helping third world countries.... charities/fundraising/awareness

[foxydivano1]

Hi,

I am only 21, but really want to help raise the awareness of third world countries, and inturn raise money to help fund medicine, education, crops etc. I have always said, if i won the lottery, this is what i'd do, but until that day, i need other ideas as to what i can actually do!

For example, ASDA were recently collecting stamps - which the Salvation Army would sell, any profit made went towards the purchase of 500 wind-up radios for children in a number of African countries. These young children (many of which were head of the family, after losing both parents), the radios would provide educational information such as sanitation, how to harvest crops, sexual health etc - and for one little boy (only eleven) said the most important gift the radio provided him was security when he was alone in the dark, it provided him with comfort and stopped him becoming scared.
The radios have also helped build friendships, as other children want to listen too.

I think this is such a wonderful idea, and think other (largeer) organisations should think about helping others less fortunate in this way.
Anyway, my local asda have taken down the stamp collecting facility, so if anyone has any ideas of how I (and anyone else) can support good causes like this, please let me know!

thanks for reading!

[Ava77]

There's a whole variety of ways you can help out. From volunteering for a charity, to raising funds. If you particularly want to raise funds, you could become a collector, you'll need to contact the charity you're interested in to do this.

Alternatively, if you want a more inspiring route, why not go on a trek or parachute jump etc. and get sponsorship from individuals and companies. If you get it covered in your local papers it would also help raise awareness as well as funds.

As an examples, take a look at this:
http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/Events/index.htm

It might not be your chosen cause, but lots of charities organise similar things if you check their website.

Hope that helps a little!

[mickeymiller]

First of all, congrats on getting your fundraising started! Raising support for a worthy cause can be super rewarding. But obviously, if you're not an official non-profit, it can be really tricky finding a good way to build support for your cause.

One route you might want to consider: setting up a homepage for your group on a fundraising website. Having a group homepage online makes organizing and fundraising infinitely easier ... And though the majority of fundraising sites require you have official non-profit status, many good ones only require that you are a group - and will give you plenty of the tools you need.

For example, one good site is Meet Up (www.meetup.com), who allow you to fundraise directly to your account, and register a group without having an official non-profit status - and they cover groups around the world, while giving you some tools to do event management. But the tools they offer are a little limited outside of fundraising.

Another good option would be Empowered.org (www.empowered.org), a platform that also helps small groups fundraise and organize (regardless of non-profit status). They also work for international groups - and offer a fair amount of useful tools, like the ability to organize your group or to create volunteer activities and fundraising campaigns for more targeted ways to raise support.

Or you could always try to send up your own PayPal account to link to you directly to help you fundraise, but this is a little trickier and a bit inflexible.

Good luck getting started moving forward! Hope that helped.