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See article on Goodwill Industries' Growing World Role in this same issue.
Most people know Goodwill in its familiar neighborhood setting: a place to deposit or pick up reasonably-priced used clothing and household items. But this is just one aspect of a program that also includes job training for people with disabilities in such fields as computer skills, banking, food services, horticulture, and janitorial services. Items sold in Goodwill stores create revenue that provides job training and placement for thousands of people each year.
In the process of accomplishing its mission, Goodwill Industries has become the largest employer of people with disabilities in the world. Each Goodwill trainee or client is considered an employee and, as such, earns a wage, pays taxes and moves toward independence.
In 1993 in North America alone, more than 123,000 people received vocational training services from Goodwill, and nearly 23,000 clients were placed in competitive jobs.
Known primarily as a federation of more than 182 autonomous, community-based, nonprofit organizations in the United States and Canada, Goodwill Industries also has a growing network of 49 overseas associate members located in 35 countries around the world. Since the mid-1920s--when Goodwill's founder, Dr. Edgar J. Helms, took the Goodwill message to Asia, Europe and Latin America--local groups of medical and social service professionals have joined with community leaders, parents and people with disabilities themselves to create variations on the Goodwill model, based on local needs.
Since 1989, private and governmental agencies in Eastern Europe and the NIS have requested direct assistance from GII in creating domestic Goodwill-style programs. Initiatives are now moving forward in Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Latvia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Uzbekistan and Russia to develop Goodwill programs in those countries.
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