Missions
Join our Mission Team!
Our missions are truly an unforgettable journey. If you haven’t experienced the immense satisfaction that comes with giving an impoverished child the gift of learning, you must join our mission. The hopefulness and gratitude expressed by this community of children is heart warming. While our mission will take you to one of the most poverty-stricken places on earth, you will be unprepared for the optimism and spirit within these children’s faces. Their smiles are quick and their response to the simplest acts of affection is the very face of humanity.
Literacy Missions are important because they provide an invaluable service to children living in poverty. The Missions achieve three objectives:
1. Build Self Esteem: Our Missions impress upon these often forgotten children that they are important enough for our volunteers to travel halfway around the world to make sure they have access to reading material.
2. Ensure the Integrity of our Project: Delivering the books personally is the only way to provide absolute certainty that our books reach the children they are collected for. Shipping is prohibitively expensive and English language books are too rare in Ethiopia.
3. Raise Awareness: It is difficult to imagine the conditions that millions of Ethiopian children live in if you have never visited. Few Americans have the opportunity to make this type of trip and even fewer have the resources. Our Project opens a world of awareness for Americans who are willing to share this experience. With each volunteer that joins our Mission, another advocate for child literacy is born.
CLICK HERE FOR THE VOLUNTEER APPLICATION
- 81% of Ethiopians live on less than $2 a day
- Only 1 in 10 people in rural Ethiopia have access to books
- Approximately 72% of Ethiopians cannot read or write
- 42% of all Ethiopians live below the country's poverty rate
Our volunteers transport and hand deliver a minimum of 4,000 children's books and school supplies to identified children's libraries, schools and orphanages in Ethiopia on each mission. In addition to delivering and unpacking books at the libraries and schools, we participate in public works programs and volunteer on community projects in Addis Ababa and beyond. Come ready to roll up your shirtsleeves and experience how making a real impact in people's lives feels!