How sponsorship transforms communities

Making an impact that lasts

When you choose to sponsor a child, you transform not only their life, but the lives of everyone in their community. That's because the most effective way to make sure positive changes have a lasting impact is to transform a child's whole environment.

Instead of just addressing issues for individual children as they arise, we work in partnership with their communities to tackle the deep seated issues that are the root causes of poverty in the area.

Sponsor a child today and equip them and their entire community with the essentials they need to build a better future; such as clean water, education, healthcare facilities, nutritious food, protection, and job opportunities for parents to improve their income.

Sponsor a child today

The cycle of poverty ends now

Child Sponsorship means empowering communities to help themselves.

World Vision doesn't believe in swooping in and telling people what they need. Instead, communities tell us what they require to become self-sufficient, and through your sponsorship, we can set out a partnership that ensures the resulting transformation endures long after your sponsorship ends.

Community in Zimbabwe sit together under a tree with World Vision worker

Consulting with communities

First, we work with local leaders and families to understand their struggles and the areas where they need support. Working together, our focus in the first year is on immediately helping the most vulnerable children in the greatest need – those at risk of the worst poverty, exploitation and abuse.

Girl in DRC stands looking at a blackboard in an otherwise empty classroom

Making a plan for change

Then, based off our consultation, we create a long-term plan to transform the community into a safe place, where children are cared for and protected. This is why we encourage long term sponsorship. Sponsoring in this way means you have incredible impact – addressing large scale issues like water scarcity and education, empowering communities to break free from poverty and become self-sustaining.

Boy in Vietnam smiles as he stands holding a letter to or from his sponsor

Turning plans into action

And now the hard work begins. Over the next years, we send you regular updates about how the community is progressing. We work to our plan, adapting and improving it based on results and community feedback to ensure that we're making children's lives better. You get to see this transformation through the eyes of your sponsored child in their letters and video updates.

Community in Malawi, including sponsored children, smile and clap in celebration

Transformation complete

Once we’re confident that the community is in a positive position to become self-sufficient, we make a plan to transition out. We’ll let you know in advance about the difference you've made, and that your sponsorship is coming to an end so you can write to your sponsored child to say goodbye. We also produce detailed reports about each project so we're always learning - and we'll share these with you too.

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Seeing your transformative impact

Throughout your sponsorship, you are kept updated of the changes being made to the lives of individual children, and to whole communities thanks to your support. Many supporters find the experience to be life-affirming for themselves, not just for those they are supporting.

Below is an example of the community update videos we send to our sponsors every year, which shows the community talking about the impact sponsorship has had on them in their own words. Sponsor a child today to hear a community talk about how you have changed their lives.

Become a sponsor

Child in Ghana smiles broadly as they collect clean water from a water pump

Charlotte, child sponsor

“I went to see the work of World Vision in Ghana when I was a student. I saw first hand how the people had clean water to drink after World Vision provided wells. I saw schools that had been built and heard how World Vision had even taken sponsored children to the doctors or hospital when they were in such remove areas that they could not access them. I began sponsoring a child after that trip and have done so ever since. That was 20 years ago!”

Child sponsor Renee holds up a photo of her sponsored child on her phone

Renee, child sponsor

"Child Sponsorship has changed me in so many ways. It’s helped me to be a better person and be able to give and have someone be part of my family – I have a true sister in another country who gives me so much in ways she doesn’t even know about. If you are thinking about Child Sponsorship, do it – it’s the best thing that can ever happen to you mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually."

Girl in Albania smiles as she sits with her special needs teacher

Francisco, sponsor for 2 years

“Children need a good community, a good education, a good and healthy lifestyle, access to health programs, access to education, clean water, food, the livestock, the books, the love by their community, the support they can learn to give to each others, their rights, and so so much more. We make a difference because we can provide them with the tools, but they are the ones making the difference by grabbing those tools and make good use of them.”

How Child Sponsorship transformed a community in India

Anand is a small scale farmer, relying on his crops to support his family with two young children. Just a few years ago, this was a real struggle. “I have three acres of land; but agriculture was impossible as we did not have enough water in our area. The few patches of land I cultivated were irrigated by small canals,” says Anand. Back then, he could only cultivate cereals that needed little water, and profits were scarce.

When Child Sponsorship came to their community, the family's lives were transformed. Anand received a motor and pump set, seeds and training in new agricultural techniques. His irrigation canals were replaced with more efficient water pipes, meaning Anand could use the land's full potential.

