Donors Choose
gregladen | October 3, 2011Remember last summer's tornado in North Minneapolis? North is one of the more challenged neighborhoods in the region, with a high poverty rate and where the schools are struggling against all odds. One of the schools in North Minneapolis that needs your help is one of the schools damaged by that tornado. So they got a double hit. I've hand selected all of the schools based on my interaction with local and regional schools, with a focus on supporting doable project related mainly to science or math. In addition, DonorsChoose carefully inspects budgets and proposals to make sure they are…
palmd | November 25, 2009Those of you who gave to DonorsChoose will find an email in your inbox with a gift card. This is free money for you to donate to any project you wish. It represents matching funds from Hewlett-Packard, so don't let it go to waste.
Next, commenting. I keep a very open comment policy, since dialog is really the whole point of a blog, but moderating comments can be rather cumbersome, and the spam and hate-comments have been sneaking through. I am considering a trial run with comment registration. The ScienceBlogs overlords assure me that most of the bugs have been swept out of it. What…
palmd | October 30, 2009This is the penultimate day of our Donors Choose challenge to fund needy Michigan classrooms. We have fully funded 13 separate projects and scooped up matching funds from the Gates Foundation and Hewlett-Packard.
You have all been terribly generous, but I have to ask one final favor. A generous reader just gave $100 to a project to create an outdoor science classroom focusing on gardening. It's a terrific project and that single donation has brought the project within $300 of being fully funded. If you, dear readers, could kick in even a few small donations (in the 1-5 dollar range) I…
palmd | October 27, 2009You guys are great. Large donations continue to trickle in, but really, we can live quite well off of small donations. It would be really cool if we finished off the drive with a bunch of micro-donations, in the 1-10 dollar range. These small donations add up really quickly.
A Story to Tell is $97 away from being fully funded, allowing the teacher to buy a laptop and printer.
Inner City Soccer Team is a bit more of a challenge with $376 to go. There is no reason we can't get this done before the end of the week.
So let's do it---a buck here, a buck there, and soon enough...
palmd | October 26, 2009We have some very generous readers. We've managed to fully fund 12 out of 14 proposals from needy Michigan classrooms. We can probably pull off funding the final two projects this week, and although our readers have been quite generous in the size of individual gifts, I'd love to see a bunch of micro-gifts, in the 1-10 dollar range.
Remaining Projects
A Story to Tell: The teacher is trying to get a lap top and printer for her kids. That's it. She's $148 $123 away from getting it.
Inner City Soccer Team: Aside from the benefit of athletics, these kids are isolated in an economically and…
palmd | October 23, 2009Technically, the Donors Choose challenge to help out needy kids doesn't end until the end of the month. But donations given by Sunday are going to be matched by Hewlett-Packard. There are two great projects I'd love to get funded by Sunday, and I can't see any reason why we can't do it. If enough of us give a couple of bucks, we can get there in no time. Some donors have been freakishly generous, but a whole lot of 2 dollar donations can add up quickly.
A Story to Tell will purchase a computer and printer to help kids print up memoirs, helping them learn to construct stories and write.…
palmd | October 22, 2009I've let you guys alone for a couple of days, but now it's crunch time. Hewlitt-Packard is going to match donation based on how much we are able to raise in the next few days. They have 200K to distribute, and who gets it will be based on how much we raise before Sunday. There are a couple of projects that look interesting, and all of them help kids in poor Michigan schools.
A story to tell: teaching kids how to write is pretty important. $219.00 left to fully fund.
Tools of the trade: kids making comic books to help learn English. How cool is that? All they need is a printer, and they'll…
palmd | October 20, 2009Hewlett-Packard, the folks who made the computer I'm using at this very moment, are going to kick in more money to our project, and they're doing it on some sort of pro rated matching system that I don't understand. What I do understand is that as of today, HP is tracking how much we give, and based on how much we raise by Sunday, they will kick in some serious dough.
Also, as a special bonus to those who have given, HP is going to send out giving cards which will let you decide where more of HP's money goes.
The details are not clear, but it boils down to this: the more we give by Sunday…
palmd | October 19, 2009Thanks to some friends, colleagues, and strangers, we've almost got another project funded. There's only 85 bucks left to fully fund this creative math project. Let's see if we can get this done before the sun rises.
palmd | October 19, 2009The Donors Choose challenge still has about ten days left, and we are falling off track for meeting our goals. There's about $1000.00 in challenge money still needed for needy Michigan classrooms, and given the traffic increases on this blog, there must be a number of people who can afford a couple of bucks. I've made my donation (although it's going somewhere a little surprising), so I have to lean on you guys. I've issued a challenge to health care professionals---we're one of the few parts of the economy that is not shrinking rapidly. Even a few bucks makes a difference.
