International Volunteer Sustainability Plan

We invite you to join us to help realize SFP’s potential for sustainability and expansion.

Dear Friend of Service For Peace,

Over the last 11 years of providing international volunteer programs we’ve learned a number of things. One of the more interesting insights is that we’ve found that when our volunteers join us for an international project, it often comes as a surprise when they find that their own lives are transformed in ways that equal the ways in which they change the lives of the people they serve. Working side by side with local people can offer a profound experience of immersion in a foreign culture and make deep connections between people from very different worlds. It can reframe one’s own world view in unique and lasting ways.

We’ve also learned that there is a significant unmet need for this type of mutually beneficial experience, with very few organizations able to provide the kind of depth and breadth that SFP is known for.

That’s why we’re expanding our international volunteer program to include corporate groups, church groups, family groups or just about any group that has the desire to serve others. We’ve found that people of every age and background can have the same profound experience when serving in SFP’s Communities of Peace.

Of course, any experience of a foreign culture can be meaningful but Service For Peace (SFP) offers a unique opportunity. We’ve been working in the same communities year after year so each group of volunteers received a very warm welcome that feels like coming home. The residents of the communities get involved with the service project and work together with the international volunteers. And our local staff member accompany the volunteers and form immediate links between the community and the visiting volunteers.

In making this change, we also see an opportunity for a new means of funding our programs in part from a sustainable stream of income that is generated from a large base of participant groups. Expanding our reach to include new groups will ensure the sustainability of our program. This is very good news for the communities where we currently work and for the new communities that will be transformed as we gradually expand.

In order to achieve this broader level of impact, we need to make some investments in our operations to add capacity and capabilities beyond those we currently possess.

We invite you to join us by investing in this expansion plan and helping transform the lives of many more people in the coming year. You can send your tax-deductible gift by mailing your check to SFP, PO Box 3096, Bridgeport, CT 06605-3096, or you can donate online by visiting our website at www.serviceforpeace.org.

Charles Phillips President - Service For Peace