CARE: Share Your Heart

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CARE is an amazing organization that I have been fortunate to intern at since August.  What does CARE do?  Here’s our mission statement:

Our mission is to serve individuals and families in the poorest communities in the world. Drawing strength from our global diversity, resources and experience, we promote innovative solutions and are advocates for global responsibility. We facilitate lasting change by:

• Strengthening capacity for self-help
• Providing economic opportunity
• Delivering relief in emergencies
• Influencing policy decisions at all levels
• Addressing discrimination in all its forms

Guided by the aspirations of local communities, we pursue our mission with both excellence and compassion because the people whom we serve deserve nothing less.

Yeah, that last line is my favorite.  Anyhow – CARE works in over 70 countries around the world, and has been working in Haiti since 1954.  We have over 130 staff members in our Haiti office, all but one of whom is Haitian.  So you can imagine the losses sustained by our staff when the earthquake hit.  Fortunately, none of our staff lost their lives – but they did lose homes, family members, friends, etc.  That didn’t stop them from coming to work every day and assisting with the disaster response.  And even though Haiti is no longer on the front page of our news, the rebuilding is still going on.  It’s a long, slow process.  Many of our staff members are still sleeping in tents – as are thousands of Haitians.

So while CARE USA’s fundraising team was busy raising money to help rebuild Haiti, CARE’s HR team decided to lead the efforts to raise funds for our staff – Share Your Heart.  Park Tavern generously donated the space, community members and Atlanta staff generously donated items for our silent auction, we put our noses to the grindstone and pulled off the event with only a month’s planning – and Mark took photos!

Which you can see.  Here.