Let's start…
palmd | October 17, 2009Just a reminder to you all that my Donors Choose campaign is still going strong. Yesterday I issued a challenge to health care workers to toss a couple of bucks to needy classrooms. If we're lucky, some of these kids will be our colleagues some day. So far, in response to my challenge the kids have received exactly bubkes (that means "nothing").
Yo, health care folks, if you can afford it, even a couple of bucks helps. Many of these classrooms don't even have pencils and paper, so if you think a two dollar donation isn't much, think again.
I know I'm starting to get annoying here, but…
palmd | October 15, 2009My Donors Choose drive is part of a larger drive. ScienceBlog's campaign is part of a larger Social Media Challenge, reaching out to millions of internet users to help kids. I'm running second among my SciBlings, thanks to Dr. Isis and her theatrics, but Scienceblogs is doing great overall, especially compared to our friends at Discover Blogs.
Discover is a powerhouse. Some of my favorite science writers hang out over there, including fellow skeptic Phil Plait, Carl Zimmer, and Sheril Kirshenbaum. They're circulation must be huge, but they are dragging far behind us in raising money for…
palmd | October 15, 2009Update: you guys finished funding one of the projects below, which is incredibly generous. I'm a big fan of micro-donations, so feel free to kick a buck or two into another project! --PalMD
OK, you guys have been great. We've funded eight projects in needy Michigan schools, reaching 630 kids---and many of the projects are multi-year so even more kids will be reached.
But from a strictly selfish viewpoint, I want more. One of my favorite bloggy friends, Dr. Isis, has brought out the big guns. She is offering to much public self-humiliation to encourage extra giving. I've got nothing on…
palmd | October 14, 2009The last project I was trying to fund---a netbook for a classroom--is finished. The netbook is on the way.
This one is really cool. It's from an inner city chemistry teacher. As the husband of a teacher (and briefly a teacher myself) I can only imagine the struggles of this teacher and her kids---most are poor, class sizes are outrageous, and there's no money for anything. The teacher wants some chemistry kits. That's it. Remember your first chemistry kit, playing with the phenolphalein? The tart smell of the weak acids? The colors? These kits are probably a bit more sophisticated,…
palmd | October 13, 2009Dr. Isis assures me that she will soon unveil a secret weapon to pull ahead in the Donors Choose challenge. I'm all for anything that helps kids, but c'mon---we can stay ahead. Even small donations help tons. For example, if 23 people give $10 each, we can buy a netbook for a classroom in need. There are plenty of other proposals from needy Michigan classrooms, too. Even a couple of bucks will help bring these projects closer to completion.
If you can give a buck, or twenty of them, that's great, but if you can't, you can still help by tweeting, facebooking, etc. so that more people…
palmd | October 12, 2009You guys (and my next blogging check) have managed to fully fund several programs already (six by my count), and we're not even at the half-way mark in the drive (well, we're almost there). We've reached over 550 kids.
I have a great project for you: there's a classroom in Michigan that wants to buy a netbook. One. That's it. It would allow the students to research questions without leaving the safety of their classroom. They need another $365 to get it. Can you imagine what kind of world could open up to these kids with web access?
It won't take very many readers making modest…
palmd | October 9, 2009My readers have just funded another project! So what's next? Are Michigan's children all set?
No, not quite. We've funded some great projects, helping out kids with hearing impairments, giving inner city girls a view into a remarkable future, but there's more work to do. I found another project that looks important. The kids in this school can't play outside (!) and need some indoor sports equipment to keep healthy, play, and fight obesity. How 'bout we do this? They need $501.00 to be fully funded (apparently indoor soccer balls are rather expensive).
palmd | October 8, 2009You guys have been great. Really. So I gave you a break from the nudging. But it's time to pick another project to fund, and this one is terrific. Go read about it.
I'm not sure what I can offer as a challenge---my blogging check is already being donated thanks to your generosity in the last challenge. But let's see if we can get this one funded by tomorrow afternoon.
palmd | October 6, 2009We reached our goal for today! We fully funded a project for kids with hearing impairments. Because you did this before the 7th inning stretch, my next blog check is going to DonorsChoose (hopefully to this project, but if not, to my "most needy" list). Of course, now I have to come up with a way to top that for the next three weeks.
palmd | October 6, 2009OK, folks, we've almost fully funded another project, thanks to your generosity. There's only $280 left to fully fund this worthy project. I'm extending my deadline. If you can do it before the 7th inning stretch of the Tiger's game, I'll donate my blog check from this month. Let's do it!
(Since I'm only getting one blogging check, I have no idea how I'm getting you to keep giving for the rest of the month...)