! For those of you wondering, here are my thoughts: We, as Christians, are called to be good stewards of the resources God has given us. Charity Streaming: A New Way To Help Children in Poverty. MJ, thank you so much for the kind and encouraging words! The project staff does an excellent job teaching the children how to respond to letters. There are 8 jobs at Compassion International Explore them all Browse jobs by location Remote 8 jobs See all available jobs Salaries Salary estimated from 315 employees, users, and past and present job advertisements on Indeed. And we will continue being committed to at least 80% of each dollar you send, going towards the programs that directly impact your child. Something began to not seem right about it anymorewhich seems to be the common thought in this thread. This fee is only to cover the transaction costs, wiring, and delivery fees on that gift. All true. These leaders dont produce anything they simply administer the money that we the sponsors have given and thats worth up to half a million salary plus perks. Compassion International, a US organisation leading and funding Christian proselytisation in India, has recently declared that it would shut down its operations in the country after . Do the directors receive similar salaries? In fact, weve been told that if an incoming ESOL student has a Jan 1, ______ birth date, we can expect that it was a child whose family didnt know the childs birthday at all. This will draw the project staffs attention to the questions. It is just not priority in these culture and in fact, hear me, is foreign!!!!!! This is one of the highest percentages for an organization like ours. Heather, this sounds very concerning. I will find it very difficult to forgive Compassion UK for that: * My child was hungry and you did not feed him. The monthly donations of $38 is a lot and it does a lot for your child. Im sure the same is true for them, too. After 7 years of sponsorship, I need to go with my gut and cancel my sponsorship. For these varying reasons, the information might not be 100% accurate for the child but its the best information our staff was able to provide when the child was registered. Kyle, It truly is. However, please know we take financial integrity very seriously to ensure we are caring for our beneficiaries the best we possibly can. Through those goat pics ive seen my kid, her mother, and her father. If you are on Facebook, follow their pages and get to know some of those who comment on posts. We are about to sponsor a child because she grew up in the Philippines and Ive traveled there many times. I worry about these children continually but dont feel that I have made any difference in their lives and often question the validity of this organization. If you donate money at Christmas time, typically this goes into our Christmas fund. In order to develop quality staff at Compassion while at the same time managing our financial resources with great care and wisdom, we seek to offer competitive salaries for the various positions necessary to successfully execute Compassions mission statement. Private Donations $1.1B. For security and privacy reasons, obtaining your childs personal address and communicating with them outside of Compassion is not allowed. We have put measures in place to make sure that these goals are being accomplished. it is hard to imagine how you can justify for yourself this type of salary in a Christian mission organization (which unfortunately became a business enterprise). When I click on it it just tells me in translationwell maybe id like to see it in his natural written language!!! Thank you so much for your feedback and Im sorry that you feel you havent been getting updated information on your kiddos :(. The letters do not seem legit. How did we go from a 6 year old to a 10 year old? Today God has blessed me with the courage and a heart to become a child advocate for Compassion International. Hats off to them for wanting to apply their unique talents to the giving process. I had NO idea that it is common for parents in other cultures not to pay too much attention to their childs exact birth date. Without them we could not help the children. Hes one handsome little man! So Im not sure how much benefit there is to having my reply on here, now. Therefore, we protect, develop, and deploy all of our resources (people, time, money, knowledge, reputation and materials) with great care and wisdom. In order to develop quality staff at Compassion while at the same time managing our financial resources with great care and wisdom, we seek to offer competitive salaries for the various positions necessary to successfully execute Compassions mission statement. This helped a lot in explaining what happened. Some leave after high school and begin working, helping their families, or go onto reach other goals they have. All Compassion partner projects are audited annually. Our center staff do an excellent job teaching the children to write letters; however, the children in our programs primarily communicate verbally. Regrettably, there arent any independent rating agencies that Im aware of that grade organizations on how trustworthy they are. If you werent getting responses, did you ask the child why? Share it with her friends, etc. I cannot afford the $3,000.00+ price to visit for a meal, then fly all the way back home. Please email me at [emailprotected] with your sponsor number as I relish the chance to be able to research this situation and set it right. I just said a word of prayer for you and your family. -supplements to protect against malnutrition I was so shocked I didnt believe. Also, Im with all the other people that are tired of all the junk mail that comes every week. There are so many things that seem strange about the letters I have recieved.Then all the other mail I get from Compassion is bothersome! It probably would have done more to convince me to stay, to see for myself, but it never happened. Good morning, Terry! I would be happy to check on the thank you letter for the gift you had sent last October. Now with our new system, they are translated through very advanced, intelligent software that learns words as it goes so that letters get translated even quicker! Thank you for verifying that there is no pronoun for he or she in the Philippines. The children do attend the Compassion child development center for a variety of activities, but they go to school the same number of hours and days as every other child at their school does :). Do they actually get anything for my donation? Debra, I am truly so sorry that your generous Christmas gift to Susi and her family was not processed the way you had clearly requested it to be. And are rated higher from ministry watch. Our own kids are of similar