Orphans Against AIDS

Project Leaders

Lindsey Reynolds

Mission

Orphans Against AIDS strives to break the cycle of HIV/AIDS by ensuring that vulnerable children in communities deeply affected by the epidemic receive a high-quality education, nutrition, and health care. Orphans Against AIDS (OAA) was founded in 2002 and is a 501(c)3 tax-exempt nonprofit organization. Currently, OAA provides more than 600 young people who have been orphaned or made vulnerable by HIV/AIDS with academic scholarships and educational support for primary and secondary school, as well as to provide support and assistance for these young people's families. We focus our programming in communities particularly hard hit by HIV/AIDS. Orphans Against AIDS partners with local community-based organizations to: 1) Provide funding for academic scholarships and other forms of educational support, including funding child care centers and after school programs for vulnerable children in affected communities. 2) Build our partners' capacity, prove their model's effectiveness, help with grant-writing and website development, and make introductions to other leading donor organizations that can help our partners' projects scale. Orphans Against AIDS is an all-volunteer organization, overseen by our Board of Directors. Because the OAA officers fund 100% of our organization's administrative and travel costs, all donations made to OAA by foundations, corporations, and individuals go directly to educational support progams for the young people we serve. Our model has received much positive press for the energy and creativity of its many young founders and volunteers. All of our project directors started their respective organizations when still students, and have continued to devote incredible personal energy to sustaining their programs, and expanding the number of young people we are able to serve. For one example of this positive press, check out the profile of our founder written by Nick Kristof in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/27/opinion/27kristof.html

Programs

Orphans against AIDS operates as an umbrella organization for fundraising and support for several community-based organizations. At the moment, our efforts are focused on supporting six community-based projects in Africa. Each of these projects is led by a project director, who manages and oversees our on-the-ground partnerships within the country. Our initial campaign on Global Giving will be to support our project Thembanathi in South Africa. Thembanathi was started in 2004 by two college students, one American and one South Africa, who were inspired to help provide support and assistance for community-based programs for women and children in areas of South Africa impacted by HIV. We named the organization Thembanathi, meaning "Hope with Us" in isiZulu, because of our strong belief in supporting communities trying to solve their own problems and address their own needs. Since 2004, we have provided support for community-base organizations in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa who provide child care services for children. Particularly in areas that have been hit so hard by the HIV epidemic, child care programs are an important means of supporting children and families affected by HIV and help in the following ways: The facilities help relieve the burden of care of young children on families, allowing older siblings to return to school and caregivers to seek work. Programs help to offset the effects of disease and poverty by providing educational and emotional support and food for young children. Childcare care centers can serve as community centers around which other services, such as home-based care, educational programs for older children, and income-generation projects, can be organized. Thembanathi's current focus is on providing support for the construction and operations of a new child care facility for a community in the Umkhanyakude district of rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The Umkhanyakude District is one of the poorest districts in the country and has one of the highest reported HIV rates in the world, with adult prevalence estimated at 25 percent in 2010. This program will be community-initiated and community-led, as are the other projects that Orphans against AIDS funds. A group of community leaders in the area has been working for some time to try to find a solution for the community's desperate need for a childcare center to provide care for young children. Though they are motivated to give their time and energy to strengthen programs for children in their community, they lack the resources and networks necessary to get such an initiative going. Inspired by their dedication, Thembanathi has decided to try to help them make their dreams a reality. We are excited to work on this project because we believe that solutions to the problems these families face need to be structural and must start with young children, giving them skills for a better life. At Thembanathi, our goal is to help this community to build a new childcare facility, provide equipment and materials, and fund operational costs for at least the first two years. This support will help the project to get on its feet. Over time, we will help the center to become more financially independent through income generation and other strategies.

Statistics on Orphans Against AIDS

• Projects on GlobalGiving: 1
• Founded: 2002