Are you throwing away money that could help your local school?

As the school year wraps up, I thought it was a good time to encourage everyone out there to support their local school's participation in the Campbell's Labels For Education and the General Mills Box Tops 4 Education programs.

Most of us probably remember saving soup can labels when we were schoolchildren, but a lot of us were mostly interested in the competitive angle (i.e.; the trip or pizza party that the top-raising classrooms). As adults, we can much more clearly understand the need for our educational institutions to take advantage of every avenue for free educational equipment, and it's incredibly easy for all of us to pitch in (even if you're a childless bachelor such as myself)!

Every General Mills box top is worth a dime, while Campbell's has switched from their old nickel-per-label model to a point system that's a little harder to figure out monetarily, but which makes certain premium products add up to more bucks for your school. I handed off my annual haul to my friends' son Lukas last week, so he could turn them in at PS58 here in Brooklyn. Surprisingly, in the past year, I accumulated $12.50 worth of box tops and what I reckon adds up to about $7 to $10 worth of Campbell's points. Imagine if every household in every school district turned in the equivalent of $20 per person each year!

It only takes a second or two to rip or clip the appropriate part of the packaging, and the whole kit and kaboodle fit in a small baggy tacked to my kitchen cork board. It's just that easy to get free money for your our kids' classrooms! Even if you don't know any students, you can mail them to a participating school for proper routing, so I hope you'll make a habit of it and help ease the burden on your local school!

By the way, in the past three days alone, I've found another 47 cents, bringing the Found Fund for charity to $20.96 so far this year!

Little Change Is The Way Of The World

I realized the other day that I hadn't done an update on the amount of found money I've gathered for charity so far this year. The reason I had this realization was that in about ten different places in a single day, I stooped to snag another 31 cents. Those two dimes and eleven pennies bring the grand total so far to $18.47!

That's an average of about 13 cents every single day so far this year. Sure, that figure is skewed by the few bills that I've found, but the vast majority of it is in change, as you can see in the photo.

Has anybody else been keeping track?

"Skip Lunch Fight Hunger" with City Harvest!

Tomorrow, May 12 is the annual City Harvest "Skip Lunch Fight Hunger" campaign, when teams of people throughout the five boroughs of New York (and beyond!) ask their friends, family, and colleagues to chip in and help reduce the number of hungry mouths in our world.

Whether or not you join (or start) a team and raise funds, I hope you'll at least throw a few bucks at the campaign. It's easy as pie...or at least as easy as giving up your pie: just donate what you would normally spend on a single day's lunch to City Harvest, who will use your generous gift to feed hungry children and families throughout the metro area! If you can spare $10 every day for a burger and fries or soup/salad/soda, surely you can sacrifice a few bucks to help support those less fortunate.

Of course, you don't actually have to give up a meal, and you're encouraged to donate much more than you spend on your average meal! A few stats that show how far your lunch money can go:

$10 can help feed 7 children for a week.
$20 can help feed 3 children for a month.
$40 can help feed 2 children for the entire summer.

Over $400,000 was raised last year through the Skip Lunch Fight Hunger campaign to help feed hungry children and families throughout New York, and hopefully this year will pull in even more donations. I joined the City Harvest team ("The Harvesters"), and I'm hoping to solicit the support of friends and family--and readers!--to add at least $250 to that total. If you feel like putting a few of your hard-earned dollars to use providing nourishment for the needy, your sponsorship would be much appreciated!

If there's a similar campaign (or any other good cause) that you'd like to share news about, please post it in the comments section. I always love learning about new pro-social initiatives!

Make every day Earth Day!

Today is the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. I remember how stoked I was on the 20th anniversary, when I was a high school senior. In part, it inspired me to start the first ever recycling program at my school. But more than that, it made me begin to live my life as if every day was Earth Day. Sure, sometimes I still buy food that's over-packaged, and I enjoy a lengthy shower, but for the most part, it's pretty easy to be an everyday environmentalist.

You've probably heard the tips a thousand times: buy local produce (or better yet, grow your own). Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. Buy in bulk. Walk or bike as often as possible. Put a timer on your air conditioner and heater. Plant a tree. Use canvas bags for your groceries. Compost your kitchen scraps. Close the drapes on hot, sunny days (or open them on cold, sunny days). Don't litter. Reduce your meat consumption. Take public transportation. Join the library. Carry an aluminum water bottle. Turn off lights and appliances when out of the room. "If it's yellow, let it mellow; if it's brown, flush it down."

