DonorsChoose Fundraiser
drorzel | October 11, 2007If you'd prefer a more positive approach to fundraising, here's another post to highlight a specific project, one of many that are asking for funding to meet depressingly basic needs. In this case, the proposal is titled "Weighing In", which is pretty accurate:
Our 7th & 8th graders from our classes in Buffalo, NY are in need of scales to develop their measurement skills in science.
My project needs 3 Triple Beam Balances.
This is a high-poverty district (80% qualify for free lunch), and they're looking for $420 to buy scales for a science lab. You wouldn't think they'd need to go…
drorzel | October 11, 2007At least, that's a conclusion a cynical person might be tempted to draw from the fact that the ScienceBlogs Leaderboard for the DonorsChoose challenge is dominated by us "Neville Chamberlain" types...
At present, the ScienceBlogs participating in the Challenge have raised more than $14,000 to help schools and school children. The Seed Media Group (publishers of Seed and backers of ScienceBlogs) have pledged to match up to $15,000 in donations, so that's really $28,000, and not too shabby.
Looked at another way, though, it's pretty pathetic. That $14,000 has come from at most 138 donors (some…
drorzel | October 9, 2007Here's another post to highlight a worthy proposal with a good science connection. "Little Scientists" is looking to bring marine habitats to pre-kindergarten students in Buffalo:
Animals and life sciences are of particular interest to young children, so we try to discover a lot about animals and habitats. We are also very lucky to have a partnership with the local science museum and students get a chance to visit at least once a year.
I am requesting science materials that will be housed in our classroom and not in the museum. For example, I would like my students to be able to handle books…
drorzel | October 9, 2007We're one week into the DonorsChoose challenge for this year, and readers of this blog have already contributed over $2,000 to help school teachers and students. Those of you who have contributed, thank you very much for your generosity.
We've still got $4,000 to go to reach the goal for the challenge, though, so there will be more than a few posts coming up to try to solicit new contributions. Today, I thought I would try to highlight a couple of the proposals in the challenge, to suggest some more concrete giving opportunities.
We'll start close to (my) home, with "Cruise the Forest", a…
drorzel | October 4, 2007At the time of this writing, the Uncertain Principles blog challenge stands in first place on the ScienceBlogs Leaderboard, with just under $2,000 in donations so far. That's almost a third of the challenge goal of $6000 in just three days, which is fantastic. Thank you for your generosity.
Of course, that still leaves $4,000 to go, which means more donations are definitely wanted. The hip thing to do appears to be to offer incentives for donations, and who am I to pass up a good idea. So, here you go:
For a $30 donation to the DonorsChoose challenge, you can buy this blog.
Details, terms,…
drorzel | October 1, 2007As you may or may not remember from last year, a number of us at ScienceBlogs participated in a charity drive, raising $34,000 for the educational charity DonorsChoose. It's back again this year, and better than ever: we've got our own dedicated leader board, and the event this time out will be a full month, starting today, October 1.
To get to my challenge, follow this helpful little graphical link, which will be appearing all over the blog this month:
Once you're there, you'll be presented with a list of proposals that you can donate money to. These are funding requests from teachers,…
drorzel | September 30, 2007If you like free money, Six Apart (owners of Movable Type and LiveJournal) have an offer for you: send them an email, and they'll send you $30.
"What's the catch?" you say. Because there has to be a catch...
And, indeed, there is a catch: the $30 is in the form of a gift certificate for DonorsChoose.org, the favorite educational charity of ScienceBlogs and a bunch of other people. But that's not a problem, right? After all, you like kids, and you believe in education, right?
So, send them an email by 5pm PDT tomorrow, and get your gift certificate. And tomorrow, I'll have some suggestions for…
drorzel | August 9, 2007The American Express "Members Project" has selected a winner, though not without a whiff of controversy. Of course, given that the winning project is intended to provide safe drinking water for children, which is exactly the sort of unglamourous but necessary work that really needs more funding, it would be tacky in the extreme to complain at length.
The locally hyped DonorsChoose proposal came in second in the voting, and will receive $100,000 (as will three other runner-up projects), which isn't too shabby. Thanks to all those who voted and contributed, and congratulations to all the…
drorzel | July 27, 2007DonorsChoose, the educational charity we ran a fundraiser for last year, has made it to the final round of five in the American Express Members Project charity giveaway, and they're looking for votes to help them win $5 million.
They're up against some stiff competition, and really, it'd be churlish to complain about any of these organizations winning the money. If you have an AmEx card, though, and are liable to be swayed by the urgings of a blogger, go over there and vote for DonorsChoose, who are doing some really good work.
drorzel | July 11, 2007You may or may not remember that we did a ScienceBlogs fundraiser last year for a group called "DonorsChoose" that provides small grants to teachers in poor school districts around the country. We'll probably do another in September this year (discussions are under way), but right now, they're involved in the Members Project run by American Express, with a chance to win up to $5,000,000 from Amex. From the mailing they sent me:
DonorsChoose has just been selected as a quarter-finalist in the American Express Members Project. The prize is up to $5 million, and if we win, we'll dedicate all the…
drorzel | December 12, 2006As you may or may not recall, some time back we did a fundraising challenge to raise money for the educational charity Donors Choose. Uncertain Principles readers donated a little over $1,200, and ScienceBlogs in general raised about $34,000.
