Do Gooding

The NY Times has a piece on donating money and time to hunger-related causes and includes names and Web sites to investigate. Is your child’s school collecting food for City Harvest and coats for New York Cares? If not, you might want to suggest it for next year, or even right away, since people in need don’t magically stay well-fed and warm after New Years Day. Next we turn to giving and getting, focusing on two international endeavors that reach out in targeted and meaningful ways.  

A World of Good “create[s] opportunities for hundreds of artisan cooperatives around the world to share their best work with you by serving as a bridge to the U.S. retail market…We respectfully assist artisans by providing access to fair wages, safe working conditions and long-term economic sustainability” and “re-invest 10% of our profits in the artisan communities through our non-profit partner, the World of Good: Development Organization.”

At World of Good we aim to build community in many ways from paying our artisan partners a fair wage, adopting strict ethical business practices, building long-term relationships with both our producers and our customers, and re-investing in the infrastructure of artisan communities through healthcare, education and development projects. Welcome to our community—it’s all good!         

I know from a very close friend, who works for the company, that it is, in fact, all good. You can order their bags, jewelry, etc., as gifts or for yourself online or find them in retail locations, including Whole Foods (clothing area).One Laptop per Child Founded by MIT professor Nicolas Negrophonte, the organization’s stated mission is:

to provide a means for learning, self-expression, and exploration to the nearly two billion children of the developing world with little or no access to education.         

Through 12/31, OLPC is running a “Give One Get One” program whereby you donate one of their XO laptops to a child in a developing country and receive one for a child in your life. After that, they have an ongoing “Simply Give” program to just donate computers overseas.I did some hunting on the Web to find criticisms of the program. I found one site seemingly dedicated to exactly that, but I still think I will give one get one before the year is out.