Top Ten Questions (Children of the Americas style)

David Letterman is known for his comedic Top Ten Questions that he answers during his evening program. While his questions and answers are funny, they also ring of truth, which is the hallmark of good comedy.

Those of us on the Children of the Americas board have our own list of "Top Ten" that we have been asked frequently over the years. We thought this would be a good venue for telling you our answers.

Common question # 1:
Who started Children of the Americas?
Answer: COTA was started in the early 1980's by Judy Schwank in Bowling Green, KY. Judy saw the incredible humanitarian need in Guatemala during a natural disaster that occurred there, and founded COTA as a result. She has since resigned from our program.

Question # 2:
How do you find your volunteers? 

COTA Pharmacy Volunteers

Answer: We are SO blessed. COTA volunteers truly are the best of the best. They are intelligent, committed, talented and hard working. Our volunteers tend to find us. They either have friends who volunteer for us and share the news of what we do, or they seek us out on the web.

Question # 3;
Where do most of your volunteers live?
Answer: Everywhere. From upstate New York to Seattle, Washington and everywhere in between. We also have many great friends in Guatemala who have been associated with our program for years, and they help us with logistical support and translating during our team week. With over 100 volunteers, we are the largest medical team that travels to Guatemala.

Question #4:
Where in Guatemala do you work?
Answer: Wherever the need is greatest, the Guatemalan hospital director can host us and the town can accommodate us. We alternate between working in coastal communities as well as in the mountains, with our goal being to reach the women and children who have no other access to surgical/medical care. Think of COTA as a mobile mash unit, and you will understand all that is involved in making a team happen. The logistics of getting a surgical/medical/dental/pharmaceutical and prosthetic team up and running for the week we are there in January takes many months of work before our volunteers even depart their hometowns in the states to join us. 

Cleft patient, Team 2011

Question # 5:
How does Children of the Americas fund the work that you do?
Answer: Tenacity.
A few of our board members write grants. Some of them speak at churches, Rotary groups and private events, or even write personal checks. In this economic climate, it is difficult.

Question # 6:
How many paid staff members do you have?
Answer: None. We are an all-volunteer board and organization. 

Question # 7:
Who pays for your volunteers expenses to travel with your teams? 
Answer: The volunteers pay their own expenses, take personal vacation time, and bring items to donate to our patients. As we said, we have great volunteers!

Question # 8:
Where is the Children of the Americas office?
Answer: There isn't one!
Our Executive Director and President run COTA from their homes. This allows our organization to have very little overhead. Our operating budget runs around $50,000 per year, which allows us to donate around 130-140 surgeries, see several thousand clinic patients, take care of over 300 dental patients and provide free pharmaceuticals to our patients, as well as providing free prosthetics. If we had a physical office, our donated dollars would not go as far as they do.

Question # 9:
I understand that your organization only works in Guatemala. Why is that? 
Answer: When COTA was first founded, Guatemala was the adopted country of the person who started our organization. After a few years of traveling to this Central American country, our infrastructure was in place to allow us to do our work there. But the real reason is that we love the people and country.

Question # 10:
Children of the Americas sounds amazing, but I still don't "get" why your volunteers and donors like it so much?
Answer: COTA volunteers share a passion for making a significant humanitarian difference in the world. COTA offers us a wonderful venue to do this.
Want to know more? Here is our website:
http://www.childrenoftheamericas.org/