None of them take much effort, and after a little while, they truly become second nature. Pick a few and give it a try...you'll see!

Another important thing you can do in your daily life is to stay on top of environmental issues and make your voice heard by local, state, and federal officials. There are a bunch of great groups out there who can keep you in the loop about pressing environmental issues year-round, and who make it easy to contact the proper authorities with a click of your mouse. If you want to get more intimate with your planet, sign up for their newsletters below (you might want to create a bulk email address for action alerts and the like).

Sierra Club

Environmental Defense Fund

World Wildlife Fund

The Nature Conservancy

Ocean Conservancy

National Wildlife Federation

Audubon Society

Natural Resources Defense Council

Center for Biological Diversity

EARTHWORKS

True Life: YOU Can Save A Life

I produced an aftershow special that followed last night's premiere of "True Life: I Need A Transplant," interviewing the two transplant recipients and their families. I also wrote a companion blog post for MTV, which I wanted to encourage you to read and act upon! Getting yourself on the bone marrow registry is the easiest and most non-invasive way to help save a life, and they're waiving the laboratory testing fees for a limited time, so please sign up today!

Money Doesn't Grow On Trees...It Grows On Sidewalks!

The theme of this blog is that each of us can do small things to make a positive change in the world, but today I want to address change in a very literal way.

 

It surprises me that even in these difficult economic times, people blithely drop change (and sometimes bills) everywhere and don't bother to pick it up. It surprises me even more that dozens--even hundreds--of people will walk right by and completely ignore it. Glance around next time you're waiting on line at the drug store or ordering a drink at the bar, and I'll bet you'll find some cold, hard cash. Last Sunday alone, I found $1.41 sprinkled around my subway station, a record fair, a bar, and a bodega. There is rarely a day that goes by that I don't at least find a few pennies here and there.

For years now, I've had a strict policy of picking up any found money, and earmarking it to give away. In the past, I've always donated it to whatever situation I next came across, whether it was a charity's donation can on a store counter or a homeless person shaking their coffee cup. For 2010, though, I've decided to slip any and all found money into my right pocket for safekeeping (I keep my own cash in my left...please don't pickpocket me), and then put it into a jar on my bookcase every night when I get home. The running tally so far this year: $9.37! Sure, it's not a mint, and it won't have the greatest impact in the world, but for cash-strapped charities, literally every penny comes in handy.

I'm going to keep an occasional count here on the blog, leading up to my end-of-year donation to the charity I co-founded, the Sean McGrath Fund, and I encourage you to do the same for the charity of your choice! I'd love to hear about your progress, so feel free to post your tally in the comments section sometime.

If your impulse is to dismiss what a coordinated effort of change gathering can accomplish, check out what the Common Cents Penny Harvest is doing in New York City right now, in hopes of beating last year's record haul of $665,000. Proof positive that a little change can make a huge change!

How you can help people "get wild" for wildlife

We all know that human overpopulation has a lot of consequences: food shortages, deforestation, pollution, social unrest, and poverty, just to name a few. While we're thinking about these human issues, though, it's easy to overlook the effects on the non-human world, first and foremost the endangerment of animal species.

Whether it's from a loss of habitat, being hunted and fished to the brink of extinction, or from environmental factors like poisoning from chemical seepage, our own imperative to propagate our lineage can imperil some of our more defenseless neighbors on planet earth.

To raise awareness about the dangers behind tipping this delicate balance, the good folks at the Center for Biological Diversity have created a clever outreach program that marries education with an actual tool to help prevent overpopulation: endangered species condoms!

Of course, proper outreach requires a lot of people to reach out and distribute these prophylactics all across the nation, and they want your help! Click here to sign up as one of their distribution volunteers, and if they still have a need in your geographic area, you'll receive a delivery of all six wildlife-themed jimmy hats (from birds to mammals to amphibians) to spread liberally around your community!

How often do you encounter a volunteer opportunity that lets you help threatened critters AND gives you an entree to flirt with complete strangers? Take advantage while you can!