This week, HVO marked its 30th anniversary and launched a yearlong celebration of the three decades that our organization has worked to transform lives through education. In the coming year, our community will celebrate and honor the work of our volunteers, supporters and partners. Their work has led to so many accomplishments:
- Tens of thousands of lives have been transformed as health workers received education, training and professional opportunity to sustain and improve their work. This empowered health workforce, in turn, strengthened health systems and led to more and better care for patients in resource-scarce countries around the world.
- More than 10,000 completed assignments in the past 30 years have left volunteers with a renewed sense of purpose and passion for medicine, a better understanding of global need, and sometimes even new and innovative skills learned in the field.
- We have created a global community that brings together a diverse group of health care workers, professional associations, overseas health institutions, organizational partners and dedicated individuals who work together to bring long-term solutions to the global health workforce crisis.
Perhaps even more exciting than celebrating these accomplishments, our anniversary year provides an ideal opportunity to look to the future of HVO. In the year ahead, we will foster collaborations and broker relationships to expand the reach of our programs and volunteers. We will research ways to improve our internal systems to increase volunteer recruitment and public awareness of the global health workforce crisis. We will start new projects and host an event focused on the future of HVO – providing an opportunity to look at what we do well and explore more ways to improve and expand our work.
I am proud of HVO’s record over the past thirty years, and I look forward to celebrating that work with all who have made it possible. However, even more, I look forward to working with our leaders, partners and supporters to launch the next 30 years of HVO! I hope you’ll join me as we celebrate, collaborate and grow.