Plan USA

Plan International USA (Plan) is an international development and humanitarian nonprofit that partners with supporters, adolescent girls and children around the world to overcome oppression and gender inequality with dignity, opportunity and safety. It is part of Plan International, a global nonprofit federation. The roganization works to tackle the root causes of poverty by working with communities, organizations and governments.[1][2] Their headquarters is located in Warwick, Rhode Island.[3]

Plan International USA
Founded1937 (1937) (as Foster Parents Plan for Children in Spain)
FoundersJohn Langdon-Davies
Eric Muggeridge
Type501(c)(3) charitable organization
FocusGirls' rights, child poverty, global development, humanitarian assistance
Location
Area served
More than 75 countries in Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Middle East
Key people
John Langdon-Davies, Laurie Metcalf, Tessie San Martin
Revenue
US$ 68 Million (2019)
Employees
136
Websiteplanusa.org

History
Main article: Plan International

Plan was founded in 1937 by British journalist John Langdon-Davies and refugee worker Eric Muggeridge.[4] Originally named "Foster Parents Plan for Children in Spain", its aim was to provide food, accommodation, and education to children whose lives had been disrupted by the Spanish Civil War. During the Second World War, as "Foster Parents Plan for War Children", it worked with displaced children throughout war-torn Europe.[5] By the 1970s, Plan gradually began working with children throughout Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean.

Plan International USA was originally incorporated as "Foster Parents Plan, Inc." in 1939 in New York to connect U.S. donors to sponsored children in developing countries.[6] It was one of the first Plan International federation members.[5] Its programs are implemented in more than 50 developing countries.[7]

In 1974, the international parent organization Foster Parents Plan shortened its name to " Plan International." In the 1990s the U.S. organization followed suit, changing to "Childreach/Plan International" and eventually to "Plan International USA".

Finances

Plan International USA is a publicly funded American non-profit charitable organization, deriving its income from a combination of individual contributions and private and federal grants. The total operating revenue in 2019 for the organization was approximately $68 million.[8]

Campaigns and Reports

Because I Am a Girl was an international campaign by Plan International addressing gender discrimination.[9] Its goal was to promote the rights of girls and bring millions of girls out of poverty around the world.[10][11] It focused on lack of equality faced by girls in developing countries and promoted projects to improve opportunities for girls in education, health care, family planning, legal rights, and other areas.[12]

In September 2018, Plan released a report titled "The State of Gender Equality for U.S. Adolescents".[13] The report was covered by several media outlets including the New York Times,[14][15][16] Washington Post,[17][18] and Forbes.[19][20] It reported how adolescents in the U.S. think about gender equality and what shapes those views. The report release was named Media Relations campaign of the year by PR Daily.[21]

In August 2019, Plan announced the largest individual gift in the organizations history.[22] The gift will fund a program model called GirlEngage, which aims to challenge social and gender norms, send more girls to school and work to keep girls safe in their communities. Plan will use GirlEngage to partner with girls around the world to understand their needs and the issues they face.[23] This approach amplifies the voices of vulnerable and marginalized girls by including them in all stages of a project life-cycle – from defining the problem to program evaluation.[24]

Programs

In coordination with Plan International and its other chapters, Plan International USA helped fund and organize the following in 2019:[25]

  • 40 million children benefited from Plan's work.
  • 1.2 million children were sponsored.
  • Partnered with 34,814 organizations.
  • 2,000 take overs took place in 60 countries for International Day of the Girl where girls took over the roles of prime ministers, mayors, CEOs, and other leaders.
  • Responded to disasters in 34 countries.

Plan works in more than 75 countries. A few examples Plan’s work are listed below.  

  • In the Philippines, it is implementing the Marawi Response Project, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development, which is assisting with humanitarian and recovery work in and around Marawi.[26]
  • Along with partner Kimberly-Clark Corporation, it is supporting menstrual hygiene management projects that touch the lives of 1.6 million people in Latin America.[27]
  • In the Central Africa Republic, it is reuniting children who were separated during conflict with their families with funding from the Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster Assistance.[28]

Child sponsorship

The child sponsorship program links each sponsor to an individual child in one of more than 50 developing countries where Plan International works. Sponsors contribute money and have an opportunity to correspond with the child and his or her family. Donations are not given directly to the child but are used to support projects for entire communities.[3] Along with microloans, direct sponsorship projects have been described to be an option for people interested in contributing to a do it yourself style of foreign aid.

