Fueled by love

Twice in his lifetime Unbound’s late co-founder Bob Hentzen walked thousands of miles across the U.S. and Latin America to show his solidarity with marginalized people living in poverty.

His first walk in 1996 was a 4,000-mile trek from Unbound’s Kansas City headquarters to Guatemala, while his second walk more than a decade later was 8,000 miles, stretching from Guatemala to Chile.

When asked why he made such journeys, Hentzen chose to directly address his explanation to those he walked for, saying, “I love you on your terms, I believe in you and you’re not alone.” His words spoke to the heart of Unbound’s purpose and programs: love for and belief in the potential of those most vulnerable in the world.

For more than 40 years, Unbound’s radical approach to alleviating poverty has been built on hope and fueled by love. It’s an approach that puts decision-making power into the hands of those closest to the issue, empowering them to create sustainable solutions to global poverty.

It’s not “love” in the sentimental sense, Dan Pearson, Unbound’s chief international program officer, explained, but the kind that connects relationships with finding solutions to global poverty.

“Solutions are good, but sometimes in society we get so focused on solutions that we forget the value of the journey,” Pearson said. “Every kind of solution is not necessarily an act of love, but every act of love is a kind of solution.

“That’s the kind of love that we’re seeking at Unbound, the kind that says, ‘I want what’s best for you as you define what’s best for you — I want the best version of your life on your terms.’”

Unbound love is believing that the families in our programs are the ones who know best how to solve poverty. When they’re empowered with the right resources and encouragement, their individual actions create ripple effects that spread outward to impact more people over time, such as those in their communities and eventually the larger society.

Sponsorship is the first act of love that mobilizes the ripple effect for one individual and their family. By controlling their own financial resources and setting goals with the support of Unbound, families begin transforming their realities — which is the key, Unbound believes, to eliminating poverty.

Here’s how two families immediately began changing their realities after becoming empowered by this approach, which will always be, first and foremost, fueled by love.

Goal setting using Poverty Stoplight empowered Marilou's family to improve their living situation

Marilou remembers a day when a rice pot and a cooking pan were the only home goods her family owned.

Unable to afford rent or their own home, the family of six lived with extended family members for more than a decade in Quezon City, in the Philippines. Marilou works as a housekeeper, while her husband, Christopher, works as a cook at a hotel.

The family was awarded a home in 2004 as part of a local organization’s housing initiative. The 40-square-foot home, which was built up against other houses in their crowded neighborhood, had one bedroom and no bathroom. But, for the first time, they had a living space all their own.

Five years later, their son Laurence, then 5 years old, became sponsored through Unbound, and their situation began to improve day by day.

For most of her life, Marilou felt frozen in place, her own needs and dreams coming secondary to those of her loved ones and their shared struggle to get by. Having the power of choice was unfamiliar.

With Lawrence’s educational needs — and even those of some of his siblings — now supported with Unbound sponsorship, Marilou found herself able to focus on other areas of their lives that needed attention.

Combining some of the sponsorship funds with earnings from their jobs, the family was finally able to save extra money. But they didn’t have a clear picture of how best to begin moving forward on their path out of poverty until they took Unbound’s Goal Orientation powered by Poverty Stoplight survey.

“At first, we didn’t know how to define our level of poverty,” Marilou said. “We just knew what we needed to do to survive every day. Poverty Stoplight helped us to understand our situation and create a map of our goals.”

Poverty Stoplight is a mobile technology platform that shows how multidimensional poverty affects each family differently. It helps turn invisible obstacles into visible ones that can be solved through action. Using the survey’s 20 indicators across six dimensions of poverty, combined with personalized mentoring from Unbound Quezon staff, Marilou and her family identified and prioritized their needs and set goals to change their situation.

Families taking the survey in Unbound’s Quezon program largely indicate experiencing extreme poverty (identified in red) in the areas of “income and employment,” “housing and infrastructure,” and “health and environment.” As they progress and reach goals, they can turn their indicators from red to yellow (poverty) to green (not poverty).

Marivic Ihap, Unbound’s coordinator in Quezon, said the survey gives families clarity about their situations so they can plan how to work on priorities.

“It teaches them to be more confident and courageous to take actions that make valuable changes in their lives,” Ihap said.

Having a safe and secure living environment was most important to Marilou and her family and was also one of their indicators in red. They decided to prioritize “housing and infrastructure.” The family’s goals included making improvements to their small home, acquiring more home appliances and building a bathroom.

