Talk:People to People International

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New York Times June 10, 1958 article titled "PEOPLE TO PEOPLE ENDED BY ITS BOARD" discloses that Charles E Wilson is president; President Eisenhower was "honorary chairman". President Eisenhower did not establish PTP International. PTP International was founded by Joyce Hall, Founder of Hallmark in 1961. President Eisenhower supported Joyce Hall's initiative. No signatures of Dwight Eisenhower on any 'organizations' Articles of Incorporation exist according to Hebert Pankratz, Presidential Library Archivist. Therefore, President Eisenhower was never a founder of any People to People Program, although he supported the concept.

New York Times September 26, 1957 declares "PEOPLE TO PEOPLE NOW PRIVATE UNIT - Plan to Promote Friendship Throughout the World Ceases to Be U.S. Agency." Therefore the above statements are inaccurate, People to People did not go private in 1961. People to People is not a government sanctioned program, nor does the organization have a 51 year history because they were founded in the early 1960's by Joyce Hall.

According to Miller Crouch, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for the United States Department of State, "Designation as a sponsor does not imply approval, sponsorship or promotion of your organization by the United States Government and should not be so implied in advertisements, business cards, websites, etc." However, People to People Programs continue to infer, "As President Eisenhower explained when announcing the formation of People to People as part of the U.S. State Department,..." (See http://www.studentambassadors.org/tw_parents.asp 2/14/08). People to People programs lead the reader to believe they are government sanctioned.

People to People Programs and Ambassadors Group Inc. (Jeff & Peg Thomas, executive officers of both the not-for-profit and for-profit entities) have been under fire for the past several years by www.consumeraffairs.com for inappropriate marketing practices. On January 28th, People to People Student Ambassadors, People to People International and Ambassadors Group were sued for the wrongful death of a student killed during a trip to Japan in June, 2008. See article by Lisa McCormick of Consumer affairs, January 29, 2008 Student 'Ambassador' Dies Neglected & Alone http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2008/01/p2p_hill.html

December, 2007 Mike & Belinda Wellner filed a personal injury lawsuit against People to People International (http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2008/01/p2p_hill.html ).

Despite these two lawsuits, People to People Programs still promote a "Golden Standard of Safety" and a "Solid Safety Record" on their websites as of February 14, 2008. See http://www.studentambassadors.org/students-world-experience-info-safety.asp and/or http://www.studentambassadors.org/special-links-safety.asp

MOMSY, could you provide a link for the Wellner suit that you cite? The link above duplicates the consumeraffairs.com link, and the link in the other article went to a password protected site, where all I could see was that there was a suit filed, but not any of the actual text of the complaint itself. I am curious to read it and if there is something in there that meets the Notability standards then perhaps there is something we can work into one of these articles. Bloombergy (talk) 18:38, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Article rework

I'm not necessarily hyper-critical here of adding references to this article, but the above sections pretty much destroyed the literary flow of the article and substantially need to be reworked into making something coherent in terms of general readability. I'm moving the references to the talk page to let this user know that I appreciate the hard references that were found here, and that perhaps some of this information can be worked into the article either by this user or by somebody else who uses these references. If I have time, I'll try to work on them as well.

The goal here is to improve the article and not have a bunch of random citations about this organization. --Robert Horning (talk) 17:03, 14 February 2008 (UTC)