You’ve probably been hearing a lot of buzz about North Texas Giving Day this week, but what exactly is it and why does it matter? Let’s dive in. North Texas Giving Day is the Communities Foundation of Texas’ annual 18-hour online giving extravaganza for North Texas nonprofits– and all of it is driven by creative nonprofits, social media activism, area wide collaboration, and you!
Since 2009, North Texas Giving Day has pumped more than $156 million to over 2,500 local nonprofits in the North Texas Community. In 2016, $37 million was raised through more than 142,000 gifts benefiting 2,518 nonprofits. The purpose and goal of North Texas Giving Day is to help build awareness and support for nonprofits in the North Texas region.
The Dallas-Fort Worth area is chock-full of amazing nonprofits who spend their days making our cities better places and fighting for causes worth believing in. Today, these nonprofits are hoping to receive funding that will help them take their philanthropic services to new heights, and they need us to help them get there.
Giving Day will last until midnight tonight, and we wanted to highlight some of our members who are participating in North Texas Giving Day. We’re beyond proud to know the following 5 DFW-based nonprofits, and since we get to watch them serve wholeheartedly from our spaces day-in and day-out, we can vouch that they are, without a doubt, worth supporting.
Read over these 5 amazing Dallas nonprofits, and if one of their missions strikes a chord with you, donate (we dare you!).
1. The Deep Ellum Foundation
The Deep Ellum Foundation operates exclusively as a nonprofit 501(c)(3) corporation to raise and distribute public funds within the Deep Ellum community to enhance, improve, and market the neighborhood as a whole.
By contract with the City of Dallas, the Deep Ellum Foundation manages the Deep Ellum Public Improvement District. In addition, the Deep Ellum Foundation strives to provide a unified neighborhood voice to the city and work among the property owners, business owners, residents, and visitors.
Without the Deep Ellum Foundation, our favorite Dallas neighborhood wouldn’t be nearly as revitalized, small-business centric, protected, or thriving as much as it currently is. But it still has a lot of room for improvement, and donating to the Deep Ellum Foundation will ensure that your funds go directly to a neighborhood that we all love working, playing, and for some even living in.
Donate To The Deep Ellum Foundation
2. 2nd Saturday
2ndSaturday is a grassroots movement that exists to Reach Lives, Restore Hope, and Redeem Communities based in Dallas, TX. They partner with those on the margins of poverty to forever change individuals, families and neighborhoods across the Dallas/Ft. Worth metroplex. It all started on a simple Saturday in 2009 when families met to repair a West Dallas resident’s home. Then, month by month, people began inviting other people, and before they knew it, a movement had started. Now, 2ndSaturday is a continuous opportunity for hundreds of Dallas residents, businesses, and churches to make an impact on the lives of those in Dallas’ poorest communities.
2S intentionally partners with other nonprofits to serve the long-term efforts of the community. 2S serves the disabled and senior citizens of Dallas, because they recognize that these people are pillars of the community. The second part of 2S, called 2S Industries, was developed to bridge the gap between men with criminal records and society by providing them with work and job opportunities that they easily would not have had otherwise, based on their life circumstances.
2ndSaturday pours into and rebuilds Dallas’ most overlooked and poverty-stricken neighborhoods, and the way they pour into homes, communities, and humans long-term is easily worth donating to.
Donate To 2ndSaturday
3. Ten for 10 Water for Africa
Did you know that 783 million people around the world don’t have access to clean water? Something as simple as clean water not only hydrates but also decreases water-related diseases, increases access to education, and allows better sanitation all around. Every realm of our society relies on clean water, and it’s mind-blowing to think that so many people groups don’t have that luxury.
This is where Ten for 10 steps in. Ten for 10 is an all-volunteer 501(c)3 that strives to create ways for everyone to have their basic human right to clean water. They firmly believe that having clean water shouldn’t be based on geographical location (and we couldn’t agree more). They use transparency, comprehensive water solutions, equality, and strategic partnerships to maximize their impact and bring water to those dying to have it.
You can help the world have access to clean water. Why choose water? Every dollar invested in clean water and sanitation brings $8 in economic return, and investing in water helps prevent 1.4 million water-related deaths in children every year.
Donate To Ten For 10
4. The Akola Project, being supported by Marie Mae Company
Marie Mae Company creates beautiful office products that do so much more than what meets the eye– each product is made from ethical small businesses and each purchase grants one business education hour to women of emerging markets enrolled in the MarieMae Business School. And to top it all off, Marie Mae does business consulting to help companies make a difference. Marie Mae isn’t participating in North Texas Giving Day, but they are donating 25% of their revenue today to a Dallas nonprofit, Akola!
In 2007, the Akola Project launched as a new sustainable model to uplift women and children in Uganda. The women that Brittany, Akola’s Founder, met and began collaborating with named the movement “Akola”, which means “to work” in their local dialect. After 5 years in the field, Brittany worked with the best development practitioners in the country to develop a sustainable impact model for women. Over the last seven years, the Akola Project has blossomed into a thriving social business that empowers women across the globe. Each piece of Akola jewelry is hand-crafted by a woman in Uganda and Dallas working to redesign her story, and 100% of product sales are reinvested to empower women and families. The hope of Akola is to encourage new thinking about international development and to inspire the next generation of social innovators to deliver the highest level of impact in disadvantaged communities.
Shop MarieMae
Donate To Akola
5. Trinity Environmental Academy
Sustainable Education Solutions (SES) is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization seeking to improve the environmental literacy of Dallas families, particularly of its youngest scholars. SES opened the Trinity Environmental Academy (TriEA) near The Great Trinity Forest in August of 2015. Creating different types of learning scenarios, both indoors and outdoors, gives educators the freedom to more share their ideas and collaborate with their peers. TriEA pledges to educate using both natural and built environments and the spaces in between to take education to a new level to develop students’ understanding of interrelationships and interactions among natural and social systems and their components.
A few of the things Trinity Environmental Academy focuses on is 1) encouraging the use of higher-level thinking and creative problem-solving skills to achieve learn real-world problem solving on issues involving the interaction of their natural surroundings with diverse cultural, economic, and political perspectives and interests 2) providing students with opportunities to explore connections between subject area disciplines and, among natural and social systems and 3) taking into account students’ individual learning styles, multiple intelligences and cultural background to insure effective instructional design and practices in the context of the local community.
If you’re passionate about seeing education in Dallas continue to grow, then the Trinity Environmental Academy is a viable outlet worth plugging into.
Donate To The Trinity Environmental Academy
Together, let’s try to make this year’s North Texas Giving Day the biggest and most successful Giving Day to date, all while supporting local causes we all know and care about. To donate, simply head to https://northtexasgivingday.org/, type out the nonprofit you’d like to donate to, and choose the amount you’re interested in contributing!
