Adobe Reaches Out Around the Globe and Around the Corner with Habitat for Humanity, UNICEF, and Multinational Scholarships

In direct response to employee feedback, Adobe has expanded its corporate giving programs to improve childhood education and to fight hunger and homelessness worldwide. Three new international initiatives in 2003 continued to broaden the scope of Adobe's community outreach and set the stage for greater global impact in the years ahead.

Habitat for Humanity International

Founded in 1976 with the aim of eliminating poverty housing around the globe, Habitat for Humanity (HFH) has built or rehabilitated more than 150,000 homes in 3,000 communities in over 80 countries. The organization accomplishes its mission using contributed funds, donated building materials, and volunteer labor.

While Adobe sites in San Jose and San Diego, California, have provided volunteers for local HFH projects in recent years, HFH International became an Adobe Community Investment Partner for the first time in 2003.

For its first HFHI project, Adobe provided US$50,000 to fund one-third of the construction costs for one home in a block of five in the town of Peckham, Southwark, the oldest borough of London, U.K. Here a higher percentage of people live in social housing than anywhere else in the country, and 97 percent of these families have no hope of affording a home of their own.

In June 2004, five Southwark families moved into their new HFH homes. Each unit has 1,000 square feet of living space stretched over three levels, including two bedrooms, one bathroom, and a loft.

To qualify for an HFH home, families must be able to make the payments on an interest-free mortgage and contribute 500 hours of "sweat equity" to the construction. A team of nine Adobe London volunteers poured their own sweat into the Southwark project. In October 2003, they drove two hours across the city and spent a full day helping the building crew apply wood siding to the home exteriors, donating more than 60 hours of work.

U.S. Fund for UNICEF

The U.S. Fund for UNICEF (United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund) is one of 37 national committees organized around the world to raise money for UNICEF, which operates in 158 countries and territories providing health care, clean water, improved nutrition, and education to millions of children.

In 2003, its first year as an Adobe Community Investment Partner, the U.S. Fund received a cash grant of US$50,000 to support the "25 by 2005" initiative in collaborating with national governments to increase childhood educational opportunities in 25 countries by 2005. Specifically, Adobe is supporting the effort to improve girls' education in India, where the company has a significant number of employees and the need is great. Approximately 14 percent fewer Indian girls than boys are enrolled in primary school-more than one million girls nationwide.

The "25 by 2005" program in India is based on the premise that when parents educate girls, more boys go to school, too, and the standard of living improves for the whole family. Adobe's grant paid for 5,000 Indian children to attend school in a region where US$10 per child covers the cost of books, classroom supplies, and teacher salaries and training.

Adobe also donated more than US$5,000 in Adobe Acrobat®, Adobe Illustrator®, and Adobe Photoshop® software for UNICEF's Emergency Operations Center in New York City, where security experts monitor real and potential world conflicts around the clock. The software enables the staff to generate maps that track the movement of conflicts and keep other UNICEF offices informed so that the center can effectively direct humanitarian aid efforts.

Multinational Scholarship Program

Since 1996, Adobe has offered college scholarships to qualified high school seniors and minority students in the U.S. In 2003, for the first time, Adobe offered similar scholarships to international students and awarded a record US$54,000 in grants, more than twice the total of 2002.

Working with the Institute of International Education (IIE), Adobe began offering college scholarships to soon-to-be graduates of Adobe partner schools in Ottawa, Canada; London, England; Paris, France; Munich, Germany; Tokyo, Japan; and New Delhi, India-all locations where Adobe has significant employee populations.

In its first year, the Multinational Scholarship Program awarded US$24,000 to 21 students between January and June 2003. These non-renewable grants ranged between US$100 and US$6,000, depending on the recipient's financial need and local costs. Founded in 1919, IIE is the world's most experienced global higher education and professional exchange agency.

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