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Mission and Programs

Mission

Save the Children is the leading independent organization creating lasting change for children in need in the United States and around the world. For more than 75 years, Save the Children has been helping children survive and thrive by improving their health, education and economic opportunities, and in times of acute crisis, mobilizing rapid assistance to help children recover from the effects of war, conflict and natural disasters.

Save the Children is a member of the International Save the Children Alliance, a global network of 29 independent Save the Children organizations working to ensure the well-being and protection of children in more than 120 countries.

Programs

Save the Children's Programs in Humanitarian Response

With more than 25 years working in Haiti, Save the Children was well-positioned to respond immediately to victims of the earthquake that struck this island nation on January 12, 2010. To date, our staff in the capital city of Port-au-Prince has delivered medical supplies to Hope Hospital and handed out food, water and hygiene equipment to people on the streets. We will continue distributing life-saving medical supplies in Port-au-Prince after a 15-metric-ton shipment of these supplied arrives in Haiti from AmeriCares.  Save the Children also started setting up the first of many Child Friendly Spaces planned for shelters and camps housing hurricane victims.  These safe spaces protect children and give them a place to play and recover from the suffering they have endured and witnessed.

Save the Children's Humanitarian Response program is dedicated to helping the world's most vulnerable children and their families during times of crisis, whether from natural disasters or conflict. To meet the unique needs of children during emergencies, our emergency response teams provide protection for children and help to alleviate the suffering of families through timely and effective delivery of food, shelter, medical care, nutritional support, and public health.

Immediate and effective emergency assistance

Save the Children ensures that our country-based staff in at-risk regions to assess emergency situations and determine what is needed to relieve suffering of affected children and families.  Because each country program has emergency response capacity, Save the Children was able to simultaneously provide emergency assistance in six countries -- the Philippines, U.S. Samoa, Vietnam, Indonesia, India and Nepal -- struck by natural disasters in October of 2009. Multiple disasters in Asia 2009. 

Be ready

In countries at high risk of natural disasters, Save the Children's emergency response teams   work with local communities to develop evacuation plans, train volunteers in providing medical assistance and establish warehouses to store food and water supplies. Our disaster-preparedness training in Bangladesh readied communities to take steps to protect families and their children when Cyclone Sidr ravaged communities along the Bay of Bengal -- and saved thousands of lives.   (Rebuilding after Hurricane Sidr: Six Months On) 

Save the Children's emergency health and nutrition initiative also builds the capacity of senior health and nutrition staff in our country offices. Senior health and nutrition personnel from over 40 countries have been trained in emergency health and nutrition And through a global partnership funded by Columbia University, Save the Children is also building capacity of in-country staff to provide maternal and newborn health care during emergencies.

Child  Hunger Crisis

Families throughout Africa and Asia continued to feel the impact of food shortages in 2009. In times of scarcity, children are often the first to suffer, with disastrous and long-term consequences to their health, such as acute malnutrition, stunted growth and decreased cognitive development. Save the Children protects children at risk of malnutrition, provides nutritional care for those that are acutely malnourished, and supports families by offering work opportunities and subsidizing food purchases 

In 2009, Save the Children distributed food to nearly 1.4 million children and others in Kenya, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Zimbabwe, Philippines, Gaza and Vietnam. Save the Children worked with Ministries of Health and other key stakeholders in six countries to provide therapeutic care for acutely malnourished children and proven treatment, such as "Plumpy'nut" -- a ready-to-eat, nutritious food that parents can feed moderately malnourished children at home.

Program / Activities (NTEE Code)

International Development, Relief Services
Disaster Preparedness and Relief Services
International Relief

Accomplishments for Fiscal Year Ending 09/30/2007

1. Survive to 5
   Despite improvements in health care for children in developing countries over the last few decades, 9.5 million children under the age of 5 die each year from causes that could easily be treated or prevented. To save lives of children whose families have little or no access to care, Save the Children has launched Survive to 5, a campaign that will invest in bringing critically needed services closer to remote communities, where most of these deaths occur. Working with local partners and government agencies, we support programs to train local volunteers in health care, educate families about nutrition and how to keep their children healthy and how to respond appropriately and quickly to illness. We also ensure the tools and know-how to vaccinate children and to treat diarrhea, pneumonia, malaria and other life-threatening conditions. With the leadership of former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, MD, of Tennessee, Survive to 5 will also work to mobilize Americans to increase U.S. leadership and funding for child survival.
2. Preparing for Disasters
   Hurricane Katrina taught us that even in the United States, communities are not prepared to respond to the needs of children when a disaster strikes. Save the Children is making children a top priority in emergency planning, beginning with preparedness training for children at schools in high-risk areas such as New Orleans and Tulsa, Oklahoma.
   
   In 2007, Save the Children's "Safe Spaces" program, developed to provide children in emergency conditions with safe and supervised places to play and learn, has become a key component in addressing the needs of children following disasters. Providing safe play activities has been highly effective in helping children recover from Hurricane Katrina and Save the Children's disaster assistance overseas. In partnership with the American Red Cross and the Church of the Brethren, Save the Children is introducing "Safe Spaces? kits to emergency evacuation shelters in high-risk areas of the United States.

