A Thank You From IOFA

Happy Thanksgiving!

IOFA is thrilled to finish up our 14^th year of working to uphold the rights of young people around the world.  With your ongoing support, we have so much to be thankful for this year:

From our new and emerging programs:

• 50 plus orphaned youth graduated from the IOFA Project Prepare Ethiopia pilot program 
• Over 500 first responders including law enforcement, legal professionals, and social service providers were trained on human trafficking in the United States
• In partnership with UNICEF, Susan Rosas, IOFA rep in Cambodia developed a safe process for orphaned youth to transition out of abusive orphanages into permanent loving homes with families
• The Asian American Trafficking Outreach Project, targeting labor and sex trafficking victims in Chicago’s isolated ethnic communities was launched in partnership with the University of Illinois, Chicago, and the Chicago Bar Association

In addition to new and continuing grants, we raised an unprecedented amount of private funds:

• We doubled the IOFA 2011 End of Year Annual Appeal donations from 2010, raising over $18,000 and an additional $5,000 in our Spring Appeal
• IOFA Champion, Tracy O’Dowd raised over $2,000 for IOFA by competing in the exhausting Chicago Triathlon 
• IOFA IVY Giving Member, Nabeela Rasheed and the South Asian Community helped raise $5,000 for IOFA at our summer Bollywood Nights Event attended by over 100 supporters
• IOFA Board Members, Meghan McGrath and IOFA Co-Founder and Board President raised over $6,000 for our local and Ethiopia work in Pound Ridge, New York
• $4,000 in seed money was awarded by the Asian Giving Circle for the launch of AATOP

As always, we are more than thankful for our wonderful interns and consultants from 2011/2012 and our new interns for 2012/13 who worked so hard to keep our programs running:

Nikel Bailey, University of Chicago, SSA, IOFA Ethiopia

Charlotte Cahill, PhD., Northwestern University

Marianna Ernst, Hillsdale College

Mikiyas Feyissa, Program Coordinator, IOFA Ethiopia.

Summar Ghias, University of Chicago, SSA

Amy Gilbert, Loyola School of Law, Child Rights Fellow, IOFA Ethiopia

Laura Horner, DePaul Law School

Esther Liew, University of Chicago, SSA

Carly Loehrke, University of Chicago, SSA, IOFA Ethiopia

Nikitha Murali, University of Chicago, Summer Links Fellow

Kelleen O’Leary, Loyola School of Law

Camil Palumbo-Sanchez, Washington St. Louis University

Chanthy aji Renaldo, IOFA Cambodia

Susan Rosas, University of Chicago, SSA, IOFA Cambodia

            Aatifa Sadiq, University of Chicago, SSA, Human Rights Fellow, IOFA Ethiopia

And we are incredibly thankful for Sehla’s new arrivals - Nuriya and Amaan Mufti – new IOFA team members who will be starting their internships once they can keep their heads up!

More than ever, IOFA graciously gives thanks to the hundreds of donors that have allowed IOFA to grow and expand it’s work to support the most vulnerable adolescents in Illinois, New York, and around the world.  

IOFA will see unprecedented growth in the US and abroad in 2013 and we will be sharing these new updates in December.   Please be on the look out for our upcoming end of year appeal.   But, as always, we welcome your renewed commitment right now to help stop the crime of human trafficking and exploitation as we enjoy this Thanksgiving season.

We look forward to hearing from all of you.

Blessings to you and your families!

Shelby French, Sehla Ashai, the IOFA Board, and the IOFA Team