The Swiss Staff Foundation for Children in Need is committed to disadvantaged children throughout the world. This commitment is made possible by the voluntary payroll deductions of our employees, and by your donations.
SWISS Children's Foundation
During our last Christmas star campaign by the SWISS Young Network (SYN), we managed to raise CHF 1,520 in aid of "JACARANDA – HOPE FOR CHILDREN". This donation will be used for uniforms, healthy food packages, and hygiene items. "JACARANDA – HOPE FOR CHILDREN" has informed us that the joy and gratitude of the children cannot be expressed in words. Erica and Dagobert Fretz visited the two houses (or rather, the two projects) at the beginning of February this year, and once again their experiences were very impressive, and the joy of being able to provide sustainable support in South Africa was immense.
The SWISS Children's Foundation is proud to have made a valuable contribution to this important project, thereby giving the children in Mombasa better prospects for the future. Please see more details under “Projects”
We at the SWISS Children's Foundation are very pleased that we can once again hold a raffle this year, and you have chosen this year's project - the proceeds from the raffle will go to Tanzania.
With the proceeds from donations, a new well with a hand pump and canister can be built, providing clean drinking water to the children. This minimizes the risk of deadly diseases caused by locally contaminated water holes. In addition, the children can look forward to at least one warm meal a day.
Tanzania, a very beautiful country, is rich in natural resources, if it weren't for poverty. Children are the first victims of poverty, they are directly affected and essential rights are constantly violated, such as the right to education, clean water, and food. Margrit Brüngger has been advocating for these children and their families for years, so they can have access to water, food, and education.
"Children - our hope, our future; their smiles always renew my confidence and enthusiasm for what I do - at the same time, I am filled with fear and anxiety when I see their great need. Hope and fear are also very close here. Thanks to the SWISS Children's Foundation, I am fortunate to bring much relief to their already difficult daily lives." Margrit Brüngger.
The concert series “SWISS Band in Concert” was held over three days at the Stadthalle Bülach in November 2017. Led by Matt Stämpfli the band entertained the ears, eyes and souls with the usual colourful mix of sounds and rhythms.
The opening concert had another special highlight: The President of the SWISS Band, Evi Schuster Michel, presented a cheque of CHF 10,200 to the SWISS Children’s Foundation. The amount came from a benefit concert held in September organised by the SWISS Band as part of its 60th anniversary celebrations. “We are delighted with this gift”, said Vice President of the SWISS Children’s Foundation, Pete Steinmann. The amount will be used to support a “Green School” project in Powai, close to Mumbai in India.
The charity tombola organised by SWISS and the SWISS Children’s Foundation at the winter party was a complete success this year, thanks to the generous donations! It is with great pleasure that we can inform you that a total of CHF 24,000 was raised from the sale of tombola tickets. Also this year, the SWISS management board had decided beforehand to double the funds raised by the tombola.
With the proceeds, the SWISS Children’s Foundation will be supporting the Swiss association “Forever Kids Kenya” in enabling disadvantaged children in the slums of Kenya to enjoy a basic school education. At present they are aiming to buy their own school building in Mombasa – and the funds raised from the tombola will go a long way to achieving this goal. We are very proud to be able to give a total of CHF 48,000 to support children affected in Kenya.
The hand-over of proceeds from the Avro flea market took place in the Operation Centre (OPC). Over 12,000 Swiss francs are being donated to the SWISS Children’s Foundation.
The Avro RJ 100 has now taken leave of our fleet. But fans of the jumbo liner were still able to get a few souvenirs. Parts of the aircraft were sold in the Avro flea market, along with models of the aircraft. There were also enthusiastic buyers of the more than 200 bottles of the phase-out whisky.
On Monday 18 December, the proceeds of these promotions were officially handed over to the SWISS Children’s Foundation, enjoying a donation of around 12,350 Swiss francs. The hand-over took place in the OPC where the Avro team met with Pete Steinmann, the vice-president of the Children’s Foundation. Alongside its large projects, the SWISS Children’s Foundation also supports various smaller projects, and the donations from the Avro flea market will also be used for this purpose.
The SWISS Children’s Foundation has been supporting the Friends Lanka Child Foundation’s Beruwala Child Guidance Centre in Sri Lanka since 2017. For many years, the foundation has been a partner organisation of Friends Kinderhilfe International e.V. and its SWISS subsidiary organisation Friends Kinderhilfe Verein Schweiz – founded in 2014 – where a SWISS employee is enthusiastically involved as a board member.
Since 2004, the focus of the Friends Lanka Child Foundation’s team has primarily been the education of underprivileged, orphaned and abandoned children. A centre for children with special needs was established in 2017 with the financial participation of the SWISS Children’s Foundation.
