Our Vision
Protecting orphaned, vulnerable children
We implement family support, economic development and foster care programs that safely place separated children back with their birth families, relatives or foster families.
We also preserve at-risk families to prevent child abandonment and reduce the reliance on orphanages.
Our services empower families to achieve independent, self-sufficient lives and provide healthy environments for their children.
Services include: parenting, counseling, early childhood
development education, sustainable income generation training and short-term livelihood support.
Roots of Promise is a 501c3 children and family organization.
We partner with government agencies and extremely vulnerable communities in developing countries to keep children in families and reduce the number children that are abandoned and placed in orphanages.
Jackie Bustamanate & Wendy Sweetmore
Co-founders
Founding Story
Roots of Promises' founder volunteered at an orphanage in Uganda where she discovered that ~90% of the babies actually had families. Many were abandoned due to maternal death or extreme poverty. The belief was that babies were better off in an orphanage until they were 3 years of age, could eat solid foods and be more self-sufficient. However, there was not a social work infrastructure in place to return these children to their families so instead they remained trapped behind the walls of an orphanage.
There weren’t enough helping hands to provide a safe, stable and nourishing environment for 30 babies. The staff turnover was high causing repetitive broken attachments during this vital bonding stage of development. While some babies were withdrawn, most were starving for love and attention. Most were significantly behind in reaching basic developmental milestones.
Jackie fostered a then 3½ yr. old boy from the orphanage for seven months in Uganda while his family situation was assessed. He was a shy, withdrawn child with trust issues and angry outbursts. The difference that a stable loving home provided was like night and day. He completely thrived when being fostered by Jackie.
The lack of quality social work and infrastructure resulted in an extremely poor and harmful family reintegration experience. Every child deserves to grow up in a safe, stable and loving family. This is how Roots of Promise came to be.
We support the development of children.