I'm looking for a charity to support. Please make recommendations of charities helping people (not Ozzy, Bugweed or PAK). My wife and I currently contribute to Save the Children. I'm looking for charities that help people help themselves with sustainable and renewable resources--things like micro lending, providing animals, crops, education etc.
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Charity
- Thread starter JBL
- Start date
if you guys have an Optimist Club locally they are about the best bang per buck in helping kids but they arent quite where your looking for(the local one here, which im a member of, could use a Shuga Daddy :grin: )
not sure who does the sorta work your looking at...............im just familiar with the ones like the Elks, Optimists, Lions, ect..................
not sure who does the sorta work your looking at...............im just familiar with the ones like the Elks, Optimists, Lions, ect..................
Clint
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Clint
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Heifer International is an organization that provides livestock http://www.heifer.org/. My wife & daughter have raised money for them.
PlantAKiss
Moderator Schmoderator Fluorescent fluorite, Engl
SAINT JUDE CHILDRENS RESEARCH HOSPITAL!
St. Jude's does incredible work for children with cancer. They take anyone...regardless of ability to pay. They pay for all the treatment PLUS housing for families so they don't have to be split up while a child is in treatment. They have made HUGE advancements in cancer treatment, with some children's cancers having an almost 90% cure rate--a rate unheard of a decade or so ago. They exist solely by DONATION. So they need money in order to maintain the free-treatment-for-everyone policy.
St. Jude's has given MANY families their children back...kids who would not have survived if it weren't for the research, diligence and caring there.
Oh...I guess that's not a "people helping people" type of charity. But if I ever win the lottery, I'm giving a HUUUGE chunk o' money to St. Jude's. Its an absolutely amazing place. I make little donations but...not what I would if I could...
Can you just imagine what it would be like to be told your 2-year-old has CANCER?
St. Jude's does incredible work for children with cancer. They take anyone...regardless of ability to pay. They pay for all the treatment PLUS housing for families so they don't have to be split up while a child is in treatment. They have made HUGE advancements in cancer treatment, with some children's cancers having an almost 90% cure rate--a rate unheard of a decade or so ago. They exist solely by DONATION. So they need money in order to maintain the free-treatment-for-everyone policy.
St. Jude's has given MANY families their children back...kids who would not have survived if it weren't for the research, diligence and caring there.
Oh...I guess that's not a "people helping people" type of charity. But if I ever win the lottery, I'm giving a HUUUGE chunk o' money to St. Jude's. Its an absolutely amazing place. I make little donations but...not what I would if I could...
Can you just imagine what it would be like to be told your 2-year-old has CANCER?
Clint
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I have to second this recomendation. Its the main charity I give to. It tries to end world hunger by giving livestock and training to a family so that they dont need help again. They are taught to maintain the animals sustainably and the animals give what is usually sorely lacking in most diets where hunger is a problem, which is protein. This charity is awesome and I really urge you to consider them. Check out their website it will give a better description of them then I ever could.
jimscott
Tropical Fish Enthusiast
You guys listed so many good causes! Keep them coming. And PAK, your charity is people helping people. St. Judes has a great rep. I'll probably give both locally and internationally.
Jimscott--Do you mean Compassion International--alleviating childhood poverty in Jesus's name? Or are you having pun with me?
Jimscott--Do you mean Compassion International--alleviating childhood poverty in Jesus's name? Or are you having pun with me?
Clint
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I hate to be Mr. butthole, BUT I'd donate to a secular charity if I were you. That organization is great and does a ton of good, but why spend money on what's pretty much missionary work when you could give the same amount to a charity that isn't concerned with "releasing children from spiritual poverty"? and "church based programs" so they can become "christian adults"? I mean.... why not just help people instead of spreading Christianity? Of course, Compassion does NOT exclude any needy kids but they seem really... helpfully faith-based. I think a charity should be helping-based. How much of your donation goes to buy bibles and support church programs and such? Wouldn't spending that money on food and drugs help more? Just a thought.
Don't get me wrong, they are a GREAT organization, totally on the up-and-up, but I guess it's just a matter of if you want to help people or help people WHILE spreading christianity. It's you're money and whatever charity you choose will still be a charity, which is good no matter what the religion is.