age which makes it great for them too to see the letters. Hes probably wondering whats wrong with us. I have relatives who are missionaries in Peru. God is ultimately the one who touches us and provides for us. (And for those of you who are wondering no, I dont work for Compassion. As Christians, we understand that every $38 we receive is really the Lords and He has called us to steward it wisely. I believe the CI blogger answered your question about Christmas giving. Contribution Reliance Ratio: 0.831 vs. 0.991 If you are in business, either for profit or non-profit problems are bound to crop up that is inevitable. Imagine how generous sponsors would be if they knew what they were doing was going directly to that child!! Sent money for a Christmas Gift, received a letter from the child but no mention of a gift. In our church, we also have a disabled child named Emilda Soriano, and she reached her dreams and changed her familys life through Compassion. Whenever I doubt that I can make an impact upon the world, I pick it up. By the way, a comment that I actually posted first, yesterday, was a reply to Kay, but this morning I am seeing it below my comment to you and your reply. I ask because I have saved every letter since the beginning, however this past week Ive received two letters written two weeks apart. I do apologize for this as our intention is not to deceive you or make you hesitant in the integrity of our ministry. We want your experience as a sponsor to be a positive one, as youre investment in his life is making such an incredible difference. Now Im off to prepare a new birthday letter with his correct age to celebrate his new double digit number. You should definitely be receiving letters from your childs pastor though. Michael, we truly appreciate your heart for our ministry and the care and concern you have for your sweet Danna. a.Transparency Proof shouldnt even need to be a debate on these forums. I miss Gadiel. My heart goes out to the work Compassion does. We assign correspondents for sponsors who do not have the time or desire to write, or sometimes a company may sponsor many children and simply cannot write to so many children. Your child will be told the gift is from you and will receive it at a special Christmas celebration. Karen, I am so sorry to hear that our CEOs salary has deterred you from sponsoring and impacting the life of a child. They are better dressed, better educated, happy, and yet these were all rescued from terrible circumstances. There is much going back and forth about the integrity of the organization and looking for proof that one should sponsor a child through Compassion or not. We all are trying. This was certainly not intentional and it sounds like it was just a misunderstanding when we spoke with you and our representative said the wrong gender. Let us remember He is our provider and our redeemer. Also, as with others, I do not agree with the CEOs salary of $330k. Yall really didnt think of that? Emily, in your reply to Kay, you made this statement: Compassion gives formal updates on your child every two years and because of that, our children keep their sponsors updated through letters being written back and forth. While I love Compassion and actively, formally, advocated for Compassions children for 11 years, I have not found that statement to be true. I can assure you however that Pransanth is known and loved individually by the staff at his student center. So we do still send some communications via mail. Though our staff do an excellent job teaching the kids the art of letter writing, having a real conversation through letters can still be a hard concept for them to grasp. I completely agree with many of the concerns expressed here about the CEO salary. I found it very rewarding; however, I was very disappointed the way it ended. Many sponsors and donors are itching for more ways to give and help people in need. It broke my heart to have thought $38 covered my sponsored childs school, food, clothing, and medical? It would cost over 3,000 dollars to go hug my child. I want to believe this organization is on the up and up, but its hard. Please chalk it up to my hunger to know how my children are progressing academically, spiritually, and in other ways that the kids might not talk about. (Their priority programs include condom promotion and distribution, anti-retroviral therapy for people with HIV/AIDS, surgeries for surgery-correctable conditions, mass drug administration to control river blindness, etc.) New sponsors should receive this introduction letter within the first four months of sponsorship. Compassion International is a Christian child development organization working to release children from poverty in Jesus' name. Protecting children and the sponsors resource is enthrined in the high level integrity as a Compassion International pillar. For this reason, I encourage donors of any organization to do their research. I just took care of updating your preferences to receive updates from Compassion and about your child by email :). This was immediately recognized by us. Please rest assured that your child will feel loved and cared for regardless of whether you are their financial sponsor or their correspondent sponsor :). I havent even thought about not trusting Compassion, somehow Ive always trusted God with this, but only God should get the credit for that. [VIDEO]. I hope that it gives you some assurance in how much your letters mean to your kiddos and that they do receive them. It makes me sad to see so many comments of people ending their commitments to the children they sponsor. When you began supporting your child, we were working with older systems in which processing letters to and from your child was very manual and took 2-3 months for letters to be delivered both ways. However, other children dont have any interest in writing to their sponsor, or they do when theyre younger but then lose interest as they become older. I am very sorry for the disappointment you are feeling about our finances, and Im sorry that this has made you decide to no longer support Compassion. Unlock your own 28-day journey to a more meaningful life. Their ratio of donated $ to direct child support has as little overhead as possible. I pray this isnt a scam . My attitude was oh well, a tax write-off if anything else. I appreciate the blessings I have received and pray earnestly for the continued integrity of Compassion. This is so disappointing. I am definitely disheartened that the CEO salary of an organization that aims to fight poverty in Jesus name got $419,184 in 2019 and his salary increases significantly each year. (34 ratings) Duration: 15 mins Frequency: 1x/week Difficulty: Casual Save Practice Mark as Tried Download PDF Print Practice How to do it