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Posted by Elaine on
Monday,
May 21, 2012 at 12:12pm
Are you on Pinterest? If so, use our new “Pin it” button to share your favorite (or your own) classroom projects with your followers. Found under our Share feature on project pages, you can use the “Pin it” button to collect your favorite classroom projects, organize ideas for future projects, or simply to gain more attention on your project that needs funding.
To get you started, we’re launching our first Pinterest contest!
Here’s how to enter:
• Follow us on Pinterest – keep up to date on our staff picks from favorite childhood books, perfect teacher gifts, and adorable classroom photos.
• Pin a favorite classroom project to one of your boards.
• In the caption of your pin, use the hashtag #iheartteaching and tell us why you love teaching. If you are a donor, use the hashtag #iheartteachers and tell us why you appreciate teachers. (Remember to add the hashtag so we can find your entry.)
Our 5 favorite pins will win a $100 DonorsChoose.org gift card! Winners will be chosen on June 4th. Best of luck to all of you and start pinning!
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Posted by jenny on
Tuesday,
May 15, 2012 at 10:59am
How are your triceps feeling? Our friends at 99designs, the fastest growing graphic design marketplace, have chosen to flex their muscles on DonorsChoose.org’s behalf. They’ll be facing off against four other startups to try to secure funds for charities in the first ever Pushup Charity challenge!
The organizations will compete relay-style to see which startup first reaches 100 pushups. Each company must raise at least $2,500 for their selected charity, and the money will be pooled. The winning team will receive 60% of it to donate to its charity, and each other team will get 10%. So, at the end of the day, there are no losers – all of these worthy organizations will benefit!
We have a few ways you can get involved without breaking a sweat:
If you’re in San Francisco, come check out the contest this Thursday! Tickets are $10 (available here: http://pushupcharity.org/)
If you’re not in San Fran, but still want to see the team in action, check out their video.
Help 99design reach their $2,500 goal by donating here. They’re generously matching all donations!
Best of luck to our buff pals at 99designs! We’ll be rooting for you Thursday!
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Posted by Reyna on
Monday,
May 14, 2012 at 2:36pm
There’s one open desk remaining at DonorsChoose.org this summer – working with our Partnerships & Business Development team to crank out new leads and dig up top prospects.
A great Development Fellow candidate will:
be a current undergraduate or recent graduate,
have experience in data mining, research and analysis,
be highly organized, detail-oriented, results driven and a strong project manager.
If you or someone you know might be interested in this paid summer fellowship position, please see position details and application instructions here.
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Posted by gwen on
Friday,
May 4, 2012 at 4:42pm
Thank you to all teachers who entered School Specialty’s Classroom Makeover Contest! We appreciate your participation and hope you’ll continue to share your ideas, opinions, and experiences in our discussion forum.
We thought we’d share a few highlights from the contest, which asked teachers to share advice or personal classroom experiences for a chance to win:
Technology in my classroom: “Having an iPad has made a huge impact in my special education/autism/behavior classroom…With the handwriting apps as well as apps for reading and other academic subjects, these students have transformed the way they learn and eagerly embrace learning time when they are on the iPad.”
Creating a memorable thank-you package: “I have my students web their ideas about why the donation is significant as a class on the board – we talk about how the materials we received will make our learning more fun/interesting/etc and compare our classroom before/after getting the materials. Doing this has resulted in some really heartfelt letters that surprised me with their detail and appreciation, and it also helps give my struggling learners and writers a good starting point.”
The most high-impact item I’ve received: “The most recent books aimed at helping my kids deal with bullying. The students are so eager to look at them and take the ideas and share them with younger students… The motivation that these books have given my students is amazing.”
1) Mrs. Veneris – Western Guilford High School in Greensboro, NC
2) Mrs. Smith – Endhaven Elementary School in Charlotte, NC
3) Mrs. Joyce – Propel East Charter School in Turtle Creek, PA
4) Ms. Goitia – Elvira Elementary School in Tucson, AZ
5) Mrs. Harris – Sequoyah Elementary School in Tulsa, OK
6) Ms. Talamantez – ALC-East in Houston, TX
Although this contest has ended, you can join the conversations in our discussion forum any time. Hope to see you there!