Don't get me wrong, they are a GREAT organization, totally on the up-and-up, but I guess it's just a matter of if you want to help people or help people WHILE spreading christianity. It's you're money and whatever charity you choose will still be a charity, which is good no matter what the religion is.
Thanks for the comments Clint. As you know, for most Christians, spreading the message is considered helping people. But I don't want anyone else turning this into a 'Here's my thoughts on Christianity...' or any other religion thread.
I am researching all recommendations through Charity Navigator as a start. Any charity, secular or faith based, has a potential to spend funds in a way not compatible with personal beliefs. I'll make sure that my selection is compatible with mine. Anyone else can spend their money as they see fit.
I am researching all recommendations through Charity Navigator as a start. Any charity, secular or faith based, has a potential to spend funds in a way not compatible with personal beliefs. I'll make sure that my selection is compatible with mine. Anyone else can spend their money as they see fit.
Clint
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Lol NO I don't want it to turn into that either lmao.
Here's the dude I was talking to it...come to think of it it might not be a charity. I'm too lazy to research it right now.
http://www.grameen-info.org/
Here's the dude I was talking to it...come to think of it it might not be a charity. I'm too lazy to research it right now.
http://www.grameen-info.org/
Clint
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jimscott
Tropical Fish Enthusiast
When looking at charities, things aren't always what they seem. Be especially cautious of those administrative cost ratios. When a charity mails you a donation request with some information about their problem of interest, the costs will be attributed to public education, not an administrative cost of fundraising.
Dumping a lot of donated stuff at an airport is cheap and it allows a charity to brag about low administrative costs. Americares is notorious for that - they collect manufacturer over-runs, close to expiration pharmaceuticals, etc. and carry them overseas. Their administrative costs pale against the "value" of what they provide and their corporate "benefactor" get a big tax write-off instead of a disposal cost.
One reason for microcredit's high administrative costs is that their usual business model requires a network that reaches into the smallest rural communities. That's expensive. Grameen is just the most famous of many microcredit organizations. I've been following microcredit for a long time and wrote a 20+ page term paper last year on the social background of microcredit in Bangladesh.
Microcredit organizations know they can score big international support by marketing their focus on women borrowers (plays well with social liberals) or that they "help people help themselves" (plays well with fiscal conservatives). The fact is that they prefer women borrowers because they're easily threatened in a patriarchal society when payments are due. And many of the borrowers pay off a loan from one organization with a loan from another so, in addition to all their other struggles, they also find themselves in debt.
Donate whatever money you can, but also look around for something you can give some of your time to. I help out with an affordable housing organization and my wife helps run a flower sale for a local shelter and she & my daughter help raise money for Heifer International. We donate money to them and others, but we're not quite in Bill Gates' financial strata and our time does them more good.
By the way, there's a real interesting book about international charities, called The Road to H*ll. With an e instead of a *, but I had to beat the dreaded Terraforum filter.
Dumping a lot of donated stuff at an airport is cheap and it allows a charity to brag about low administrative costs. Americares is notorious for that - they collect manufacturer over-runs, close to expiration pharmaceuticals, etc. and carry them overseas. Their administrative costs pale against the "value" of what they provide and their corporate "benefactor" get a big tax write-off instead of a disposal cost.
One reason for microcredit's high administrative costs is that their usual business model requires a network that reaches into the smallest rural communities. That's expensive. Grameen is just the most famous of many microcredit organizations. I've been following microcredit for a long time and wrote a 20+ page term paper last year on the social background of microcredit in Bangladesh.
Microcredit organizations know they can score big international support by marketing their focus on women borrowers (plays well with social liberals) or that they "help people help themselves" (plays well with fiscal conservatives). The fact is that they prefer women borrowers because they're easily threatened in a patriarchal society when payments are due. And many of the borrowers pay off a loan from one organization with a loan from another so, in addition to all their other struggles, they also find themselves in debt.
Donate whatever money you can, but also look around for something you can give some of your time to. I help out with an affordable housing organization and my wife helps run a flower sale for a local shelter and she & my daughter help raise money for Heifer International. We donate money to them and others, but we're not quite in Bill Gates' financial strata and our time does them more good.
By the way, there's a real interesting book about international charities, called The Road to H*ll. With an e instead of a *, but I had to beat the dreaded Terraforum filter.