Why to Try It Quiz Compassion chooses to send dollars to the Implementing Church Partners for our programs that impact children. And maybe read this again when you grow older, as I am sure it will mean more to you then. Because it takes 2-3 months for gifts and letters to be delivered both ways, we ask that our sponsors wait up to 6 months to receive an acknowledgement for the gift they sent. If 6 months passes and a sponsor has not received a letter from their child, we will send a notification to the childs project to determine why the child has not written. I am grateful for it. Do the greetings sometimes seemed coached? . Now I am getting stuff about taking a trip to hug my child. Hi Dennis! Sadly, many children feel timid or have a lack of confidence when it comes to writing. If anyone doubts the heart of Compassion and wonders if it is a scam, Id be happy to speak to them directly. All the proof of Compassions sincerity was within the first few months of becoming a sponsor. Thank you all I loved reading all your stories, God bless all of you and especially the childrenJesus loves them all. While Josiane is indeed writing her own letters to you, she may still feel timid or have a lack of confidence when it comes to writing. oh yes, I saw the article on web about the man who travels to help other people. I am concerned as well with the letters we receive. You can toss the packet as we will not need that back. Your gift was such a blessing to his project, and I cannot wait for you to hear just how grateful they are for you! She retrieved their birth documents and when I made cakes for them for their birthdays she thought it was a very strange custom lol. I wrote a letter to Compassion explaining I might not be able to continue because of medical expenses and such, but for now I would try to keep giving the 38.00 a month. I have included a link to the 990 form posted on our website here: https://www.compassion.com/multimedia/2015-2016-form-990-compassion-international.pdf. Im sure having to add something specific about each child would be a burden, in a project serving 350-400 children, or even 200. When I lived in Egypt I was told no one celebrates birthdays. I just dont know. Each of your letters will bring incredible encouragement to Farel. But you dont know that. (More) Rating Information Great -And much more! I am a beneficiary of Compassion International and I categorically believe its not a sham as my sponsor paid for my education right from secondary school through college.I am now working and am preparing to sponsor a child myself to give back to the society. According to Compassion International, I was sponsoring an eight year old girl in Ghana named Elizabeth. I currently am sponsoring 3 children thru Compassion International. I still pray for my child and hope/trust I made the right choice. Missionaries do not make this amount of money. Compassion is the best paying position they can find. There also exist the letter "A" symbol inside a circle icon -- which to some, represents the letter symbol meaning "Anarchy" -- or "no government". You are doing an amazing job of writing him and encouraging him. As Mugisha gets older, you will begin to see him write his own letters without the assistance of a tutor/mentor. I have been a sponsor for almost 7 years now. I have not had a chance to visit Iddi in Tanzania but my heart so desires it. Letters are important. I recently have begun sponsorship of a boy in Central America. The date on the letter is 3/09/16! I am sure each location is a little different but my $38 goes pretty much for school expenses and Compassion sponsored activities. Therefore, we protect, develop, and deploy all of our resources (people, time, money, knowledge, reputation and materials) with great care and wisdom. In order to develop quality staff at Compassion while at the same time managing our financial resources with great care and wisdom, we seek to offer competitive salaries for the various positions necessary to successfully execute Compassions mission statement. Instead of June 2010, it had September 2006!!! Our Business Model Is Out of Date. I love them and now occasionally find myself mixing he or she just by association with them. Good move! I hear you and understand where you are coming from, and Im very sorry to hear that these are things that are causing you to leave Compassion. As for your letters being different each time, ive learned over the years that it completely depends on the rep helping them. However, releasing children from poverty is the core of what we do and this is why we aim to be the best stewards of your generosity. or less frequently. Please rest assured that Lilibeth is currently on hold specifically for you, and she will be placed on your account soon. Didnt gt one at all, really. It is now August. She would have received these gifts in the beginning of April when she was completing the program. I played dumb, asked the same question to other Compassion staff, I quizzed the teen children and none had ever seen their sponsor or the sponsor of any other Compassion child. We certainly understand that when you give to a charity like Compassion, you expect transparency and honesty about finances. I guess I dont mind it stuff comes in a mass email that goes to everyone on the list but this stuff by mail has got to end. They seem to have been just cutting costs lately which have impacted us negatively. Might it be better for those of us who are very keen on writing to our children to cut back on our letters for awhile to ease the burden of getting this new system ironed out? I havent gotten a Letterrible or picture from my sponsors child nor I have seen an update. It is hard to write letter after letter and never hear back. For compassion Sunday I bet I got at least 6 or 7 mailings and probably that many or more emails. She would say things like, Please pray for my parents to have more money to provide for me and my two brothers. In every letter, it made me feel like my contributions werent enough. I have written several letters mentioning his mom and their relationship. Princess Aurora, also known as Sleeping Beauty or Briar Rose, is a fictional character who appears in Walt Disney Productions' 16th animated feature film Sleeping Beauty (1959). If you can, travel to see what we do firsthand and meet your child. Report this GIF; Iframe Embed. Im wondering if she has possibly actually received the April letter but its just not showing up that way in the account information. -Shannon. If we had received a letter with an explanation like this along with our new pictures, we couldve avoided a lot of confusion. Look at what watchdog organizations, like Charity Navigators, say about Compassion. 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