the world’s largest orphan charity
« SOS Children – a charity where deeds speak louder than words » (The Dalai Lama)
This is the UK charity homepage of SOS Children, the world’s largest orphan and abandoned children’s charity. Child sponsors and donors worldwide provide a new family and home for more than 70,000 children in 473 unique Children’s Villages in 123 countries. Our supporters also help a million children and their families through SOS community outreach programmes … (full text Homepage).
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Address: SOS Children’s Villages, St Andrew’s House, 59 St Andrew’s Street, Cambridge, CB2 3BZ, England;
Contact.
Charity Facts – Choosing a charity: When the Dalai Lama said that we were « a charity where deeds speak louder than words » doubtless he knew there are lots of ways to choose a particular charity, for example through which to sponsor a child.
Some people choose charities based on the charity’s presence giving opinions on the news, the charity’s TV or newspaper adverts or the mail the charity sends. These people aren’t wrong, but we are not that kind of charity; we build families not headlines. We get on with giving the least fortunate of children a chance of a proper family life. People find us and it is by our deeds that we think they should judge us.
Partly, our approach is needed dealing with orphans: orphans require longer term help and generally local government has at least legal responsibility for them. We have to co-operate, not condemn, and this method has allowed us to continue to do critical work in places like Zimbabwe where others have had to leave. There is no point being outspoken and thrown out when children depend on you being there. And of course the upside of not having a lot of « words » is that we do well when you compare charity costs. Most of our supporters come to us online or by word of mouth, and because donors tend to find us we do not have to pay a lot to find donors.
What we do best: giving children a family for life
At SOS Children, we believe all children should belong to a family which is why we look after children who have lost their parents through war, famine, disease or poverty.
For more than fifty years, SOS Children has developed an approach based on building a community for children who have nobody to turn to. Traditionally, we provide children with a home, a family and a new mother in a purpose-built local Village, where they can stay until they are ready for independent life. We currently run 473 of these unique SOS Children’s Villages, and 342 Youth Homes, caring directly for more than 70,000 children in 123 countries worldwide.
Investing in local communities: … (full text).