A non-profit organization is defined as, “Not established for the purpose of making a profit; not entered into for money.” This means that all the money that is donated directly funds the FREE services we provide to our community. Braveheart’s purpose is the protection, justice, and healing of a child of has been abused. Without effective therapeutic intervention, many traumatized children will suffer ongoing or long term adverse social, emotional, and developmental outcome that may impact them throughout their lifetimes. Because all our services are FREE to our children and their families, we are always in need of funding.

Gifts made to Braveheart Children’s Advocacy Center represents a gift to our entire vision to eliminate the suffering of abused children. The list below helps show what your gift can give to our kids and their familes. To ensure we can make the biggest impact to our community, we do not earmark donations for specific supplies or activies.

• $50.00 Donated can provide snacks and drinks for children
• $100.00 Donated can replace old worn our toys and books
• $250.00 Donated can provide toys, snacks, and art supplies for our therapist to help children effectively cope through play
• $500.00 Donated provides training for 50 adults on preventing abuse and helping children who need it
• $1,000.00 Donated can provide supplies for our forensic interviewer for one year
• $2,000.00 Donated can run one school outreach support group in one school
• $2,000.00 Donated can also fully support an investigation including advocacy and forensic interviews
• $2,500.00 Donated can provide six months of therapy to help a child overcome trauma and build coping skills

Braveheart CAC’s revenue comes from four main sources: individuals, foundations, the government and corporations. There are two ways that for-profit companies can partner with nonprofits: corporate sponsorships and matching-gift programs. Braveheart CAC’s Coporate Programs present an excellent way for companies to invest in our mission. The company would also receive exposure in the community through our social media, signage, events, etc.

For more information, contact Jackie Diediker at (309) 937-5663 or jackie@braveheartcac.org. 

Gifts such as these are an easy way to make a donation to Braveheart Children’s Advocacy Center. Your gift of securities (stocks, bonds, and mutual funds) can provide you with significant tax and financial benefits, such as bypassing capital gains taxes and providing a valuable income tax deduction (both usually reduce the cost of making your gift as well). Contact your broker or accountant to see if you are right for this type of gift.

Sometimes the easiest way to gift stocks and securities is through an electronic transfer. Braveheart CAC would provide you with the information to be able to do this so please contact us at (309) 937-5663 or at jackie@braveheartcac.org. If you have stock certificates, fill out the information on the back of the certificate and send via a secure, trackable method to:

Braveheart Children’s Advocacy Center
ATTN: Jackie Diediker
292 SE Rd Suite A
Cambridge, IL 61238

Braveheart Staff will be proud to acknowledge your gift including any information you deem important on our social media.

Sometimes you want to do more than just a simple one-time donation. Planned Giving has traditionally been defined as the gift that an individual creates during his or her lifetime that will take affect at or after their passing.

There are many kinds of planned gifts, including, but not limited to: simple bequests in a will or trust or within an estate plan, charitable gift annuities, charitable remainder trusts, charitable lead trusts, non-cash assets and assets transferred using pay-on-death or transfer-on-death documents.

If you would like to talk to Braveheart Staff about this please contact Jackie Diediker at (309) 937-5663 or jackie@braveheartcac.org with your Bequest Intention or Planned Gift Intention.

Do you buy off of Amazon.com? Visit Braveheart Children’s Advocacy Center’s AmazonSmile! AmazonSmile is a simple and automatic way for you to support your favorite charitable organization every time you shop, at no cost to you. When you shop at smile.amazon.com, you’ll find the exact same low prices, vast selection and convenient shopping experience as Amazon.com, with the added bonus that Amazon will donate a portion of the purchase price to your favorite charitable organization like Braveheart! Learn more here.

Do you buy off of Walmart.com and want to know how to access our Registry for Good? Walmart is teaming up with Braveheart CAC to help us get the supplies we need in order to help the children and familes that come through our doors. Go to this website to see the items! Here is a PDF that shows how to add items to your Registry for Good.

Do you have an idea that could turn into a FUNdraiser for Braveheart CAC? We love doing events in our community but unfortunatly, fundraising events can take a lot of time and supplies that we do not have while we do our normal daily requirments as well.

