Help us select our next slate of charities

It’s time to help us choose our next slate of featured beneficiaries! Because Foundation Beyond Belief is a member-driven organization, and member donations will support the selected beneficiaries, we welcome our members’ comments and preferences to help us make beneficiary selections.

We’re seeking member input to help us choose an encore Education beneficiary, as well as our Human Rights and Challenge the Gap beneficiaries. Click here to take the survey. The survey will be open until August 5. After the jump, keep reading for a look at the nominated charities.

Education Encore Nominees

Our Encore Beneficiary Program is choosing beneficiaries featured in 2010 and 2011 to highlight a second time, which gives us a chance to introduce them to our new members and provide a significantly larger grant to their programs. For the fourth quarter of 2013, we will feature an encore beneficiary in our Education category. Here are the nominees:
 

Roots and Wings International’s programs are effective in helping build the communities where they work for the long term instead of just providing short-term aid. They work to encourage universal education among indigenous and rural communities, as well as supply materials and technology to existing schools. RWI meets several Millennium Development Goals, including working to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger (through education), achieve universal primary education, and promote gender equality. Because Roots and Wings is a relatively small organization, it would benefit greatly from an FBB grant. RWI has a large volunteer network, and most of their work is done in Guatemala. RWI was very popular among FBB members when it was last featured.

Roots and Wings International was a beneficiary in Q1 2011 and received a donation of $3,390 from Foundation Beyond Belief members.

Point Foundation helps marginalized LGBTQ students achieve higher education and develop leadership skills through financial support, mentoring, and an annual Leadership Conference. With the Supreme Court’s decision on DOMA in the news recently, selecting Point Foundation as our encore Education beneficiary would show Foundation Beyond Belief’s support for equality.

Point Foundation was a beneficiary in our debut quarter, Q1 2010, and received a donation of $1,640 from Foundation Beyond Belief members.

Global Fund for Children works to improve the lives of children on the edges of society—trafficked children, refugees, and child laborers. GFC’s programs work toward achieving universal primary education, as well as reducing HIV infection and empowering women through education. They are exceedingly financially responsible. They provide grants to homegrown organizations that are resourceful and rooted in their communities, and they have reached 8 million children across the globe.

Global Fund for Children was featured in our now discontinued Child Welfare category in Q2 2010 and received a donation of $1,975.

Human Rights Nominees
 

• Tamil Nadu Tribal Development submitted an extensive proposal to our Humanist Crisis Response program. They are addressing the direct aftermath of the Himalayan/Indian floods in June 2013 in a thorough and efficient manner, including providing counselors, establishing mobile medical units, and distributing blankets and baby food. More than 5,000 people were killed, livelihoods were wiped away, and homes were destroyed during the floods. Tamil Nadu’s request for aid gives us a direct opportunity to support crisis response in the aftermath of these floods with dedicated budget and purpose.
   
• Apopo is an innovative organization that uses trained detection rats to tackle a surprising variety of humanitarian challenges. Their approach to using these rats for landmine and tuberculosis detection is based on scientific research, and their methods are well documented for easy duplication. The giant trained rats used for landmine detection are too light to set off the landmines, so there are no exploding rats. Apopo’s methods are novel, interesting, and groud-breaking. This organization is an FBB staff favorite.
   
• Leo Igwe Refugee Camps, Northern Ghana: Witchcraft accusations constitute a serious threat to human rights and individual safety in several regions of Africa, none more so than Northern Ghana. More than a thousand Ghanaian women are currently detained in “witch camps” after being accused of witchcraft and expelled from their villages.

  “The consequences of witchcraft accusation are dire and diverse,” says Leo Igwe. “Those accused of witchcraft are often subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment by states and non-state agents. They are feared and treated as enemies to the society. Those alleged to be witches are attacked, exiled or lynched by mobs, forced to drink concoctions by local diviners or traditional medicine men and women, subjected to abusive treatment in the name of exorcism by pastors and other god-men and women, persecuted and jailed by the states. Some of those accused of witchcraft who survive the ordeal are then exiled from their homes and are forced to live in camps or on the streets. Witchcraft accusations are at the root of egregious instances of human rights abuses and social problems across many regions of Africa. They fuel hatred, conflicts, and mistrust in families and communities across Africa.”

  We featured this beneficiary as a small grant in Q3 2012 and have been able to send more than $5,000 for this project since that time, largely through targeted donations through our website.

Challenge the Gap Nominees

Challenge the Gap features carefully-selected, non-proselytizing charities based in other worldviews.

• The Night Ministry is a Chicago-based nonprofit initiated by a collective of 18 congregations (a spectrum of Christian and Jewish groups) to provide, through a variety of programs, housing, health care, and human connection to the homeless, with a particular emphasis on disenfranchised youth. They operate “the only shelter in Chicago that will work with pregnant or parenting teens as young as 14” and also have programs aimed at transitioning teens from homelessness to long-term independent living within two years. They have had steadily growing revenue the past four years.
   
• Feed My Starving Children (FMSC) is a Christian nonprofit with a simple approach: They hand-pack and distribute meals specifically formulated for malnourished children, and ship the meals to nearly 70 countries around the world. While they are guided by Christian principles, they allow all to volunteer, and do not require a Christian message with their donations. “All of God’s children deserve to be fed.”

  Financially, this charity is superb, with a four-star rating on Charity Navigator. They also have a very active Facebook page, which frequently gives weekly updates on how many meals have been packaged and shipped.
   

• Justice for Our Neighbors (JFON) is a Christian nonprofit acting as a subgroup of the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR). JFON offers high-quality immigration legal services in 24 sites, along with education and advocacy for immigration reform. None of the donations designated for JFON get sidetracked to the parent charity.
   
• Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) Relief USA focuses on a variety of humanitarian services, including disaster relief, women’s temporary housing, hunger prevention, and other social services. Their women’s shelters provide temporary housing, counseling, job training, and other services to women in need, helping them transition to permanent, stable housing of their own. ICNA Relief USA does not discriminate based on religion.

Thank you for your time and willingness to learn more about our nominated charities. Your opinion is crucial to our final decision on which organizations to feature. To make your voice heard, please go to our survey at Survey Monkey to vote on your preferred charities.