I want to share with you, as a donor and supporter of WorldCamps, some important recent information.

These intent young women, campers at our most recent camp in April, were part of an entire 6th and 7th grade at a Soweto elementary school. Moving from our past patterns of taking children from a wide range of places, we decided that it might make a greater impact to have an already existing community, such as a school, participate in the camp program at the same time.

It also provided us with the challenge/opportunity of our first coed camp.

Attendance at school tails off late in the month as people on monthly stipends from the government run out of money and can't afford transportation to school. The school has an extensive feeding program. They know that the meal at school might be the only meal of the day for the student. An increasing number of people are adopting children because they receive a stipend for each child. Needless to say, the care is not always wonderful in such situations.

There is violence, including abductions of children from school, as a normal part of the day. The teachers have been the first responders when a child is reported missing. Not trained in search or apprehension, the teachers, by acting much sooner than police, can often find a missing child.

On the other side of the coin, the school, run by dedicated administrators and teachers, has a championship drum corps, an excellent cheerleading group, and has student exchanges with the U.S., Denmark, and Switzerland.

The Deputy Principal and two of the teachers stayed at camp the entire 10 days plus 5 days of staff training. Two other teachers were there for staff training. We had our largest group of campers ever at 174.

The campers, despite knowing each other from school, were very appropriate in their socializing and didn't try to take advantage of the more relaxed setting for any experimentation. The campers had an amazing time and, when counselors visited them at their school after camp, the only complaint they heard was, "why can't we come back?" The school administrators and teachers loved it and are eager to have the other half of the classes come to camp in June and July. We may even expand i to the 5th graders.

I wanted you to know all this so you know what you are supporting. Though 8,000 miles away, these children are gaining skills that will make them healthy, in all senses of the word, adults. They have already formed a Kids Club (our fourth) at their school and have been clamoring for us to push them further into new projects. We hope to have an income-generation project begin this summer. We hope to have 850 (half of all campers) people producing goods that can be marketed in South Africa and abroad.

Several nice honors have come our way:

• • the American Camp Association presented WorldCamps with its highest program award
• the Eleanor Eells Award.
• • the Ontario Camping Association invited me to speak about WorldCamps at their annual conference on February 18. After the talk 30 camp people signed up to be included on our mailings and to explore volunteering at a future camp. They also made us the recipient of the proceeds of their silent auction, which raised $5,000.
• • the Virginia House of Delegates passed a resolution honoring WorldCamps. Delegate Ken Plum presented the resolution to me on May 9.

I have spoken to some school groups. I spoke at Rye Country Days School in Rye, NY, in March. One girl there, Caroline Breinin, collected 200 pairs of sneakers. for WorldCamps. The school and her family have made it possible for a camper to go through the camp and a year of Kids Clubs.

One major step we took was to hire an outside firm to do an outcomes study. This began with a sampling of children, parents/caregivers, and teachers at the April camp and will continue for about three months. We will then get data on how well we are doing in meeting our goals. If it is as we hope, we will be well-positioned to provide more compelling statistics when reporting to funders and in applying for new or renewed funding. We are excited to have our work quantified and validated.

It's been exciting and rewarding. I appreciate those who got us this far and want you to continue your investment in the youth of South Africa. If you have ideas on other sources of support for WorldCamps, I would welcome hearing from you.

We have recently been notified that we have been accepted by the Combined Federal Campaign, the federal government's unified charitable giving campaign. If you know of anyone who works for the US Government, please let him/her know of our inclusion. Our number is 9275. Because of the way it works, the more we can get in funds designated directly, the greater the percentage we share in the undesignated funds pool.

We need your continued support. Please consider this a renewal message. While we will be sending our new brochure to you in a week or so, we need your support now as two summer camps are on the horizon.

We are in a position where we are recognized by many people in the orphans and vulnerable children field, particularly in Africa. We need to keep the momentum we have gained so far and to continue at the pace we have achieved. Please consider a generous response.

Thanks for all you have done to get us here. I have valued our partnership and hope that it will continue.

Remember to register at iGive.com to have WorldCamps receive a portion of the amount you spend online at over 600 merchants! It's free to you.

Warm regards,

Phil