1. Increase the impact of other programs with great potential
   Several other new initiatives have been launched recently that have shown great promise in FY2007 and will be expanded in-country or to new countries in FY2008.
   
   o First, a new program in early childhood development was pilot tested at 10 sites in the United States as well as in the Philippines and El Salvador. Because many children enter primary school emotionally or intellectually unprepared for school, they fail to learn and drop-out rates are extremely high. Early Steps to Success is Save the Children's initiative to prepare children for learning and ensure that they succeed in school.
   
   o Save the Children also launched a program to combat obesity among rural children in the United States. With childhood obesity rates on the rise, Save the Children?s after-school physical activity and nutrition program has helped more than 4,800 poor, rural children develop healthy habits for a lifetime. Through our new partnership with Tufts University, Save the Children is exploring further ways for schools, communities and parents to help prevent childhood obesity in rural America.

As Save the Children's 75th anniversary year draws to a close, we have developed a new strategic direction for 2008-12: Save the Children's goal is to reach at least 74 million children worldwide over the next five years -- double the number we reached in 2006. We will measure our performance in achieving this goal globally, based on careful tracking of our progress in each country. Key indicators for monitoring our the impact of our work include ensuring that children are safe, educated, healthy and better able to attain their rights. We also aim to engage our global workforce, mobilize resources, build our brand and strengthen our agency systems so we can maintain our responsiveness as an organization and our ability to reach our goals for children in need.

This year, Save the Children received the 2005 Better Business Bureau Wise Giving seal and for the fourth consecutive year, Charity Navigator's highest 4-star rating. Currently, 90 percent of total Save the Children expenses were spent on program services.

Chief Executive Profile

Charlie MacCormack is President of Save the Children, a nonprofit organization with programs in the United States and more than 50 countries, an annual budget of over $40 million and more than 6,000 staff worldwide.  

He served as Board Chair of InterAction, the national association of over 160 U.S. international humanitarian and development organizations from 2006 to 2009. He also serves as Co-Chair of both the Basic Education Coalition and the Campaign for Effective Global Leadership, is a Founding Board Member of Malaria No More and is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Prior to his current position at Save the Children, Dr. MacCormack was President of World Learning.  He earlier served as Assistant to the Dean of the International Fellows Program at Columbia University. Dr. MacCormack received his doctorate and master's degrees from Columbia University and his undergraduate degree from Middlebury College. He was a National Science Foundation Fellow at the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico in Mexico City and a Fulbright Fellow at the Universidad Central de Venezuela in Caracas.

Additional Comments

Save the Children has consistently received high scores from leading charity rating services, and continues to be awarded major private grants from leading philanthropies such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.
Save the Children continues to be a leading agency responding to many of the world's most critical humanitarian disasters, such as those in Indonesia, Iraq, Sudan, Ethiopia and Afghanistan.
Ninety percent of Save the Children's expenditures go to program services for children, one of the highest ratios among NGOs.

Financial Data
From the organization's FORM 990

Revenue and Expenses: Fiscal Year Ending September 30, 2008

Revenue			Expenses
Contributions $323,620,401 Government Grants $131,494,719 Program Services $4,169,948 Investments $8,432,855 Special Events $51,368 Sales $88,331 Other $589,123			Program Services $424,168,650 Administration $17,206,833 Other $21,159,373 Total Expenditures $462,534,856
Total Revenue	$468,446,745		NET GAIN/LOSS	$5,911,889

Balance Sheet: Fiscal Year Ending September 30, 2008

Notes
The balance sheet gives a snapshot of the financial health of an organization at a particular point in time. An organization's total assets should generally exceed its total liabilities, or it cannot long survive, but the types of assets and liabilities also must be considered. For instance, an organization's current assets (cash, receivables, securities, etc.) should be sufficient to cover its current liabilities (payables, deferred revenue, current year loan and note payments). Otherwise, the organization may face solvency problems. On the other hand, an organization whose cash and equivalents greatly exceed its current liabilities might not be putting its money to best use.

Assets	Oct 1, 2007	Sep 30, 2008	Change
Cash & Equivalent	$63,728,397	$31,421,839	$(32,306,558)
Accounts Receivable	$0	$0	$0
Pledges & Grants Receivable	$37,083,770	$37,626,187	$542,417
Receivables/Other	$0	$0	$0
Inventories for Sale or Use	$8,364,571	$17,590,670	$9,226,099
Investments/Securities	$49,070,403	$36,443,127	$(12,627,276)
Investments/Other	$85,203,968	$123,652,853	$38,448,885
Fixed Assets	$17,683,651	$17,302,053	$(381,598)
Other	$17,958,498	$17,871,911	$(86,587)
Total Assets	$279,093,258	$281,908,640	$2,815,382
Liabilities	Oct 1, 2007	Sep 30, 2008	Change
Accounts Payable	$19,075,131	$22,184,911	$3,109,780
Grants Payable	$55,004,566	$63,577,784	$8,573,218
Deferred Revenue	$703,487	$553,109	$(150,378)
Loans and Notes	$0	$0	$0
Tax-Exempt Bond Liabilities	$0	$0	$0
Other	$12,270,340	$12,611,354	$341,014
Total Liabilities	$87,053,524	$98,927,158	$11,873,634
FUND BALANCE	$192,039,734	$182,981,482	$(9,058,252)

Comments from the organization
HOW EXPENSES WERE ALLOCATED in FY 2007
Program Services 90%
Fund-raising 6%
Management & General 4%

Operating revenues for fiscal year 2006 exceeded $332 million, a decrease of 16 percent over the previous fiscal year (though more than twice that in fiscal year 2005). Save the Children is committed to raising funds and operating the organization as efficiently as possible in order to provide the maximum amount of resources to quality programs for children. In 2006, the percent of expenditures directed to program services was 90 percent.

The full financial statements, audited by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, are available upon request by calling 1-800-728-3843 and at www.savethechildren.org.

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