Friends of the Children - Southwest Washington

About Us

In 1993, Friends of the Children opened its doors with three Friends serving 24 children in Portland. Today, Friends reaches thousands of children in over 540 schools in communities across the nation in 22 locations. In March of 2020, Allison Pauletto was selected to launch a new chapter in SW Washington as the new Executive Director after a successful expansion campaign led by local philanthropists and community leaders. Allison began her career at Friends 14 years ago, and most recently served as the Chief Development Officer for the Portland chapter. In just under a year, she built a team of Friends to provide the infrastructure to support the youth roster and future expansion goals here in SW Washington. Today, we have six Friends supporting and mentoring almost 50 children in Clark County. We look forward to expansion outreach this spring to include a new cohort of youth from foster care. Our mission is to impact generational change by empowering youth who are facing the greatest obstacles through relationships with professional mentors - 12+ years, no matter what.