The Beruwala Child Guidance Centre includes:
- Day care for children with special needs
- The introduction of methods for early recognition of special needs (e.g. hearing impairment)
- Education for children with special needs
- Psychological support for parents and family members
Donation account
UBS AG
Postfach, CH-8098 Zürich
IBAN CH32 0023 0230 2778 9201 G
Kto.: 230-277892.01G
BIC: UBSWCHZH80A
Since 2012, the SWISS Children’s Foundation has been working with the "JACARANDA – HOPE FOR CHILDREN" foundation, which was initiated by former SWISS Captain Dagobert Fretz among others. In 2015, the SWISS Children’s Foundation was able to build the "SWISS JACARANDA HOUSE" in Cape Town with a donation. This house was opened in 2016 and offers a home for six children aged between 2 and 14 years. These are orphaned children who are traumatised and come from broken backgrounds. A foster mother looks after the children and is responsible for their daily needs, security, safety, as well as emotional and therapeutic development, and physical well-being. Another house was financed by "JACARANDA – HOPE FOR CHILDREN" itself.
Forever Kids Kenya is a foundation in which Kate Kaufmann, a SWISS employee, is actively involved. Her sister Pia is also on board, and she also used to work for SWISS.
The school has been providing children from disadvantaged backgrounds with a valuable basic education since 2013. An important milestone is now imminent: the move to a larger building of its own. This move will not only create space for more pupils but will also sustainably improve learning conditions and ensure the organisation's long-term independence from tenancy agreements.
Our support is making a significant contribution to the completion of the first two floors so that the use of the new premises is within reach. A dedicated member of Forever Kids Kenya is regularly on site to monitor progress and ensure that everything is running smoothly.
This positive development allows the organisation to make rapid progress on the construction of the school building so that the first classrooms can be used by the end of the year. The association is delighted with the ongoing progress, which will ensure a stable future for the school and its 300 or so children.
Thanks to our donation of CHF 16,500, the Forever Kids Kenya association was able to make decisive progress in the construction of the new school building in Mombasa.
The SWISS Children's Foundation is proud to have made a valuable contribution to this important project, thereby giving the children in Mombasa better prospects for the future.
With a population of around 1.7 million people, Faridabad is an important economic centre and is situated in the metropolitan region of the Indian capital New Delhi. Unfortunately, this also means that numerous slum quarters have sprung up in recent years.
Since 1984, any children in the region who have been unable to stay with their parents have found a loving home at the SOS Children's Village. Here, they and their siblings are lovingly cared for by SOS Mothers in a total of five SOS families. What makes this SOS Children's Village so special is that the SOS Mothers are specially trained to look after an SOS Children's Village family independently. Furthermore, children receive a primary and secondary level education at its own SOS school. In 1990, a department for commercial and technical training was added to the school.
Thanks to its flourishing economy and proximity to the capital, Faridabad enjoyed a rapid growth in population. Consequently, the city's infrastructure is completely overloaded. Due to the lack of affordable living space, new arrivals end up in settlements, where they construct temporary accommodation from whatever scraps and rubbish they can find.
Children who grow up in poverty often suffer from diseases and malnourishment. Most don't go to school because they have to work to contribute to the household. Many of them are threatened by the loss of parental care; others have already lost the protection of their families, and end up living on the streets. The safety, nourishment and healthy development of these children is seriously endangered.
Since 2015, the SWISS Children’s Foundation has been supporting an initiative in Faridabad, in the metropolitan region of the Indian capital, New Delhi. With its 1.7 million inhabitants, Faridabad is an important economic centre. Unfortunately, however, many slums have also emerged in recent years as a result of the city’s economic pull. Children from the region who can no longer live with their parents have been able to find a loving home in the SOS Children’s Village since 1984. Here they are attentively looked after along with their siblings by SOS mothers in a total of five SOS families. In the SOS school, children attend classes at the primary and secondary school levels. In 1990, the school was expanded to include a special faculty for commercial and technical education. With your commitment, the SWISS Children’s Foundation supports a family and covers their living costs.
The project in Cartagena, Colombia was announced at the 2010 Christmas Party. After successfully recruiting new contributors, the funds for a further commitment were secured. Once again, we got together with SOS Children's Villages Switzerland, to see where they were going to build their next village.
This time we decided to take a slightly different path. We decided to opt for a new project of SOS Children's Villages International, in Cartagena, on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. The money from passenger donations was used to buy and carefully renovate a house.
Unusually, the passengers' money was also used for the running costs of the house, costs that were far higher than before, because of the approach of the decentralised organisation. As usual, the Children's Foundation took on the cost of sustenance for the children.
When the devastating tsunami in the Indian Ocean caused so much suffering on St Stephen's Day in 2004, it was clear to the Children's Foundation Board that we had to help somehow. The commitment had to be sustained, which was why nothing suitable could be found in the first phase of the chaos. A few months later, a suitable project emerged – a new SOS Children's Village to be built on the island of Phuket. This village was to be a new home for the many orphans of the tsunami.
We were also able to work together with our passengers in this project. Passenger donations funded the construction of the SWISS house. The Children's Foundation would then later take over the cost of sustenance for the children. We were able to visit the Children's Village for the first time while it was being built.
Its good location means that the family in Phuket is the most-visited of the four projects so far. The children look forward to seeing their visitors every time, and they are exceptionally generous. Lunch is eaten with the children on every visit and we are welcome to play with them afterwards!
