Shade for Children

Awareness- Our mission is uniting churches and communities to cherish orphaned and vulnerable children in our region. To unite anyone requires raising awareness. Shade for Children
Advocacy,- Once people are aware then we want allies who will join us in advocating for these children
Action- beyond talking about it but doing something.

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Shade for Children supports the Deinstitutionalization of children. We have four primary areas of focus: 1) Family Preservation and Family Reunification- we want to support families-in-crisis before they feel like their only option is to give up their children, we want to see most of the children in orphanages reunited with their families. We work with State social service agencies to provide a variety of support for families. Our Angel Tree Program at Christmas not only provides gifts for at-risk families but provides an opportunity for us to build relationships and a safety-net for those families. 2) Advocating for Domestic Adoption and Foster Care- we want to advocate for children with Status and we want to encourage families to pursue adoption and foster care. We provide services to help families pursue adoption and foster care. Our Orphan's Prayer program works like a child sponsorship program (minus a fee) to encourage people to pray for orphans with quarterly updates that we provide. We believe some of the people praying for these kids will someday adopt or foster them. 3). Orphanage Visitation- Until there are no kids in orphanages, we will take trained and consistent volunteers to visit the same kids at the same orphanage at the same time every week for as long as we can. We want to build long-term relationships with kids and caregivers. Our volunteers hold abandoned babies nearly every day of the week in a local pediatric hospital. Through an agreement with the hospital, new volunteers are vetted and trained by Shade for Children. 4) We provide camps for orphaned and vulnerable children.

We are a small organization but because of our work in "uniting churches and communities," we've partnered with at least six churches in our home-town of Uzhhorod to provide services for families-in-crisis. Volunteers for our camps and our orphanage visitation represents several churches and at least three other NGO's.

We are a founding member of the Transform Uzhhorod Alliance, made up of more than 30 leaders from churches, NGO's, business, education, and government, which aims to make sure no one is invisible and everyone has access to food, freedom, and health in our community.

We need more orphanage visitation volunteers to expand our weekly visits to include more locations. We need more volunteers who are confident enough to share our vision in churches and with community groups.

1. We have provided support and assistance to more than 100 local families-in-crisis in partnership with State social services.
2. We have sponsored several children from families-in-crisis, met through our partnership with social services, for summer camps and after-school programs.
3. In one year since our founding, we have recruited two families to pursue domestic adoption and provided assistance to one family that completed an international adoption. Working with another NGO, we recruited a family that will soon complete an international adoption.
4. We have a solid team of volunteers that have been very consistent in one orphanage location- going every week to the same location to see the same kids, for more than a year. We will expand to weekly service in at least one other location this year and we have visited three other locations for seasonal (Christmas, Easter, etc) programs.
5. Our Summer Camps is sold-out every year (the camp program precedes our founding).
6. We've been invited to conduct Day Camps in two orphanages this coming summer.
7. We have recruited more than 120 people to pray for specific orphaned children- we provide a quarterly update about those children.
8. We raised more than $5000 to create Yearbook/Photo Albums for orphaned children this year.

What's next?
1. We want to recruit at least four families to foster or adopt this year.
2. We want to speak in at least six new churches this year.
3. With our Transform Uzhhorod Alliance friends, we will meet with NGO's and Govt Leaders in March for roundtable discussions.
4. We want to expand our summer camp program from 2 weeks of residential camp to 4 weeks, and from 2 day camps to 4 day camps.
5. We want to sponsor a part-time Nanny to be with the abandoned babies at the local hospital at least half a day, five days a week, and increase the number of volunteers that hold babies to at least 2 volunteers every day.
6. We want to double the number this year of people committed to praying for orphans.