Emergency Disaster Fund grants assist children

Church of the Brethren Newsline
August 23, 2018

Children’s Disaster Servicese volunteer Kat Leibbrant supervises a pickup soccer game in McAllen, Texas. Courtesy of Children’s Disaster Services.

The Church of the Brethren Emergency Disaster Fund has made several recent allocations, supporting efforts on the Texas border and refugee work in the Middle East.

Two grants, the first for $5,000 and the second for $24,600, are funding Children’s Disaster Services (CDS) work as they respond to the crisis on the US-Mexico border. A CDS team was initially deployed to the area in late July, serving more than 75 children on its first day and 790 in its first two weeks. The team has been working out of the Catholic Charities Humanitarian Respite Center.

In addition to aiding the current response, the funds will support four-person teams in October and November as they meet continuing needs and two trainers who will work to create a sustainable presence there.

The third grant, for $40,000, is providing psycho-social support for Syrian refugee children through the Lebanese Society for Education and Social Development (LSESD), responding to victims of the ongoing Syrian civil war. LSESD began in 2011 and has become an important partner in the Syrian refugee response.

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