The second Children's Foundation project was again to be at one of our destinations. Because these things take so long to prepare, we got in touch with SOS Children's Villages Switzerland very early on. They had plans for a new village in Dar-es-Salaam, funded by money from Switzerland.
For the first time ever, we were also able to involve SWISS passengers in this project. The fledgling Children's Foundation lacked the money to fund one of the buildings. The total from the coin collection on board our SWISS aircraft was enough to build one house in the village. So we decided to play a part in building the new SOS Children's Village.
The first project of the Children's Foundation after it was established. Looking for a suitable project, we got in touch with SOS Children's Villages. SOS Children's Villages is a charitable organisation with an outstanding reputation, which has been working since the seventies with the Swissair Children's Foundation, which is closely related to us.
Together we decided on the existing Children's Village in Rio Bonito, a poor suburb of the vast metropolis of São Paulo. Since the start of 2000, we have been supporting the children in house no. 9 – we finance the cost of their subsistence.
The present-day Children's Foundation developed from the original Staff Foundation of Crossair staff. This always had good contacts with the much larger and older Swissair Staff Foundation for Children that still exists, and continues to discharge its responsibilities.
The Swiss Children's Foundation mainly works together with the SOS Children's Villages organisation. Funding is provided primarily for the sustenance of numerous village families in SOS Children's Villages. In recent years, the income and thus the assets of the foundation have improved so much, that it could keep making one-off contributions to support other projects as well. These are often humanitarian projects, in which company employees are personally involved.
That it has been possible to expand the Foundation's activities is primarily thanks to those employees who, every month, allow a small or large deduction from their salary in favour of the Foundation. Larger, one-off donations also keep being received, whether from staff occasions in New York, or from the increase in lost and not collected items of baggage in Berne.
The gratifying trend of recent years motivates the Foundation Board, that works voluntarily and therefore generates virtually no administrative costs. Success is satisfying for all those employees who already donate every month. And we would be delighted, of course, should any more of our colleagues feel ready to help us with our project.
Board
Peter Laasner / President
Peter Laasner joined Swissair as a trainee pilot in 1986 and qualified as a pilot in 1993. After flying with SWISS as a Captain on the regional fleet, he became a co-pilot on the Airbus A330 & A340 fleet. He is currently a Captain on the Embraer 190 with Helvetic Airways.
Peter is the President of the Children's Foundation. He took up this office shortly after the Children's Foundation was established in 1999.
Dominik Fischer / Financial chief
Dominik Fischer has been working at SWISS since May 1999 and has been a member of the Board of Trustees and Treasurer of the SWISS Children’s Foundation since 2003.
Dominik works in the Technical Division of SWISS and is responsible for handling insurance claims in cases of damage to aircraft vis-à-vis the global insurance industry.His main task at the Children’s Foundation is financial supervision including the liaison with accountants, auditors and supervisory authorities associated with it.
Gabriele Hofmann-Schmid
Gabriele Hofmann-Schmid worked in the Legal Service at SWISS between 1992 and 2007 - initially for Crossair and later for SWISS, and she has been a member of the Board since the Foundation was established.
Gabriele has been self-employed since 2007, but continues to support the SWISS Staff Foundation for Children in Need as a member of the Board. She is responsible for all legal questions on the Foundation Board.
Tom Mutschmann
Tom Mutschmann has worked at SWISS since February 2013 and has been a member of the Board of the SWISS Staff Foundation for Children in Need since May 2014.
Tom works in the Technical Division in Technical Claim Management. He is responsible for negotiating and handling the technical guarantees of the SWISS fleet. In the Children's Foundation, he holds the office of Head of Communication.
Philipp Bonkatz
Philipp Bonkatz spent over 4 years working in SWISS Revenue Management, and has also gained experience working at Zurich airport. He is currently working for Lufthansa in Moscow as Senior Manager, Business Development & Market Steering Russia & C.I.S.
Philipp has been a member of the Board of the SWISS Children's Foundation since 2014, and has also been its Vice-President. Since changing to Lufthansa, he is largely continuing with his activities.
Silvia Koch
Silvia Koch has been active at the SWISS Children's Foundation since 2014 and was elected to the board in September 2019. She provides support in communication and administrative tasks.
Silvia has been with SWISS for over 27 years and has worked in various departments. She works as Product Owner TMS in Crew Training.
Julia Wetter-Studinka
Julia Wetter-Studinka has been with SWISS since March 2018 and, as Head of Regional Sales Switzerland, she is responsible for the Lufthansa Group's sales activities in Switzerland. Since September 2019, she has been a member of the Board of the SWISS Children's Foundation, where she coordinates cooperation with Lufthansa Aviation Training (LAT) and takes on various communication tasks.
Constantin Bausback
Constantin Bausback has been working for SWISS since October 2018, currently as Business Assistant to the CEO and as a detached Cabin Crew Member. He is a member of the SWISS Children's Foundation Board since May 2024.
