Tweet This
- #GivingTuesday, which began as a way to deepen local outreach and broaden national impact for New York’s 92nd Street Y, has marked the opening day of giving season
- #GivingTuesday isn’t just about giving money—it can also include donations of coats and food, time and talent, or anything else people want to share with organizations that move them.
Despite the fact that there are 7 billion people around the globe, technology has enabled us to come together in an instant over an event, a concept or a scandal. Consider the hashtag, the “#” octothorpe symbol, which at any instant can connect social media users with up-to-the-moment news or key words. With exponential rise of social media use and a smearing of the lines between our in-person and online lives, it’s no wonder “hashtag” was introduced into the Oxford English and Merriam-Webster dictionaries this year.
This season you’ve seen plenty of #BlackFriday and #CyberMonday references, but be on the lookout Tuesday, Dec. 2, for the new tag in town, #GivingTuesday. The movement is meant to harness the collective power of charities, families, businesses and individuals to transform how people think about, talk about and participate in the giving season.
Since 2012, #GivingTuesday, which began as a way to deepen local outreach and broaden national impact for New York’s 92nd Street Y, has marked the opening day of giving season , said founder Henry Timms, philanthropy superstar and executive director of the Y's community center that provides programs and services to more than 300,000 people who comes through its doors, and thousands more via technology and online access.
“A lot of people get through the holidays, and there’s a sense that we want to find a way to connect more meaningfully to more people who don’t have as many things,” Timms said. #GivingTuesday isn’t just about giving money—it can also include donations of coats and food, time and talent, or anything else people want to share with organizations that move them.
“There’s no doubt that we all like to rally around something. What about a rally for good and giving in a season that many people feel has been hijacked by just consumerism? And there’s clearly a demand for this,” said Aaron Sherinian, a spokesperson with the UN Foundation, an early partner in #GivingTuesday. “We’re not saying to people, ‘don’t shop on Black Friday,’ or, ‘don’t shop on Cyber Monday.’ But we’re saying to people that giving season shouldn’t be something that happens around last three days of the year, when a lot of people write checks. And regardless of your faith, your nationality, or your ZIP code, everyone has an opportunity to give back at the end of the year.”
#GivingTuesday has engaged 20,000 nonprofit organization partners this year, up from the original 2,500 in 2012; organizers say they are surprised by the rapid growth of the movement and creativity it has sparked. For example, the Nightingale-Bamford school created a philanthropy curriculum, free to anyone who wants to use it; the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is matching donations to Shot@Life, a vaccination effort via the UN Foundation.
Organizers say the decentralized nature of the campaign makes it impossible to pinpoint exactly how much the movement has raised. However, in 2013, “online giving on #GivingTuesday increased compared to the same time the year before without a corresponding decline in giving for a majority of the organizations that reported the year before. So what this means is we weren’t just moving around money,” Sherinian said. “What #GivingTuesday proved to people is that if you ask and if you ask big, people will show up. And they’ll show up big and support their charities and causes.”
Sherinian added that the campaign this year encouraged families to talk about charity when they came together over Thanksgiving and that he witnessed firsthand in his own family how effective the power of giving is when children feel aligned with a cause.
Timms said that the most passionate givers come to celebrate the cause on a year-round basis, going from donors to “owners.” “Think about who you can get behind in a longer-term way. What people really need is not just #GivingTuesday moments in a day, but people who can get behind them for a long time. … if you’re able to, make a recurring gift. There’s nothing more valuable for nonprofits than recurring giving.”
Asked if #GivingTuesday is a harbinger of the end of holiday consumerism, Timms said, “I think it would take a very brave man to bet against consumerism, But having said that, I would be prepared to make a big bet on community.”