After just a few years of saving and with follow-up guidance from staff, the family has successfully moved indicators in these areas to yellow and green. With planning and saving, they were able to acquire a refrigerator and a washing machine, create a more functional kitchen in their home and add on a bathroom.

“Right now, most of our needs are already in green, and we can say that our life has improved a lot from before,” Marilou said.

Marilou feels empowered now to continue addressing the challenges that will lift her family out of poverty. Next, the family will work on adding more bedrooms to their home so that the older children can have privacy.

Learn more about how Poverty Stoplight empowers families to self-direct their own paths out of poverty.

Direct cash benefits empower Maria's family to keep pushing forward

Direct cash transfers (DCTs) are the primary way that Unbound provides economic support to program beneficiaries. Sponsorship support is distributed monthly to local programs, and each program then places funds into individual accounts (often held by the mothers of sponsored children) in local banks, cooperatives or mobile banking platforms.

Families can withdraw the funds at their own discretion or save over a period of transfer cycles to make larger purchases, such as for housing improvements, health care or educational needs. The use of cash transfers as a form of direct humanitarian aid supports one of Unbound’s nine program characteristics, “decentralized decision-making.”

“When families receive cash, they have the freedom to choose what, when and where to purchase, therefore reducing waste of unneeded items, targeting resources toward their personalized goals and maximizing positive community impact by investing in the local economy,” Pearson said.

Direct cash transfers empower families, reduce fraud risk and stabilize the flow of funds during times of crisis. Unbound has been using DCTs to distribute sponsorship funds to families for almost 25 years, but only since the early 2020s has it become a standard practice across all program sites in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

In Unbound’s Ecuador program, Maria’s family is a prime example of how having direct access to sponsorship funds can empower a family in poverty with choices.

Maria and her husband, Antonio, are the parents of Cristhian , 16, and Estefani, 25, who are both sponsored. Estefani has a medical condition called myelomeningocele, a birth defect impacting the brain and spinal cord that can cause seizures, hydrocephalus (an abnormal amount of fluid in the brain) and paralysis, among other things. Antonio finds work as a cabinetmaker when it’s available, and Maria had to stop working to care for their daughter.

When their son became sponsored six years ago, his sponsors learned about Estefani’s condition through the letters they received from the family and requested to also sponsor Estefani. Her sponsorship benefit supports the family’s purchase of her medical supplies and doctor’s visits.

“I used to live [borrowing] money for medicines and school supplies for my children,” Maria said. “Now thanks to the sponsor, I don’t run out of money, and I know every two months that I will have this deposit to use for my children.”

Maria’s gratitude for her children’s sponsor has led her to make a positive impact with other families in Unbound’s programs and in her larger community. As the elected “recreation leader” of her Unbound mothers group, Maria shares her story with other mothers, motivating them to show their gratitude to sponsors by using their sponsorship benefits wisely and encouraging their children to get good grades in school.

Once a shy woman, Maria’s leadership in her mothers group has given her confidence, and she has begun to participate as a leader in the larger community, joining the board at her son’s school.

Though Estefani’s sponsorship benefit largely supports her medical needs, the family has also made the decision to use a portion of the funds to make improvements to their small home, a prefabricated structure that has begun to deteriorate with age.

“You see me fighting for my family, for my children, and believe me, it has hit me very hard,” Maria said. “But Unbound has helped me grow and improved my family. Unbound is a blessing from God.”

Every year, Unbound continues to increase the percentage of direct benefits delivered in cash and discover new ways this decentralized approach can increase and sustain impact by empowering families on their paths out of poverty.

Support Unbound's radical approach to overcoming poverty

Unbound’s 2030 strategic plan, “Hope in Every Step: A Radical Journey to End Poverty,” guides the organization’s work helping to eliminate poverty by expanding the impact of our decentralized approach, which we call “Circles of Impact.” Unbound's Goal Orientation powered by Poverty Stoplight and direct cash transfers are just a few of the tools and strategies from Unbound’s approach that support the empowerment of families as they move beyond poverty.

Also part of the approach, Unbound mothers groups are essential social support systems, encouraging learning and growth, while the Unbound Agents of Change platform gives families the opportunity to identify larger-scale community needs and implement solutions. Learn more about all the ways Unbound 2030 will help realize a world where every person lives free from poverty.

Unbound’s regional reporters in Latin America, Oscar Tuch and Josue Sermeño, and regional reporter in the Philippines, Tristan John Cabrera, provided photos and information for this story.