Change by Doing Explore the world of volunteering and service

SO I recently read the horrifying facts about how women and girls are being attacked and raped in alarming numbers in and around the tent villages where displaced Haitians are living post-earthquake. Security and safety are dire with no power, after dark, it is simply unsafe to be out, which means women just headed to a latrine are in danger. An organization called EarthSpark is working to mobilize delivery of over 20,000 lamps to the camps to make them more safe for all, in addition to other clean and sustainable energy projects around the world. Just lighting the way can bring more security to these tough conditions.

In that same vein, Kris Allen, winner of American Idol last year, was the figurehead of a program via Idol Gives Back to which viewers donated to provide new solar street lamps for the Haitian camps. More than $250,000 was raised for the United Nations Foundation during the special AMERICAN IDOL episode in February of this year, and then Allen traveled to Haiti with UN representatives. The UN Foundation has granted the money to the United Nations Population Fund to provide energy efficient street lights, as well as emergency health kits to help pregnant women deliver their babies safely when they can’t reach a hospital or clinic or don’t have access to those facilities.

Since the devastating earthquake, which killed an estimated 200,000 Haitians, the United Nations Foundation has raised nearly $4 million for relief and recovery efforts in Haiti. The funds were  to help provide food, medicine, water, and shelter immediately following the earthquake, to the United Nations Development Program for their Cash-for-Work Program (to offer Haitians temporary jobs with necessary demolition and rubble removal work), and to the UN Population Fund for maternal health kits. The solar street lights are an additional arm of the programs.

Your support of EarthSpark, Idol Gives Back, and the UN Foundation will go farther than you think–so use those links.