He planted a variety of vegetables and saw the impact from the very first harvest, and his agriculture has continued to thrive.

No one would believe that this area used to be barren and dry. It's transformed.

Ramesh, 31

Anand's friend

Anand is now able to employ women from the local community to help his maintain the fields. He has used profits to start a chicken farm, and his family can rely on a stable income. His 6-year-old son Praveen attends school and plans to become a police officer.

Family of four stand in a field in India, a field which is now flourishing thanks to new seeds and irrigation made possible by Child Sponsorship — Anand, 29, stands proudly in his now thriving land with Rukma, 21, and their sons Praveen, 6, (standing) and Sreekanth, 4.

Anand's family is not unique. Many farmers in the community have benefitted from the area's sponsorship. In addition to resources and training, they learnt about the benefits of Farmer Producer Organisations, where farmers share profits and benefits, ensuring better income through government subsidies and bulk buying. The future of their community and its children looks bright.

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The ways Child Sponsorship transforms communities

A young girl from Malawi sat in a classroom with a workbook and listening, with lots of other children in the background

Education

Your sponsorship can fund community projects and clubs so children have endless opportunities to learn. It can provide new school supplies - making sure teachers and schools have the supplies they need to give children quality educations, such as books.

A family of four from Cambodia smiling at the camera with a large bowl of rice

Food

You can help make sure families have the means to provide for their children - with your money we'll teach communities about growing stronger and effective farming techniques. We share knowledge of nutrition, helping families feed their children nutritious food and saving millions of lives around the world.

Mother and song from Bolivia with a brick background. Mother is looking at her son as he looks at the camera.

Protection

You can make sure some of the most vulnerable children in the world escape abuse like child marriage, by enabling us to work with faith leaders and community leaders to change attitudes about a girl's worth. You can also help children escape child labour by supporting their families to earn enough that children can go to school instead of having to contribute financially.

Two mums from the DRC at a health clinic holding their babies and laughing

Healthcare

Help fund World Vision's healthcare assistants who can teach communities about caring for young children, vaccine people against dangerous diseases and run menstrual hygiene management clubs to end the stigma of periods among children and their parents.

Water

You can stop children dying from drinking dirty water. Sponsorship helps us build boreholes and clean water taps – so no mother has to choose between giving her child dirty water, or none at all. Clean water saves lives, keeps children healthy, and allows them to go to school.

A young girl holding a bowl of eggs, and a boy holding an egg in each hand. Standing in front of their family smallholding in Myanmar

Income

You can help World Vision teach new skills, and support mothers to start their own businesses and allow farmers to diversify their crops so they're less vulnerable to droughts and floods. We're helping families gain a stable income so they can afford the essentials, like healthcare, nutrition, and education.

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Child Sponsorship FAQs

When you sponsor a child, your donation goes towards projects that help the entire community, rather than directly to the individual child. That's because experience has taught us it’s most effective to use sponsorship money on projects that will benefit your sponsored child’s community as a whole, while still improving the well-being of the child you sponsor. This way you can make changes to the institutions and structures in your sponsored child's life, meaning that they benefit right away, and the whole community benefits in the long term.
We work with national governments and other international agencies to identify the regions and communities that are most in need and where the most vulnerable children live. We then meet with community leaders and the wider community to gain a greater understanding of the challenges and the opportunities that exist for them and we develop a long-term plan together, to break the cycle of poverty. Find out more about how Child Sponsorship works.
In short, both! How involved you are in your sponsored child's journey is completely up to you. You’ll receive regular letters, photos, and updates from your sponsored child, and you can write back and send small gifts if you wish.

Some of your updates will include an update about the transformation of the entire community.
All of World Vision's work begins with listening to communities in need. Community leaders work with us to identify the most vulnerable children and families who will benefit from Child Sponsorship.

Usually one child per family is enrolled in the sponsorship programme. This is because of our community-based model that lifts not only the individual child but their wider environments. Ultimately we let the community members themselves decide which children to choose for sponsorship.
Sponsoring a child with World Vision costs just 85p a day, or £26 a month. Our Child Sponsorship is community-led and community-focused so for every child you help, four more children benefit too.
World Vision only works within countries where we have our own offices so we can be sure that we can account for all the money that we receive and how it is used.

We have audited accounts that are publicly available at any time. As a charity, we're regulated by the Charities Commission – a legal body, which oversees all UK charities and their activities.

We are a not-for-profit organisation, and we know that the continued support we receive is dependent on our efficient use of supporters’ money. Our Annual Report is available here.