Why I Give: Assisting Self-Sufficiency
Global Volunteers relies on a steady stream of volunteers to serve in partner communities each year, ensuring that essential services continue. Volunteers are our essential resource – the human capital that partner communities request and require. Most communities need our help also to support their vision of self-sufficiency with additional financial capital as well. Many donors invest in local leaders’ projects to help children and families to reach their full potential. Tom and Tracey Reimann, who have served in Tanzania and Romania with their twin sons, share their reflections on giving here:
What considerations go into your giving decisions?
We are grateful to be able to share our financial resources in ways that align with our values and help make a difference in the world. Our preference is to supplement our giving with the ability to be “hands-on” through participating as team members with one of the many areas where Global Volunteers works around the world. We are fortunate for having had such experiences in Tanzania and Romania.
Why do you support Global Volunteers with your donations?
We believe strongly in the mission of Global Volunteers – especially the focus on working side-by- side with the local community to help provide them the “tools” to become self-sustaining. The aphorism “give someone a fish and they eat for a day, teach them to fish and they eat for a lifetime” very much applies. It is powerful to think that we can have such an impact and in doing so make the world better, even if it is one person at a time.
“We are grateful to be able to share our financial resources in ways that align with our values and in a way that we believe can help make a difference in the world.”
– Tom Reimann, Global Volunteer on two service programs
How do you know your donations are well spent?
I’ve witnessed it through the volunteer work that my family and I have had with Global Volunteers. I also know through the Global Volunteers newsletters and by researching the organization’s non-profit report filings as a 501c3 organization.
How have you witnessed the impact of your donations to Global Volunteers?
Firsthand through our service: From supplying and installing soap dispensers at an orphanage, teaching the children proper hygiene, teaching math and English in classrooms – to painting (murals) in the rooms of a children’s hospital and visiting with those children. Those are all examples of how (we’ve seen) donations can make a lasting difference where Global Volunteers provides support. We also learn about it through the Global Volunteers’ newsletters and website.
Matt (left) and Andrew (right) get ready for conversational English classes with their peers in Romania. 
Andrew works with a child at a hospital in Romania.
Why is giving now during the pandemic important to you?
We strongly believe in and support the Global Volunteers mission. At a time when teams are not able to travel for making a hands-on difference by giving their time and talent, Global Volunteers has been in no greater need than now for financial support to still provide as much meaningful support to the local communities it serves through volunteering.
One of Andrew’s service projects in Tanzania in 2016 was teaching conversational English to Tanzanian students. 
Matt worked at an orphanage in Tanzania where he helped install soap dispensers.
Why do you plan to serve with Global Volunteers again?
In addition to firmly believing in the mission of Global Volunteers and wanting to make a difference, Global Volunteers provides a wonderful way to learn about and meet with people from many different cultures. It allows you to connect with volunteers who place a similar importance in being able to make a difference and those connections can last far beyond serving together on a team for one or two weeks. As a family, we have maintained contact through social media with several team members from Tanzania and Romania we served with. Lastly, serving with Global Volunteers provides a valuable and unique experience as a family with lifelong memories. It combines the opportunity to bond more closely together through doing meaningful work while meeting people, learning about culture, and exploring parts of the world that you may otherwise never see or learn about.
“Serving with Global Volunteers provides a valuable and unique experience as a family with lifelong memories. It combines the opportunity to bond more closely together through doing meaningful work while meeting people, learning about culture, and exploring parts of the world that you may otherwise never see or learn about.”
– Tom Reimann, Global Volunteer on two service programs
Read about the Reimanns’ service in Romania:
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