We're Rebuilding Sponsor Field Experiences

The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted more than international travel, significantly impacting our field countries. Prolonged effects of the pandemic such as supply chain issues and inflation are contributing to global food insecurity, which is exacerbated by conflict and extreme droughts. Compassion has responded to current events with agility by quickly adapting to redeploy resources in the most effective way to serve our mission of releasing children from poverty in Jesus’ name. During the pandemic, the US Trips and Visits Field Experience workforce, dedicated to planning and facilitating trips and visits, was reduced and repurposed to meet more urgent needs of the ministry, given the travel restrictions.

Over the last few years, Compassion USA has been carefully rebuilding the Field Experience team, while striving to be fiscally responsible. Rebuilding our teams and systems requires careful planning and budgeting to ensure that we are stewarding resources well. We are grateful for your partnership in our mission to release children from poverty as we work to re-open Sponsor Trips and Visits Field Experiences in a way that effectively serves our mission.

Compassion USA is rebuilding the Field Experience Team while striving to continue being fiscally responsible. Since we are not able to immediately facilitate the same volume of trips as we did prior to the pandemic, we made the difficult, yet strategic decision to prioritize group trips that help more children get sponsored. This will bring the greatest amount of visibility to the critical needs of the children and families we serve amidst the pressing challenges they are currently facing.

Many of these trips have involved strategic ministry partners, church pastors, and media gathering trips for Compassion Sunday® events. Over the next few months, with our limited capacity, we are partnering with a handful of churches to send a few groups to the field while simultaneously piloting six Sponsor Trip Field Experiences in 2025 for supporters who have trip cancellations due to COVID-19.

We are excited to be able to communicate the full re-launch of our Sponsor Trips and Visits Field Experiences with you as soon as possible. Registration will open several months before to give time for supporters to prepare, so please be sure to watch our website for more information.

Currently, we are limited in our ability to facilitate Sponsor Visits due to our capacity and resources. Like other Field Experiences, Sponsor Visits require formal registration, background checks, paperwork, and many resources to arrange. In this season of rebuilding, we have made the difficult decision to prioritize other types of Field Experiences that will serve the most children possible. We hope to resume Sponsor Visits by January 2025.

We understand the desire for sponsors to visit their sponsored children, especially if a sponsor is traveling to a country where their sponsored child lives. We also hold child protection as our highest priority, and children who live in extreme poverty are the most vulnerable in the world. As such, we do not allow supporters to visit a child on their own to protect both the children in our program and their sponsors.

We know many of our sponsors have been eagerly anticipating the moment when they could go on a Sponsor Trip, which is why we are thrilled to announce that we are piloting the relaunch of Sponsor Trip Field Experiences in six countries, starting in January 2025!

For these initial pilot trips, we are extending a special invitation to sponsors who had their Sponsor Trip cancelled because of COVID-19, allowing them to partner with us to help rebuild our Sponsor Trips Field Experiences.