Sending funds (instead of mailing a purchased gift) gives the greatest flexibility for children to get what they want. This is what we strongly recommend, after doing this for several years.

Most families value and appreciate extra funds / gifts at the beginning of the academic school year (August / September). 

Some families have asked us to accumulate child sponsorship funds till this season when they are most in need for bulk funds to take care of school-related expenses. 

If you would like to make an additional donation towards this at anytime, you are welcome to do so.

Yes.  See responses below for the child, the family or the community.

Child:

You might consider providing a range of materials that will be beneficial to the child.  This could range from assorted clothes to school supplies to even a laptop computer. The cheapest way to do this would be to ship the items by surface mail in a drum.  We could purchase the items for the child and ship them out to the child for you.  Cost will include the cost of shipping the items.  Recommended minimum budget for this is $300. 

Family:

Your monthly donation helps take care of your sponsored child's health, education, and overall well-being.  The families focus on ensuring the children receive regular meals and all school-related costs (miscellaneous school charges, special fees, events and activities, books, school supplies, uniforms, etc.).

Additionally, in some communities, we provide other grouped services focused on improving the community—for instance, after-school lessons/tutoring, counseling, computer / vocational training, etc.  

By sponsoring a child, you will have the opportunity to relate with and connect with a child.  This also extends to the family and the community as you will have an opportunity to learn more about the family and community.  As a child sponsor, you will relate and correspond with one unique child.

You can expect to receive hand-written notes from this child, and we encourage you to write back and continue this relationship.  Periodic correspondence will allow both of you to learn more about each other. 

Every child sponsor will receive, have access to or be able to do the following:

Care Package: yes, you are allowed and very welcome to to send gifts. We can include your small gifts in our periodic surface mail shipment to Sierra Leone. The gifts will take at least 3-4 months to arrive depending on when our next shipment leaves etc.  

We recommend that you carefully select an age-appropriate gift. We discourage any gifts that relate to war, violence etc. Below are some suggested items: 

Suggested Items That You Can Include in Your Care Package for Your Sponsored Child:

Yes, you are free to do so at anytime.  We understand your circumstances may change in one way or the other.

If at all possible, we recommend that you temporarily reduce the amount rather than cancel.  In the event that you need to cancel, we would be grateful if you could renew as soon as you can as this allows us to together continue to impact the child's life.  As you realize, continuity and consistency plays a big part in the care, growth, and development of children and we welcome your on-going support as we bring permanent and lasting change. 

Your username is your email address.  You can reset your password by

1.  Go to http://developafrica.reachapp.co/users/sign_in

2.  Click on "Reset Password"  and follow instructions

If you have any trouble or still have any questions please email us at child@developafrica.org

You can expect to receive photos, a letter, or a video from your sponsored child 2-4 times a year.