CFC Causes of the Week: Children & Family Services & Global Health

The Combined Federal Campaign is the official workplace giving campaign of the federal government, allowing federal employees and retirees to pledge monetary support and volunteer time to approved charities.

This year’s campaign runs from Sept. 21 to Jan. 15, under the theme of “Show Some Love: Be the Face of Change.” Federal workers can contribute to any of the thousands of participating charities by visiting the online pledge portal at https://GiveCFC.org.

Children & Family Services

The physical, emotional and social development of a child has a direct impact on their overall development and future wellbeing as an adult. Children and family services play a vital role in achieving effective outcomes from emotionally and physical strained family circumstances.

A philanthropy officer for the local chapter of the nation’s largest donor- and volunteer-supported network that provides one-to-one youth mentoring services spoke of the importance of relationships and the effects mentoring can have on vulnerable children and teens. With experts finding depression and anxiety in children at younger and younger ages, the organization’s surveys show after a year of mentoring:

93% of youth report maintaining or improving their social relationships;

97% of youth report maintaining or improving their hope for the future and a reduction in being involved in risky behaviors;

87% of youth improved their academic performance;

90% of mentees report they made better decisions;

93% of mentees report their mentor is important to help them achieve their goals;

97% of mentees have more confidence in themselves because of their mentor;

86% of mentees reported depressive symptoms that had either improved or had not worsened;

97% Have more self-confidence in themselves.

“These are kids who have been identified as needing additional support in their life,” he said. “Ninety percent of the children who have come into our program have experienced three or more adverse childhood experiences or some sort of trauma that has really impacted them negatively,” he said. “Having a mentor – an additional positive role model who can spend time with them, can talk with them – is a big deal for a child.”

Donations through the CFC can help children & family services charities go a long way in making a difference in the life of these children and families.

Global Health

Information provided by a global impact fundraising coordinator states that at least half of the world’s population does not have access to basic healthcare, making CFC donors' impact extremely important. For charity partners, $28 provides one month of food for a stunted child, $88 supplies mosquito nets to protect families from malaria and $175 installs a hand-washing station at a school to prevent disease outbreaks and illness.

CFC donations designated to charities working on global health issues make a significant difference around the world helping to increase access to maternal and prenatal healthcare, prevent disease, cure cancer, distribute nutritious food and a host of other services.

More than 20% of child deaths (about 15,000 a day) are from preventable causes and one in four children are stunted (lacking proper nutrition). Over 1.2 million people have died from COVID-19. When donors support global health charities, they are providing vulnerable communities with health care facilities and training professionals to address these challenges head on.

Investing in global health goes beyond physical well-being too. Helping kids access simple things like glasses help them perform better in school. Healthy adults miss fewer days of work and contribute to the growth of their local economies. And preventing the spread of deadly outbreaks in one community protects us all – as we’ve learned with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Volunteer opportunities can be found and contributions to CFC can be made by visiting https://GiveCFC.org and in particular this week, https://ohiocfc.givecfc.org/children-family and https://ohiocfc.givecfc.org/global-health.

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