The reason we call them FUNdraisers is because raising money through events can be FUN for a great cause! If you have a fun idea that could help us raise funds, do not hesitate to contact us as at (309) 937-5663 or jackie@braveheartcac.org. Here are a few ideas that have worked in the past for people who have put on a FUNdriasing event for us:

• Walk/Run/Bike-a-Thon or choose a sport of your liking!
• Car Wash
• Taco, Spaghetti, or Burger/Hotdog Dinner (Bake Sale counts as well!)
• Jeans or Casual Dress Day
• Queen of Hearts Fundraiser
• Paint Along or Vino Van Gogh

Sometimes you may be in a spot where you have donated for years but cannot afford your annual donation. Or you learned about Braveheart CAC and want to do more for our mission but cannot donate funds. Do not worry! We have some ideas for you.

• Vollenteering: Braveheart is currently accepting applications for volunteers able to commit to 4 or more hours per month for event and office needs.  Projects include organization of mailing campaigns, distribution of awareness materials, and light office cleaning. If you are interested in volunteering please call (309) 937-5663 or email  jackie@braveheartcac.orgVolunteers do not have direct contact with children and families; however, due to the potential that you may be in the office while children are being served, a complete background check including fingerprinting is required.

• Stewardship: Are you interested in serving as a steward of Braveheart’s organizational effort to intervene in the lives of abused children?  Braveheart’s Board of Directors actively recruits new members whose knowledge, skills and abilities closely meet the current needs of the agency. We are currently seeking community members who are interested in serving on the Board of Directors to share their human resources, information technology, marketing, volunteer coordination or fundraising expertise.  The Braveheart Board of Directors meets every other month and holds an annual ½ day meeting. To express interest, send a brief paragraph via email telling us about yourself, what you would like to gain from being on the board, and how your special talents can help Braveheart serve its mission to: jackie@braveheartcac.org​

• Host A FUNdraising Event: Do you have an idea that could turn into a FUNdraiser for Braveheart CAC? We love doing events in our community but unfortunatly, fundraising events can take a lot of time and supplies that we do not have while we do our normal daily requirments as well. The reason we call them FUNdraisers is because raising money through events can be FUN for a great cause! If you have a fun idea that could help us raise funds, do not hesitate to contact us as at (309) 937-5663 or jackie@braveheartcac.org

• Social Media: Follow, Like, and Share our social media posts and pages! The more media coverage we have, the better chance we have at helping fight against child abuse.

Donor Privacy: Braveheart Children’s Advocacy Center respects your privacy with great importance. In order to track donations, we protect your personal information and adhere to all legislative requirements with respect to protecting privacy. We do not rent, sell or trade our mailing lists, nor do we send letters on behalf of other organizations. If at anytime you do not want mail or information about Braveheart CAC anymore please contact Jackie Diediker our Executive Director at jackie@braveheartcac.org

Donor Bill of Rights:

Philanthropy is based on voluntary action for the common good. It is a tradition of giving and sharing that is primary to the quality of life. To assure that philanthropy merits the respect and trust of the general public, and that donors and prospective donors can have full confidence in the not-for-profit organizations and causes they are asked to support, we declare that all donors have these rights:

1. To be informed of the organization’s mission, of the way the organization intends to use donated resources, and of its capacity to use donations effectively for their intended purposes.

2. To be informed of the identity of those serving on the organization’s governing board, and to expect the board to exercise prudent judgment in its stewardship responsibilities.

3. To have access to the organization’s most recent financial statements.

4. To be assured their gifts will be used for the purposes for which they were given.

5. To receive appropriate acknowledgment and recognition.

6. To be assured that information about their donations is handled with respect and with confidentiality to the extent provided by law.

7. To expect that all relationships with individuals representing organizations of interest to the donor will be professional in nature.

8. To be informed whether those seeking donations are volunteers, employees of the organization or hired solicitors.

9. To have the opportunity for their names to be deleted from mailing lists that an organization may intend to share.

10. To feel free to ask questions when making a donation and to receive prompt, truthful and forthright answers.

The text of this statement in its entirety was developed by the American Association of Fund-Raising Counsel (AAFRC), Association for Healthcare Philanthropy (AHP), Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), and the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP), and adopted in November 1993.