Plan USA

Plan USA[1] is an international charity, part of Plan International,[2] helping children and their families in developing countries. The organization's goal is to give people a hand up, not a handout, by training community members, mostly young people, to organize and advocate for their own well-being. Programs focus on the areas of health, education, livelihood, and habitat.

Plan is a child-centered organization. We work at the grassroots level with the active participation of children, their families and their communities.

We involve children in all aspects of our programs. Projects are planned, implemented, and their results are evaluated at the level of the child. Families and communities contribute as much as they can of their time, labor, and their funds — a value that can amount to more than half of project costs.

Designing programs at the level of the child, we can better see the complex web of causes and effects that impact a child’s life, and respond with programs in five interrelated areas—Growing Up Healthy, Learning, Habitat, Livelihood, and Building Relationships.

Our Five Key Program Areas

Growing Up Healthy

Ensuring children have the means and the knowledge to grow up healthy is a core part of our program. Yet in the poorest communities the odds are stacked against children. We work to ensure the children's very survival. We fight for their protection and their healthy development. Inseparable from this work is ensuring the reproductive health of adolescents and adults, especially women of child-bearing age.

Learning

We want all children, adolescents and adults to acquire basic learning and life skills so as to contribute to the development of their communities. We teach parents the importance of an education for the benefit of their children and the future of their communities.

Habitat

For children to reach their full potential they need to live in safe and healthy homes and neighborhoods—"habitats." We work with children, their families and communities to focus and act on children’s habitat needs, from home construction to safe drinking water and waste disposal.

Livelihood

This domain addresses the root cause of poverty and ensures that the improved financial position of families leads to increased economic and social benefits for their children. We have award-winning strategies that help parents—especially mothers—with poverty-busting credit and small business development programs.

Building Relationships

Increasing understanding and unity among people of different cultures and countries is a goal that we take very seriously. We passionately promote the rights and interests of the world’s children. With caring donors in 17 industrialized countries, we work toward the day when all people act as a single community sharing a common agenda: a better, safer world for children.