Get to Giving-March

I am now budgeting $100 per month for charitable giving. I am going to give in different ways each month and write about it in my "Get to Giving" posts, hoping it will inspire you to give back.

I've sort of talked about Pennies for Patients and the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society in another post, but that's where my March giving budget went, so here's a more detailed post.

Every year my middle school does a campaign called Pennies for Patients. Basically, each homeroom has a box where the kids donate money to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. We have an assembly where they learn about blood cancers and we explain the campaign. Each kid gets a small box for collecting change at home, which they seem to like. We also make it a contest, where the winning homeroom gets a pizza party. This year, we had a dance and all the proceeds went to the campaign as well.

I don't work in a wealthy area. 76% of my students receive free or reduced-lunch. Many are in foster homes. There is some gang activity (though not a lot). 

My school raised $5,826.14!!! Yes, you read that correctly. I would say about a thousand of that was teachers and the rest was kids being generous. I had kids give $5, kids who emptied out their change compartments in their wallets, kids who brought in baggies of pennies that their parents let them take from the change stash at home. Kids gave up their daily Gatorade or vending machine snack to give a dollar. I love this campaign because it's my whole school teaming up to make a difference, and literally every little bit counts. Our school has about 1,100 kids and together we did something that I'm really proud of. 

So, if you're a teacher or work at a school in any capacity, I would recommend that you get involved in this incredible charity. It teaches kids about the value of helping others and I think it brings our school together in a pretty incredible way. So, as you may have guessed, my $100 for March went to Pennies for Patients. This one was easy.