After a long Thanksgiving weekend filled with eating and shopping, people around the world donated to organizations and charities this Tuesday as a global fundraising effort.
On Nov. 27, organizations throughout Yale, New Haven and Connecticut, such as CT Fund for the Environment-Save the Sound, Havenly and Camp Kesem, took to Facebook and Twitter to promote donation efforts as part of Giving Tuesday, a worldwide campaign that uses social media to encourage donations to nonprofits and charities.
“We wanted to give people a chance to give on Giving Tuesday, even if they do not have much money to give to charity,” Havenly Co-Founder and Executive Director Caterina Passoni ’18 said. “It also allowed us to reach people beyond Yale. One of our goals is to work with New Haven to pierce the Yale bubble as much as possible.”
Havenly — a bakery run collaboratively by students and refugees with a mission to create employment for refugees — partnered with New Haven’s Chipotle restaurant, which pledged to give 33 percent of Tuesday evening’s purchases to the fundraiser, if customers requested that the sale be put toward the donation efforts . According to their online donation platform, Havenly had raised $2,136 as of 8 p.m. on Tuesday.
Passoni added that by the end of this year, she hopes to raise $8,000 — the amount the company requires to fund staff and operations for its apprenticeship program starting in January.
Student representatives from Yale’s chapter of Camp Kesem — a national organization that operates free summer camps for children whose parents are battling cancer — were notably active on Facebook, encouraging friends and family to give to the chapter’s donation drive. Student representatives started individual campaigns and set their own monetary goals on behalf of the camp.
By 8 p.m. on Tuesday night, Camp Kesem’s national organization had raised over $800,000 from nearly 20,000 donations. The Yale chapter had raised $41,450 — with one student’s campaign totaling nearly $5,000 — according to the Camp Kesem website.
Organizations in Elm City also engaged with potential donors on the national day of giving. CT Fund for the Environment-Save the Sound Director of Member Engagement Joe DiMaggio said that social media allowed the environmental group to reach a younger donor base.
“We wanted to open up our online aging campaign by making it a lot easier for a lot of people, class types, access types to donate,” DiMaggio said. “The data [since participating in Giving Tuesday for the last three years] has definitely shown that new donors are people who haven’t given in the past.”
DiMaggio added that, although they have seen an increase in donors, the organization has not seen a significant increase in money donated.
While many groups were active on social media, some organizations, such as the United Way of Greater New Haven, also emailed potential donors to solicit donations as well as showcase their social media fundraising campaigns.
The Belfer Center for Innovation and Social Justice at 92nd Street Y, a New York City cultural center, founded Giving Tuesday in 2012. In 2017, participating organizations raised over $300 million — with $1.2 million donations coming from over 150 countries. Organizations participating in last year’s Giving Tuesday received 21.7 billion impressions — likes, shares and more — and the average online donation totaled $120.40.
Nick Tabio | nick.tabio@yale.edu