DonorsChoose.org will be attending South by Southwest Interactive in Austin, TX, over the next few days, and we’d love to see you there.
DonorsChoose.org staff Katie Bisbee will be serving on a “Donations 2.0” panel, facilitated by Beaconfire Consulting. The panel will discuss how traditional nonprofits may need to adopt new technologies and fundraising models as donors demand greater accountability for their funds.
Joining DonorsChoose.org on the panel will be Skylar Woodward from Kiva, Ruth-Anne Renaud from Opportunity International, and Milo Sybrant from Amnesty International USA.
Shopping has never been so rewarding! Thanks to all shoppers (and window-shoppers!) who downloaded the CauseWorld App and spent their karma points to support a classroom, CauseWorld users have helped fund their first project on DonorsChoose.org.
The first batch of karmas will supply a high-need Chicago classroom with netbooks. But the fun is not over! You can download the free CauseWorld app to your iPhone or Android-compatible phone and start earning karma points today just by walking into stores. After you’ve scored some karmas, choose to support a classroom and help some students in need. Your karmas will help fund selected projects on DonorsChoose.org – no purchase or donation necessary!
DonorsChoose.org likes how CauseWorld is pioneering an innovative way to use technology to connect people and needs – and we’re not alone! CuaseWorld has been featured in popular blogs and websites such as Tech Crunch and The Washington Post as an easy way for shoppers and businesses to partner up and do good.
Download the app today and stay tuned for more news on projects funded – by you – through CauseWorld!
Throughout March, DonorsChoose.org is in the running to win $250,000 for classroom library projects, but we need your help! By voting for us in the Pepsi Refresh Project, you can help improve classroom libraries for students across the country with the click of your mouse.
How to help supply new books, rugs, and literacy resources to classroom libraries:
• Vote today! Go to www.refresheverything.com/donorschoose, sign up instructions below), and cast your vote.
• Vote tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after… Until March 31st. You can cast a new vote once a day. If you want help remembering, set the DonorsChoose.org page as your homepage or create a recurring calendar entry.
• Multiply your impact by spreading the word. Share this post www.refresheverything.com/donorschoose on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc., and tell you friends to vote early and often.
$250,000…just think – that’s over 23,000 copies of Dr. Seuss’s Oh, The Places You’ll Go, or over 27,700 copies of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird!
Thank you in advance for helping students everywhere get hooked on reading!
• If you have not yet registered, click “No, I’m new here!”
• Enter your name, email address, birthday, create a password, and the text from the automated box (to prove that you’re not a robot!) and click “Done” (Pepsi will not email you unless you opt-in to their mailing list).
• Now you are registered and signed in!
• Click on “Vote for this idea” once more for your vote to be counted.
• Repeat once a day until March 31st!
Mashable (www.mashable.com), the world’s largest blog focused exclusively on Web 2.0 and Social Media News, ranked the Crate and Barrel / DonorsChoose.org GivingCard partnership as one of the top 5 Winning Corporate Social Good Campaigns.
The Crate and Barrel GivingCard campaign is praised for the positive impact it has had on customers (82% of customers who redeemed the certificates were “very likely to consider Crate & Barrel for their next home furnishings or accessories purchase” compared to 76% of a control group of customers that didn’t get certificates), as well as public school teachers and students (over 14,500 projects benefiting 347,000 students).
Three years ago, Ariba and DonorsChoose.org embarked on a unique partnership to use spend management technology to help DonorsChoose.org expand nationally and serve millions of students from low-income families. Now, over 60 men from Ariba are using their upper lips to help even more kids.
DonorsChoose.org uses Ariba’s software to manage the procurement of the materials teachers request, from sourcing and ordering through invoicing and payment. But last February, Ariba took the partnership to a new level, when some staff bravely sprouted sweet mustaches for four weeks to raise cash for schools. Going stache-to-stache with titans of industry, these growers made Ariba the top fundraising company of 2009.
This February, Ariba growers aim to beat their performance and are now over halfway through their facial hair marathon for kids. To show your support, visit Ariba’s hair-raising Giving Page today. Besides helping kids, you’ll get to see the fuzzy faces of folks at the company behind the procurement process that helps bring classroom projects to life.
Yesterday afternoon, DonorsChoose.org supporter Adam Lambert, of “American Idol” fame, surprised music students at Belvedere Middle School in Los Angeles with a special visit to their classroom, bearing supplies funded through his DonorsChoose.org challenge. Adam unpacked composition books with the students, who are learning to compose their own music, and even performed a live acoustic set for the class (video below). The students then presented Adam with their own surprise by performing one of his American Idol songs using instruments that were also funded previously through DonorsChoose.org. Read more about the event at the Los Angeles Times website.
Belvedere Middle School is a high-poverty public school whose budding music students have benefited greatly from DonorsChoose.org’s generous donors. This past fall, Adam and DonorsChoose.org launched a challenge to Adam’s fan groups to support students and teachers across the country by funding critical music and arts supplies for high-need public school classrooms. Thanks to the enthusiasm of Adam’s fans, to date more than 2,300 fans have contributed over $290,000 directly to project requests, subsequently benefiting 215,000 students.
Members of one of Adam’s fan groups ONTD_AI, which raised the most during the challenge, received a special thank-you of their own, as Adam joined them after the school visit for a live online video chat. Adam answered tons of questions submitted by his fans and thanked them personally for their overwhelming efforts to help students and teachers in need across the country.
Yesterday we launched the most generous match offer ever seen on DonorsChoose.org. And thanks to the incredible support of the Pershing Square Foundation and citizen philanthropists across the country, our first ever Presidents’ Day sale has SOLD OUT!
Don’t worry, if you missed this sale opportunity, you can still help by donating to classroom projects for under $100.
Starting Thursday morning, the Pershing Square Foundation funded American history and civics projects down to $98 – on the condition that citizen philanthropists (you!) took the projects across the finish line. And you did it! Over 600 citizen philanthropists funded the remainder of more than 675 projects, directing over $315,000 to classrooms in need in one day.
HP is giving folks an even bigger opportunity to help classrooms. Now through May 30, 2010, when you purchase any HP product through the Create Change program, HP will contribute 4% of the purchase to the charity of your choice, including DonorsChoose.org. That adds up to a lot of critical supplies for students!
You can also check out this video for more information about how you can give back to schools when you purchase HP products. Thanks so much HP for helping students and teachers get the resources they need to succeed!
The team worked enthusiastically screening and processing classroom feedback and even processed their own Dice Holdings thank you package from support given to math and science classrooms in Washington DC, New York City, San Francisco and Chicago this fall.
Thank you Dice Holdings for your time and for your great energy!
If your company is interested in volunteering in our NYC office, please contact Associate Director, Yaritza Olmeda, at yaritza (at) DonorsChoose (dot) org.
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