Dear Family, Friends, Colleagues:
I became connected to Kidsave many years ago, primarily as a donor. About six years ago, at the annual Kidsave Gala, kids were telling their stories about how Kidsave truly helped them, bringing family and love into their lives. One story struck me particularly hard. Before Kidsave, this child had no love in their life, no meaningful parental influence, no one to help keep them on a good track. Kidsave brought all this and more to this child. In that moment, I decided I wanted to volunteer. My expectation was that it would be in some small way, at one of their events – at that time, I wasn’t even sure how Kidsave did their work.
A couple of month’s later I was at a Curriculum for Living Course with Landmark…this one used project work to facilitate the learning. Naturally (for me), when I started the course, I had work projects in mind. Yet, I participated in the self-brainstorming session and came up with new ideas for projects. When I looked at what I had written and combined some of the ideas, the spark of our Kidsave hike was born. Once lit, it could not be extinguished.
We are now in our 5th year of the hike! The purpose of the Hike is 3-fold
- To bring the community and kids together, in order to create long lasting connections between our community and Kidsave in support of Kidsave’s goals
- To raise funds for Kidsave to support their programs
- To bring the joys of hiking to the kids and broader community
The Kidsave Mission:
Kidsave’s vision is a world where every child is nurtured from birth, where the loss of human potential due to neglect is absent, and where people everywhere care enough that all children, even those abandoned, grow up in stable, loving families.
Our mission is to create change so that children to be adopted grow up in families and connected to caring adults.
Kidsave is passionate about the value of older kids. We believe every child needs a family and our work is to make that happen.
There are many ways you can support our hike. We have the following volunteer/support categories:
- Core team – will attend the meetings / spread the word / raise funds / engage in planning / help get volunteers / get a celebrity. There are currently nine on this team.
- Scout team – will spread the word / raise funds / participate in local events / help get volunteers / get a celebrity. I’ll send the meeting notes and all other communication to you so that you are always in the loop. There are nine on this team so far.
- Event day volunteers – will include Core / Scouts / and all additional volunteers
- Hike Participants and Donors – please join us for the hike day and give from your heart either way.
- If you are interested in joining one of our volunteer teams, please let me know.
Special Thanks:
Thank you Frances Moreno for introducing me to Kidsave. Thank you Mariana Maddocks for introducing me to Landmark. Thank you Michele Daneshrad for inspiring my brainstorming. Without all of you, the Kidsave Hike would not have been created.
Thank you to all who have sponsored, donated, volunteered, and/or participated in making our hike an amazing experience for the kids and our community.
