WishMakers are wanted for World Wish Day 2024! By becoming a WishMaker, your donation can help return a critically ill child’s stolen childhood. Wishes need more than luck to come true. Wishes need people who speak up for, donate to and fundraise for children living with critical illnesses. Since the very first wish in 1980, WishMakers have brightened the lives of children across the globe.

Grant life-changing wishes

What is World Wish Day?

On World Wish Day Make-A-Wish celebrates the wish that started it all. On April 29th in 1980, a young boy living with leukemia wanted to be a police officer more than anything. With the help of family, friends and his Phoenix community, this little boy’s wish was granted and a global movement was founded.

Although the Make-A-Wish Foundation started in the United States, it quickly became an international phenomenon. In 1993 Make-A-Wish International was formed and today, 40 Make-A-Wish affiliates help critically ill children across 6 continents, in over 50 countries.

But none of this would be possible without our volunteers and countless WishMakers. Community plays an important role in a child’s wish journey: they help a child living with a critical illness regain their stolen childhood.

Granting critically ill children life-changing wishes

To a child living with a critical illness, a wish is more than a one-off gift. Research shows that a wish helps improve the child’s quality of life as it gives them and their families hope and motivation. A wish is truly life-changing.

Between hospitalization, doctors and medication, living with a critical illness can make it feel like your childhood gets stolen. That’s why your donations allow us to create memorable experiences that help children feel like themselves again and reduce strain on them and their loved ones.

The wish impact goes further than just the wish itself. Going through the wish journey, children bond with their families and community, helping them experience a sense of normalcy. From wish capture where we get to know the child and their family, to wish design and wish anticipation where hope rekindles, to wish realization and wish effect where the work of volunteers, partners and WishMakers inspire critically ill children giving them strength.

Find out which Make-A-Wish activities you can participate in

How you can become a WishMaker today!

By donating, fundraising, or subscribing to Make-A-Wish you become a WishMaker. Without WishMakers, over 585,000 children would not have received their one true wish. Over half a million wishes have been granted since that first wish in 1980. Become a WishMaker and help more children regain their childhood!

Grant life-changing wishes