1919: Quota Club International, Inc., is founded by Wanda Frey Joiner in Buffalo, New York, United States. Members contribute to a World War I victory campaign.
1924: “Girls’ Service” is adopted as the main service project for members to identify and assist underprivileged girls.
1925: Quota Club International officially becomes an international organization supported by 2,000 women when Canadians in Winnipeg, Manitoba, establish a Quota community.
1927: Quota International receives the attention of U.S. President Calvin Coolidge and subsequently moves its headquarters to Washington, D.C.
1930s: The service focus broadens to include good citizenship, international and women’s service.
1940s: During World War II, Quota members supported the Red Cross and volunteering for other war and defense projects. After the war, Quota International sent a representative to the White House to urge the inclusion of female delegates in conferences and agencies, both nationally and internationally.
1946: Aid to deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals is adopted as a service mission.
1950s: The Quota International Fellowship Fund is established to provide scholarships to college students.
1954: With service work focused on traffic safety, Quota International is invited to send a delegate to a White House Conference on Highway Safety.
1960s: Quota International partners with the international relief organization, CARE, supporting solutions to poverty for more than 25 years.
1970: South Pacific members advocate for television news to include closed captioning and promote Vial of Life to provide life-saving medical information in the home.
1972: Aid to hearing- and speech-impaired people becomes an official service project with Shatter Silence, a public awareness campaign about deafness. Quota International pioneers efforts helping the public understand deafness.
1974: The Quota International Charitable and Educational Foundation is established to expand work with hearing and speech providing scholarships to students who are deaf or hearing-impaired or students preparing to work with deaf or hearing-impaired.
1975: Quota International becomes a certified NGO with the United Nations.
1980s: Closed captioning is adopted as a Quota-wide project. Other Shatter Silence initiatives included: increasing awareness of noise pollution, promoting hearing screening for infants and senior citizens, providing scholarships for those entering the field of hearing and speech, recognizing an international Deaf Woman of the Year, providing subtitles for children’s videos in Australia, and becoming a member of the Council for Better Hearing and Speech Month in the United States with regular meetings at the White House and on Capitol Hill.
1983: The Club-to-Club initiative is launched for Quota Clubs in any country to contribute to the service work of Quota Clubs in developing countries.
1984: A UN representative attends and addresses Quota’s 1984 convention in its Revolution for Child Survival program.
1985: Quota adopts a UNICEF-assisted project in Uganda to provide immunizations for children. This program aimed at preventing such diseases as polio, measles, diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough, and tuberculosis in children.
1985: Quota International purchases offices in DuPont Circle, Washington, D.C. that have served as the world headquarters since 1950.
1988: Quota expands its partnership with UNICEF in a new project to provide oral rehydration therapy to the children of Bhutan. Oral rehydration rights infant diarrhea, one of the deadliest killers of children of that country.
1991: UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and actress Audrey Hepburn writes to Quota club presidents applauding Quota’s involvement in the efforts in Bhutan.
1993: Assisting disadvantaged women and children becomes the second service mission.
1995: Quota International begins awarding large research grants focused on bettering the lives of the deaf and hearing-impaired. The House Ear Institute, in Los Angeles, California was granted $100,000 and the Children’s Cochlear Implant Center in Sydney, New South Wales, received $25,000 for continued research.
2000: Quota International’s newly named We Share Foundation wins the Blue Ribbon Award from the United Nations Association for its Club-to-Club World Service and Volunteers in Action initiatives.
2002: Quota International attends the U.N.’s annual NGO conference as a member of the United Nations Association of the United States of America’s Council of Organizations.
2005: Quota International’s We Share Foundation launches its Hurricane Relief Fund, Quota’s first-ever worldwide emergency response to natural disaster facilitating support relief through its Volunteers in Action.
2006: Cops ‘n’ Kids is officially adopted as an international literacy initiative for Quota Clubs following the first effort in 1997 by Quota International of Kenosha-Racine, Wisconsin to work with police officers to promote literacy. The Healthy Hearing Campaign is launched with the distribution of ear plugs in Quota communities.
2007: Quota International’s We Share Foundation expands its Club-to-Club initiative to include 15 projects run by Quota members in developing countries.
2008: Through the Sound Beginnings Children’s Hearing Aid Program, Siemens Inc. provides Quota International with 100 hearing aids for children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Valued at several hundred thousand dollars, it is the largest donation that Quota International has received. Following the distribution of the first 100 hearing aids, Siemens donates another 100 hearing aids.
2010: Quota International expands its Junior Quota Mentoring Program to help local middle school, high school, or college students develop leadership skills and perform meaningful service work.
2014: "Empowering men, women, the deaf, hard-of-hearing, and speech-impaired in local communities around the world," becomes Quota International's new mission statement during International Convention.
2015: In light of Quota International's powerful history of women in action, it entered into a formal partnership with the National Women's History Museum--a non-profit that recently gained approval from U.S. Congress to build the first women's history museum on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Quota International officially partnered with Smart911 as well. Smart911 also empowers women, children, the deaf, hard-of-hearing, and speech-impaired by allowing all families to provide lifesaving information directly to 9-1-1 dispatchers and first responders by creating a free Smart911 Safety Profile.
2019: Quota International Inc. celebrates 100 years of outstanding service in local communities around the world.