The New Face of Philanthropy: How You Can Give $5 Million to Education This Week (URGENT!)

[Linkedin-Entrepreneurs.com Victory Darwin]

The below interview with Charles Best will show you how to pair a luxury lifestyle with changing the world, how he went from zero funding to receiving help from Pierre Omidyar of eBay, how he got on Oprah, and much, much more.

DonorsChoose.org, which started in Bronx public school cafeteria, is — after years of sweat and tears from hundreds of volunteers — now a semi-finalist in the American Express Members Project, which you’ve seen on TV with Martin Scorcese, Ellen DeGeneres, and others. This is their one big chance, and 100% of the funding will go to classroom projects that you get to choose. In the spirit of “letting the people decide,” they would distribute DonorsChoose gift certificates to all the people who voted, enabling them to apply the award proceeds to classroom projects of their choice.

The margin of victory could well be a hundred votes or less. This is one contest where each person’s vote makes a huge difference. If you want to skip the interview and vote, click here. Otherwise, read on and be amazed…

What prompted you to start DonorsChoose.org?

During my first year of teaching at a public high school in the Bronx, my colleagues and I would talk about books we wanted our students to read, a field trip that would bring the subject matter to life, an art project that just needed certain art supplies… Many of us would go into our own pockets to buy copy paper and pencils, but for the most part, we saw our students going without the materials and experiences they needed to learn.

But why attempt to create an entirely new way of donating?

I suspected that there were lots of people who wanted to help our public schools. But I also suspected that those same people were skeptical about writing a $100 check to a big institution and then wondering whether their money really went to the intended recipients. By using the power of the web, I saw a way to give ordinary “citizen philanthropists” the same level of choice and impact that Bill Gates gets when he’s making a million-dollar gift.

Did you have to be tech-savvy to start the website on your own?

I’m not tech savvy at all. In fact, I only learned how to do instant messaging a year ago. I created DonorsChoose by putting pencil to paper—literally—and sketching out each screen of the web site and how it would work. Then I paid a programmer from Poland $1,500 to turn my sketches and common-sense rules into a functioning website. That was Version 1.0 of DonorsChoose.org, and it sufficed for two years!

With the website constructed, how did you get teachers to participate?

My mom helped me make dessert for my colleagues, and I put it in the teachers’ lunch room saying, “If you eat this dessert, you have to go to my newly created website and ask for whatever it is you most want for your students.” Eleven of my colleagues ate the dessert, and then went to DonorsChoose.org and submitted project proposals ranging from “Immigration Novels ($200)” to “Baby Think-It-Over Dolls for Pregnancy
Prevention ($400).”

READ THE REST AT TIM'S BLOG
http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2007/07/17/the-new-face-of-phi...

THEN, if you have an Amex card, vote here (or ask a friend with an Amex card to do it).

http://www.membersproject.com/Education/5630

[Linkedin-Entrepreneurs.com Victory Darwin]

SOME COMMENTS ON TIM'S BLOG:

# Jefferson Kim Says:
July 18th, 2007 at 1:14 am

Not to sound unsupportive of Tim’s work. . . but. . .

Would anyone dare to say that providing classroom supplies to our “needy” children in America be more valuable than providing basic, clean water to developing countries? If so, I’d be interested to hear the reasoning.

I know we all have the freedom of choice, but it just seems to me to be logically inconsistent to be worried about our country’s underfunded education system when there are people in other countries that are so destitute and lack basic infrastructure to provide for their people’s basic needs like water and food.

But then again. . . could it be that a lot of those countries that are destitute or under developed are because of the fact that their government is so corrupt and messed up? And actually the people of that country are to be blamed? And that actually providing charity (even basic items as water) is only supporting the preexisting government and allowing that existing government to continue and NOT to its basic JOB?

But then (of course arguing with myself again) couldn’t you argue that about any sort of foreign aid? And the concept of “tough love?”

Anyway, this goes down the slippery slope that eventually says that anyone less off than you is because of their lack of effort, and any sort of “handout” will only hurt them. . . so therefore any sort of charity will actually hurt them in the long run.

Just some thoughts that I’m sure aren’t new, but does anyone have any studies that they can point to where it shows charities actually HURT rather than help? And then back to the same original question on how do you justify giving money to our underfunded children when there are drastically much more underfunded children in other countries.

