Great news, friends! We’ve recently released our Impact Report showing our results for 2022. If you receive our email updates, you should have gotten it in your inbox. If you don’t yet receive our email updates, send us a message at contact@thefreedomstory.org with your contact info to make sure catch all our news and developments.

2022 brought a lot of change for us at The Freedom Story – both internally and with external challenges. Rachel Goble passed the baton of leadership to Lucy McCray; meanwhile, our staff prepared for and organized the move back to more in-person services as COVID-related regulations relaxed. Our commitment to our values remained robust through it all, as did the prevention work that helped keep our students safe and their families supported through turbulent times. 

Moreover, the partnerships that we’ve cultivated are growing, meaning that our ability to bring prevention work to other vulnerable communities is expanding. We work with other civil society organizations, government agencies, and businesses to bring every tool to bear on child protection and safety. We’re taking every step possible to make sure that children are protected from exploitation, not just in one or two small communities but on the larger scale as well. We have big dreams and partnerships make those dreams possible and sustainable.

Here are some other highlights from our 2022 Impact Report

• Our human rights program reached over 5,600 people and was accessed over 6,600 times in 2022.
• We worked directly with 80 impoverished families to develop sustainable farming skills and practices to help them earn additional income.
• We trained more than 15 other organizations on Ethical Storytelling.
• We provided 2,072 hours of mentorship.
• More than 600 stateless students were supported in getting access to better legal status and basic rights.
• More than 800 home visits were conducted.
• More than 5,600 people were reached with our programs on human rights.
• We distributed more than 2,000 sets of COVID relief materials to 10 migrant worker communities.

As the famous John Donne quote goes, “No man is an island.” The same is true for organizations seeking to change such a widespread problem as child exploitation and trafficking. If we focused our efforts on our scholarship students alone, our impact would be very limited. But because we do both – attempt to change individual lives while also impacting the broader community – we are able to develop relationships that create deep change. 

Because of the work we do with partners, we’ve become a source to turn to when translation services are needed to process labor violation cases. We are called when government agencies need help running workshops or training sessions on child safety online. Because of these relationships of trust, we also have help achieving our objectives – for example, rescuing youths who’ve been trafficked into online scam centers or raising attention at the higher levels about problems witnessed at the local level.

We believe our values of transparency, upholding dignity, respect, positivity, inclusivity, and resilience are central to our ability to cultivate the trust that enables us to work with people, changing attitudes about the value of education and children’s rights. These values have made it possible for us to develop a position as a leader in the region in issues related to child trafficking prevention as well as Ethical Storytelling in nonprofit work.

To everyone who has invested in our work and our mission, we want to extend our deepest gratitude. Thank you for trusting us to get in the ring and fight, every single day, to safeguard children from the horrors of trafficking. You’ve been instrumental to making this effort possible, literally changing the lives of children who deserve safety, dignity, and the chance to pursue their ambitions and dreams.

“The Freedom Story contacted me to say that I had received a scholarship. When she heard, my mom cried as though all the stress, all fear was all taken away. At that time, it was as if another hand had reached out to help our family in a time of helplessness, like a light that opened a blind, someone to bring us out of hopelessness to see some of the family’s hopes.” — Sara, scholarship student