Web-based philanthropy: DonorsChoose lets people fund needs identified by public school teachers. Nice. Many-to-many, a middleman that adds value, distributed giving.

A teacher might post the need for, say, a piece of lab equipment, and anyone who really likes that teacher, or that school, or science, or whatever, can donate directly to that cause. The DonorsChoose organization vets the proposals, collects the dough, and purchases and delivers the goods. Almost all of the money flows through to the end users.

From the site:

DonorsChoose presents a new business model for accomplishing good works. Typically, a nonprofit organization must pay itself to assess needs and design services for a particular group of people. At DonorsChoose, motivated teachers--who know their kids better than anyone in the system--perform this essential task for free. Correspondingly, a foundation pays itself to evaluate the programs designed by nonprofits and to channel funds to the most worthy programs. At DonorsChoose, citizen-philanthropists perform this task.

Started in New York -- now former teacher turned software magnate turned philanthropist Michael Brader-Araje has brought it to North Carolina.

[EdCone.com]

3:17:02 PM