Where does the insanity end!!?? There’s so much need in the world and collectively as a US population in our wealth have the power to stop it all, but are we to help everyone else’s children at the expense of our own?

# Jefferson Kim Says:
July 18th, 2007 at 1:49 am

Darn, I can’t delete comments I wrote (referencing the above one) . . .

I actually *read* Tim’s comment reply after typing my entry above, and yes, Tim did attempt to answer my questions above so sorry to everyone who read through my comment based on my lack of effort to read preexisting comments. I should go back to sleep.

Commenting to Tim:
Domestic education as the solution to all the world’s problems. . . interesting concept to ponder. . . so is that like saying that we are educating the people of our country, giving them the tools to eventually make enough money and then trust that they will go and fight against all the world’s problems? For some reason, I really lack the faith of our selfish, consumerist society to overall really actually CARE about other countries. . . aren’t we as US citizens educated enough right now to make a difference? (I just read Farenheheit 451, and sadly I see that as our country’s fate)

You state, “Adding people without adding the tools — education and confidence — can create more problems than it solves. Increased disease, famine, and war are just three examples,” but when it really comes down to the United States in its CURRENT WEALTH, could we not actually battle disease, famine, and war RIGHT NOW? What are we waiting for?

What if, RIGHT NOW, every single American citizen stopped buying that extra new vehicle, or Wii, or PS3, or new clothing style, or Starbucks Coffee, . . . and gave 10% of their income to solve the world’s problems (. . . if one could be so bold and general as to claim to know exactly what that is)? Would we solve all the issues? Is education really the bottle neck of the “good doing” of the United States? Or is the US already rich enough in its current state that in truth it’s not education, money, or resources that’s keeping us from solving the world’s problems, it’s just our selfish desire to increase our own personal comfort of living?

After all. . . we do live in a Capitalist society, which means we make it to the top at the expense of others. . . but then it’s that very same system, where the rich can become filthy rich, that has propelled us to become so filthy rich as a nation. What beauty! What sadness. . . So I can’t really bash on our selfishness, as that very selfishness has brought such great innovation!

But in the end, the answer probably isn’t just ONE charity over another, and my point isn’t necessarily to bash on Tim’s charity or one charity over another. My point is along the lines of, we, as an American people in our extreme wealth, just need to be more generous with our great power.

We need more of everything above (and tons more), and it’s counter productive for me to try and argue one charity over another when the underlying solution needs EVERYONE’S contribution.

I hope DonorsChoose does extremely well, but for the sake of actual needs, clean water is needed more urgently. I’m just not convinced that education is the long-term solution, when currently, as educated as we are in the United States, we already do so little. . .


# Victory Darwin Says:
July 18th, 2007 at 2:39 pm

To Jefferson Kim:
I’m going to try to be positive here. I think you should rethink everything you said with this in mind: Anytime anyone takes action to do something good, it creates a ripple effect (as we are seeing here). Whether you look at it on a law of attraction level or just that we get emotionally inspired, the fact is it works. If I feel my calling or purpose is to educate potential social entrepreneurs (World Vision Entrepreneur) then I should focus and succeed at that rather than pursue food/water/health projects which I would be much less likely to succeed at. The same goes for donations. Do what inspires you, and then you will want to do even more and you will inspire others. It doesn’t make sense for you and I to spend our energy arguing about which cause is more important, when we are really both on the same side of the “help our fellow man” equation.

My daughter takes our junk change (pennies, nickels, dimes) and giftwraps them into little $1 packages, and gives them to beggars on the street (lots of them in Victoria). I told her to stop that and put it all in the bank and make a monthly donation to Feed the Children or World Vision. But she said she likes to do this because so many people pass them by and she can be the one who doesn’t, and show them she cares, and she always tells them that she wants them to buy good food. What purpose would it serve to argue with her. Anyway, she said she will start doing paid blog posts for my site and then she can do the donations my way too!
~Victory

[Linkedin-Entrepreneurs.com Victory Darwin]

checkout the WIDGET above (in the first box of middle column, when u first come onto this group page) supplied by the AMEX MEMBERS PROJECT SITE.

[Brent Goodman]

Tim's friend's organization made it to the final judging round today, by a margin of 65 votes. So even posts like this could generate the votes needed. And that's the difference between $5million and nada!

Vote for your favorite organization now... it's the final round!

click the AMEX MEMBERS CHOICE WIDGET just above the start of the forum. (click BACK in your browser to see it).

B.G.