Updated
August 20, 2007
First 10 Years
1997 - 2008
Sponsoring Costs
As GTS has grew - it became necessary
to raise funds in the traditional way and Register as a UK charity No
1110998
GETS now deals with all sponsorships from the UK but still operates the
GTS system of transferring the moeny into each students account to pay
for their education
Sponsorships
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GTS provides its sponsors with the actual costs for each school and each
child.
Costs vary greatly from school to school even in similar age ranges.
To ensure we have the correct information our researcher collects this information from all the schools available, as well as visiting the pupils at home and at their schools.
We ensure it is used for the purposes you instruct us to support.
This page is ARCHIVE Information - BUT, GETS still uses the same principal as GTS used before, your money is used for your child and accounted for seperately, you will receive an account each year and see how much is still in your students account - GETS asks for fixed amounts for several years and your childs account grows in the early years to help pay for the more expensive years to come.
For sponsorships to work successfully, GTS has to have a relationship with the child sponsored and their family. We meet the child and family when the sponsorship is setup and then make regular visits during the year to ensure the child is attending school and that their work is progressing satisfactorily.
We do this by visiting the school and the family, we take photographs, collect letters from the child to the sponsor and make sure reports are copied for the sponsor, we keep a running account of all money used in connection with each young person so we can send an annual account.
Unfortunately, even charity services cost some money.
GTS guarantees that we make no profit out of carrying out sponsorship services, we just cover the costs of transport, postage, email, stationery, films and processing etc. and we charge 10D an hour for any time taken dealing with a sponsored child around £3.50 for a full day, but in effect, generally a couple of hours each month on each child.
For GTS members we estimate the cost at £20 a year, for non members we double that figure to contribute to our charity reserve for emergencies. If all the money is not used (for instance on uniforms in the second year or on our expenses), we will advise the sponsor and they can decide how the surplus is to be spent or returned to them.
Where non members want to send sponsorship money to The Gambia we can handle the transfer for them, we make a small handling charge of £10 or each £100 transferred. If they would like GTS to monitor the sponsored child and the payment of the fees etc., the transfer fee is included in the annual expenses.
ALL Sponsorship transfers are FREE to members.
Up to now GTS has covered all the cost of expenses from GTS development money, this has lead to less frequent visits to families and schools than we would like, problems with making time available etc. but as the number of sponsor projects increases, we are creating a job for a local Gambian to work in this area and so have to raise some of the money to cover those costs. GTS will also contribute as the job will include research for the GTS web directory, sadly neglected since Foday started the work so well.
We hope you will consider visiting The Gambia and contribute to our charity wiork by becoming a GTS member and maybe consider sponsoring a young person or a Gambian family trying to become self sufficient.
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