** We want to remind our teachers that School Specialty is offering each of the prize bundles above at steep discounts only through DonorsChoose.org. Search by item number when creating your new project to find them quickly. You’ll see the discounted price in your cart.
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Posted by gwen on
Monday,
April 30, 2012 at 2:33pm
Did you know that technology is the second most popular resource requested on DonorsChoose.org? We wanted to learn more about the effect technology has on a classroom, and asked our community of DonorsChoose.org teachers to share their thoughts and experiences. We were blown away by the response.
Check out some examples of how technology has influenced classrooms across the country, and read all of the other great responses in our discussion forum.
Christine: “I teach at a high poverty school. Very few of our students have computers at home. In our high tech society this really puts them at a huge disadvantage. I received a laptop and projector through donors choose. Now my whole class can see the computer screen and together we can learn to navigate and utilize the internet. We have video chatted with astronauts from NASA, published our work online, participated in Wheresthesmath.com, and seen the world through our computer. This has made a HUGE difference in our teaching and learning!”
Dena: “As a speech therapist at a school for moderately-profoundly disabled students, technology has a huge impact on the way I work and the way my kids get to learn and interact. Many of my students rely upon AAC devices to speak, interact with staff and peers, operate electronics, etc. The iPad as well as my iPhone with several educational and/or motivating apps has been key this year. Students are highly motivated by these devices. The Talking Tom app, for instance, encouraged one of my mainly non-verbal 12 year old students to formulate some of her first bilabial words! When I enter the room now, she immediately will go to the speech page on her AAC device and request to use the ipad or other items on the page (navigating her AAC device as well as making requests like never before!)… I was told in grad school that one day I could do therapy with just a paper and pencil…Now I believe I can do therapy with just an iphone or ipad and my ideas :)”
Adrienne: “For me, it makes learning a language real when they can interact directly on a near daily basis with native French and Francophones. It has changed my teaching to make it more based on the way that this new generation learns, and it has changed learning for my students in more ways than can be listed here.”
Susan: “I have to say that having an iPad has made a huge impact in my special education/autism/behavior classroom. Many of my students have fine motor deficits, so the physical act of writing is not only challenging for them, but can bring on behaviors that in the past have resulted in loss of instructional time. With the handwriting apps as well as apps for reading and other academic subjects, these students have transformed the way they learn and eagerly embrace learning time when they are on the iPad. We have only one iPad that we acquired early in the school year, but the knowledge that they have acquired has begun to translate to tasks outside of iPad use…”
Thanks to everyone for your thoughts and opinions. You can read more or join the conversation in our discussion forum at talk.donorschoose.org.
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Posted by Anna on
Thursday,
April 26, 2012 at 2:46pm
This month, a group of DonorsChoose.org staff members was invited to West Virginia to learn how local teachers are using DonorsChoose.org.
The day started with a visit to the classroom of Ms. Murray at Preston High School in Kingwood, WV. Ms. Murray teaches 10th Grade Chemistry and has been able to outfit her classroom with many necessary tools through DonorsChoose.org. She has requested (and received!) everything from digital microscopes to thermometers and beakers to petri dishes, all of which help bring science to life for her students.
Walking into Ms. Murray’s classroom, it was clear what an amazing teacher she is. Every student was excited to tell us what they’ve learned in her class, and to show us what they were working on.
Anna and Tommy get a lesson in forensics from two Preston High seniors.
Ms. Murray’s students showcase homemade compost (complete with worms!) they’ve created in their class.
How do different metal ions interact with fire? We found out!
DonorsChoose.org staff members with Ms. Murray, science teacher extraordinaire!
After our Chemistry lesson, our team visited West Virginia University, where we learned about the incredible work the University is doing to promote service learning with students. We were so impressed by the thousands of students who volunteer their time every year to improve the community around them! Our evening concluded at the Festival of Ideas, where Charles shared the story of DonorsChoose.org, and offered his advice for being successful to WVU students.
Charles challenges WVU students to be relentless, and to always admit mistakes!