When I kicked in my money, I forgot to un-check the option to have thank-you notes sent from the classes that were funded by the contribution, mostly because I didn't understand what it was. A week or so ago, a big envelope arrived from DonorsChoose, containing a bunch of hand-written notes from one of the classes who got funding through the Challenge,…
drorzel | July 5, 2006I had meant to post something or another yesterday, after we got back, but, well, I was still in vacation mode, and didn't get around to it. I also didn't queue up anything for today, thinking that I would write something last night, but I didn't feel like doing that, either. You may get another "Classic Edition" post this afternoon, or you may get nothing. Check back regularly to find out.
I do want to post a belated wrap-up of the DonorsChoose fundraiser (official tallies from Janet):
Total donations: $22,554.38
Amount matched by SEED: $10,000
Completion bonus from DonorsChoose: $1447.30…
drorzel | June 30, 2006As you have no doubt seen elsewhere on ScienceBlogs, the great DonorsChoose blog challenge ends tomorrow. I won't actually be here to do a final post on the subject, so this is the last prodding you'll get from me.
As of this morning, the Uncertain Principles challenge entry stands at $996.02, according to the leader board. If you've got a spare $3.98 that you don't know what to do with, please consider donating it to a worthy cause, to get us an even $1,000. Or kick in a little extra-- I'm not that obsessive about round numbers...
On the other hand, if you're being strategic about this, and…
drorzel | June 27, 2006Last week's attempt to shame people into donating to the DonorsChoose fundraiser produced a flurry of donations that brought us up to a respectable $896.02 and third place on the leader board. Which is pretty cool-- thanks to all who have donated.
The official challenge runs through July 1 (that is, Saturday), and it'd be cool to take that total over $1000, if possible. I'm not really going to ramp up the annoying pledge-drive stuff as we approach the deadline, but if you haven't given anything yet, please do consider contributing. There are a large number of proposals left open, seeking…
drorzel | June 21, 2006That's the inevitable conclusion to be drawn by anyone looking at the DonorsChoose Leaderboard at the moment. So far, we've had ten donations to my challenge, raising a total of $395 for deserving school teachers and students, which is good, and I thank those who have contributed.
But, man, we're getting our clocks cleaned in both absolute and per-capita terms. I mean, it's one thing for PZ Myers and his billions of tentacled minions to be beating us in absolute dollars, but even in average-donation terms, we're getting housed. Math nerds have ponied up an average of $110/donation, the squid…
drorzel | June 19, 2006I'm really not going to keep flogging the DonorsChoose fundraiser in an active way for the next two weeks (it runs through July 1), so you don't have to worry about that. I will continue to include the donation button/ link in my posts, though:
and occasional updates will follow as events warrant. Collectively, we're probably past the $10,000 match that Seed promised, which means that school teachers will have gotten at least $20,000 in funding as a result of this drive, which is pretty cool. And more is always better.
One final bit of active enticement, and then I'll shut up about it for a…
drorzel | June 18, 2006ScienceBlogs Charity Liason Janet Stemwedel provides an update of the first two days of the ScienceBlogs fundraiser for DonorsChoose: over $8,000 in direct contributions, with our Corporate Masters at Seed agreeing to match up to $10,000. Not bad for two days, on a weekend no less.
As for the local update, the Uncertain Principles challenge drive stands at $310, of which $100 is my personal contribution (I actually gave them $200, but didn't get the second $100 contribution recorded as part of my challenge). That's not bad, but we're getting our clocks cleaned by the bio nerds-- come on,…
drorzel | June 16, 2006Why is this dog sad?
Because people aren't donating enough to the ScienceBlogs fundraiser... Isn't it worth a few bucks to cheer her up?
(Actually, that's not true-- donations thus far are in excess of $3,000, and Seed has promised some additional matching funds. But how could I resist the opportunity for a shameless appeal, and some Friday dog-blogging?)
(She's really very easy to cheer up, as you can see after the cut:)
All it takes is some smelly gym clothes for her to roll on:
(If you really want the full effect, there's a movie of her ecstatic rolling at my old blog. The one linked in…
drorzel | June 15, 2006At the suggestion of our resident ethicist, we've decided to try to use the power of ScienceBlogs to do some good. Thus, we present the first-ever ScienceBlogs Charity Fundraiser.
Here's the deal: An organization called Donors Choose solicits proposals from school teachers who want equipment that their districts can't provide. They then accept donations toward the purchase of those items, and give the money to the districts and teachers who need it. The proposals range from requests for money to buy computers and other tech gadgets (LCD projectors are a popular request) to books for use in…