May Nonprofit of the Month: Bethania Kids May 5, 2010

Each month our intern Anthony highlights one of our GiftWorks customers as nonprofit of the month.  If you’d like to be featured, please let Anthony know by emailing info@missionresearch.com. Here's his feature of Bethania Kids:

Changing Lives from Childhood Up

Bethania Kids is always putting children before revenue; noting that 100% of contributions are given directly to support children in India; they are truly a “not-for-profit” organization.

“This is a ministry that nurtures and equips the children of India through Jesus’s love to change their world and many of the children who started as preschoolers in the beginning are now getting ready to graduate from high school,” says Tena Marsiglia, the director of development of Bethania Kids.

The organization has been using GiftWorks fundraising software for over 3 years now, but their history extends well beyond that. Bethania Kids was founded in 1987 with Dayavu Dhanapal, and the Granner and Hennig families in southern India. Twenty-three years later, and the organization is still going strong, helping about 900 children in several locations.

Tena explains some of the ways GiftWorks has helped Bethania Kids:

• “Bethania Kids workers don’t have time to worry about manually searching through donor records; that’s why they use GiftWorks. Tena notes that “GiftWorks allows for more flexibility so that we can see if a donor has fulfilled a pledge. This makes it easy to send a friendly reminder in the fall of each year.”
• “Reports are 100% better than the previous database and this means that our Board members have a much better awareness of where Bethania Kids stands in regard to donor giving.”
• “And finally when it comes to auditing, GiftWorks provides a much higher level of accountability.”

Tena adds that “we have a great curriculum available for churches or schools if they want to do a mission project. I am also available to help guide a committee or individual that is interested in doing a fundraiser for Bethania Kids.” To find out more about Bethania Kids or to become a sponsor, go to http://www.bethaniakids.org.