Many thanks to everyone at Preston High School and West Virginia University for being amazing hosts. We’re so inspired by the work you are doing to make the Morgantown community a (even) better place!
Check out the latest external report from a new non-profit analysis group, Nonprofit Investor. This organization performs in-depth research on charity organizations by a team of volunteers who have backgrounds in investing, consulting, and equity research. DonorsChoose.org was one of the first charities reviewed by NPI, and good news: DonorsChoose.org was rated a BUY!
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Posted by jenny on
Monday,
April 23, 2012 at 11:13am
We are so fortunate to have teamed up with Starbucks, MSNBC, and Morning Joe! Thanks to the generosity of our favorite morning newsies, every dollar donated to classroom projects will be automatically doubled! Head to http://www.donorschoose.org/morning-joe and search for a project that speak to you.
Morning Joe will automatically double all donations, up to $2,500 per donor. Thanks Starbucks, MSNBC, and Morning Joe, for giving us the chance to be twice as nice!
Our partnership with the new documentary “BULLY” is helping thousands of students across the country see the serious consequences of bullying. While we’re obviously big fans of the film, we thought it would be useful to share some thoughts from a teacher who recently took her students to a screening. Check out this response from teacher all-star, Anna Morphew:
I teach at a small K-8 charter school in the first ring suburbs of Minneapolis. Over 85% of our students receive free or reduced price lunch, and many of their parents work multiple jobs to keep their families going. We recently had the chance to take our entire middle school (over 70 students) to see the movie “Bully” thanks to DonorsChoose.org, Chase, and Townsend Press. Many of our students (like a lot of middle school students) like to think they are tough and cooler than everything. We were a little concerned that they wouldn’t take the movie seriously because of this, so we did a lot to prepare them. In their language arts class, they watched the trailer and discussed what they saw. Before leaving on the trip, we separated them by grade and gender to have some discussions about how bullying has affected them and people they know. We were so impressed by the discussions they had. They were honest and took the issue seriously. At that point, we couldn’t wait for them to see the movie.
The movie was definitely intense. There were times when the whole group gasped in shock at the things we were seeing. Many students have told me they were fighting back tears throughout the movie. Afterwards, I heard many comments about how the students thought the movie was sad, but very touching. We have already begun to see changes in our students. One student went up to another right after the movie to apologize for the way she had treated the other student in the past. Another student admitted to a teacher that he realized he has sometimes shown bully-like behavior. We’ve also seen a higher awareness of bullying behavior. If a student is teasing someone, either the student being teased or another student is much more likely to speak up and point out that behavior as bullying. As a teacher, I try to make my classroom a safe, bully-free environment, but the movie has pushed me to think about this even more and try to improve how I handle conflicts between students. The movie has not solved all of our problems, but seeing it has really helped us and our students make changes that we know will last well into the future.
We are so thankful for the opportunity to take our students to see the movie “Bully.” I know that it will make a lasting impression on our students and staff. If you have the chance, I would highly recommend taking your students to see it. Thank you so much to DonorsChoose.org, Chase, and Townsend Press for making this happen for so many students and teachers across the country!
Teachers, there’s still time to take your students to see “BULLY” for free, thanks to our great partners. Check out this previous post for more information.
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Posted by Katie on
Thursday,
April 19, 2012 at 7:37pm
To celebrate Earth Day 2012, the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation is partnering with DonorsChoose.org to match $25,000 in donations to “green” classroom projects. “Our goal is to leverage community support for classrooms and to encourage youth stewardship this Earth Day by supporting recycling, waste reduction, and creative plastic-free projects.” said Executive Director Jessica Scheeter.
100% of Jack Johnson’s 2008 tour profits were used to establish the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation, founded by Jack and Kim Johnson to support environmental, art and music education worldwide. In conjunction with his 2008 world tour, Johnson also launched the All At Once campaign, a social action network and global community that provides information, tools, and motivation to empower individuals to become active in their local and world community.
As part of Johnson’s 2010 To The Sea tour, The Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation made donations to over 220 community groups focusing on plastic free initiatives and sustainable local food systems, as well as environmental education, oceans & watersheds, tree planting and other hands-on community projects.