New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof visited a child he sponsored in the Dominican Republic, a trip he wrote about in one of his columns, while pointing out the benefits of child sponsorship programs.[29]

The effectiveness of the program was studied by RMIT University through an analysis titled Changing Lives: An Analysis of Child Sponsorship Data.[30] The report looked at more than 12 million surveys from 2.7 million sponsored children over several years. It found that that more children attend school in sponsored communities than in non-sponsored communities, that school attendance rises every year Plan works in a community and most children have greater access to improved water and sanitation.[31]

Leadership

In 2010, Tessie San Martin became CEO & President.[32][33][34] The board has included at least one youth representative since 2015.

Youth engagement

Plan includes young people in its strategy and governance structures.[35] Plan’s Youth Advisory Board is a youth-led group that advises the organization on projects and participates in events[36] The Youth Advisory Board runs an annual Youth Leadership Academy, a summer program for high schoolers to learn about and take on global issues in their schools and communities.[37]

The organization was featured in the 2002 film About Schmidt and Girl Rising in 2013. The organization is also featured in the book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, published in 2009.

References
  1. "What We Do". planusa.org. Retrieved July 18, 2020.
  2. "Charity Navigator - Rating for Plan International USA". Charity Navigator.
  3. "Charity Report - Plan International USA - give.org". www.give.org.
  4. "Plan International". NGO Advisor.
  5. "Plan International". Human Surge.
  6. "Plan International USA embosser, ca 1939". Smithsonian.
  7. "Plan International USA". NGO Aid Map.
  8. "Financial & Tax Information". planusa.org. Retrieved July 18, 2020.
  9. "Discrimination against girls 'still deeply entrenched". The Independent: 1. May 15, 2007.
  10. "Because I Am A Girl". Plan International USA.
  11. "Because I Am a Girl, By various authors". Independent.
  12. "Because I Am A Girl Campaign Support". The Telegraph.
  13. "State of Gender Equality Summary 2018" (PDF).
  14. "NY Times Boy Talk Breaking Masculine Stereotypes". The New York Times.
  15. "NY Times Sex Education Ethics Assault Boys". The New York Times.
  16. "Gender Stereotypes Survey Girls Boys". The New York Times.
  17. "7 ways parents can teach girls to build one another up, instead of tearing one another down". The Washington Post.
  18. "If we want to make lasting change against sexual misconduct, get young people involved". The Washington Post.
  19. "The Future of Masculinity: Overcoming Stereotypes". Forbes.
  20. "What Is All That Confidence About?". Forbes.
  21. "Media Relations Campaign of the Year Over 50000". Ragan.
  22. "Plan International Receives $12 Million to Transform Girls' Lives". Philanthropy News Digest (PND).
  23. "Nonprofit to Implement Global Education Program for Girls". Diverse. August 14, 2019.
  24. SIPA, Columbia. "GirlEngage - Placing girls in the driver's seat of sustainable education reform - 2019-04-22 April 2019". Evensi.
  25. "Plan International Worldwide Annual Review 2019". Plan International.
  26. "US gov't awards grants to Marawi's displaced communities". pia.gov.ph.
  27. Corporation, Kimberly-Clark. "Kotex Brand Marks 100th Anniversary with Global She Can Initiative to Fast Forward Women's Progress". www.prnewswire.com.
  28. "Log In or Sign Up to View". www.facebook.com.
  29. Kristof, Nicholas (April 18, 2009). "Opinion | Changing Lives, Mitt by Mitt" – via NYTimes.com.
  30. Feeny, S; Posso, A; Awaworyi Churchill, S; Westhorp, G; Gauer, M (2019). "Changing Lives: An Analysis of Child Sponsorship Data - RMIT Research Repository". researchbank.rmit.edu.au. Retrieved July 18, 2020.
  31. "Changing Lives: An Analysis of Child Sponsorship Data". Plan International.
  32. "Tessie San Martin, Plan Intl USA Inc: Profile and Biography". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved September 7, 2020.
  33. "Welcome new Board Member, Dr. Tessie San Martin, President and CEO of Plan International". Equal Access International.
  34. "Her Success Story: Her Success Story 35 - Tessie San Martin". slatersuccess.libsyn.com.
  35. "SID-Washington". sidw.org.
  36. "Apply to become Plan International USA's newest Youth Advisory Board member TODAY!". December 18, 2014.
  37. Scarborough, Senta (April 16, 2020). "Emory student named 2020 Truman Scholar for promoting economic justice". news.emory.edu. Retrieved July 18, 2020.
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