Nana Goebel probably knows the international Waldorf movement (schools, kindergartens and other institutions), better than anyone else. She hears about older schools when they run into difficulties, and she hears about new schools when they falter, such as during the Covid pandemic. Nana Göbel knows most of the institutions and their people through visits, so her knowledge is not just based on paper. Nana Göbel is Managing Director and responsible for the work in the Berlin office.
Anselm Cojaniz corresponds with representatives of the institutions we support abroad and checks their non-profit status. When schools receive grants, they send proof of allowable expenditure to Anselm Cojaniz. In 2021 we supported 251 institutions and all of them have to send us receipts, activity reports and annual financial statements, which we have to look at and check. Anselm Cojaniz also submits applications to foundations and undertakes due diligence checks and is Nana Goebel's assistant.
Johanna Ruber organises the WOW-Day (Waldorf One World), where students spend one day a year collecting money, or working to support Waldorf schools in poorer countries. Last year, 30 institutions in 21 countries could be supported. In addition to her work for WOW-Day, Johanna Ruber also submits applications to the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The work is not finished with the approval of the applications, of course. The funded institutions have to be accompanied, detailed accounts have to be prepared and proof of allowable expenditure is recorded.
Christina Reinthal reports on our work with the international Waldorf school movement. She is the editor of our newsletter, "Waldorf Weltweit", designs and edits our website, makes sure that online donations are possible, sends out the electronic newsletter and also our appeals for donations. She informs our donors where help is needed and what has been done with the funds from our appeals.
Fabian Michel, Aimo Hindriks and Paulina Jantos each work 20 hours a week in our sponsorship team. You will meet them when you call our office. They answer questions, send out thanks for SEPA direct debit mandates, help with questions about transfer options and so on. Most of their time is spent on our education sponsorship programme. They arrange educational sponsorships and are in constant exchange with 65 Waldorf institutions that receive donations from our sponsorship programme. They make sure that 879 education sponsors receive twice-yearly mail from their sponsored child and inform them when a child finishes school.
Claudia Schwoch registers incoming donations and makes sure that each donation is allocated to the right donor and for the right purpose. Last year we received 21,306 donations from 4,197 different donors for the international school movement. If information is missing, she does the research. That way, the donation gets to where you want it to go. Claudia Schwoch also takes care of many other tasks, for example, she maintains the worldwide list of Waldorf institutions.
Eleonore Jungheim (Chief Financial Officer) runs checks at the end of each month for those institutions for which we have received donations and transfers the money to our project partners (whose non-profit status and proof of use have been clarified). She also issues the donation receipts for our donors, which are then checked and signed by Nana Göbel. Eleonore Jungheim is our contact person for the tax office and the German Donations Council. She ensures compliance with all charitable law requirements and transparency - among other things in the annual business report, which is published on our website.
Since our founding, we have managed to pass on 100 per cent of earmarked donations. Only those who actively choose to do so take part in our 10% campaign, and thus donate 10 percent of their donation to our administrative work. We also finance our work through membership fees from individuals or German Waldorf schools and, of course, through targeted donations with the purpose "Friends' work". It is important to us to adhere to the principle of strict separation between donations to Waldorf institutions around the world and donations for our work. But it also means that we depend on these conscious donations. We are, therefore, happy about every donation for our work in the 10 percent campaign, because our continued existence depends on it.