"We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future."
– Franklin D. Roosevelt
An Example
In 1995, a 12-year old boy in Toronto was flipping through The Toronto Star in search of comics. Instead he found a story about another boy on the other side of the world who was sold into slavery at age four, spent six years chained to a carpet-weaving loom, and then was killed two years later, aged 12, for bringing the worlds attention to the issue of childrens rights. So inspired was the young Canadian that he went on to found Free The Children, an organization that has built more than 500 schools around the world and has reached more than one million young people through outreach in North America. The boy was named Craig Kielburger, and the world needs more youth like him.
Good kids grow up to be good adults
The only way that we can solve the worlds increasingly challenging problems is if every generation grows up more socially responsible than the last. The success of Free The Children and TakingITGlobal are just some examples of the incredible power youth can have on the world. Statistics Canada also performed a survey called The Canadian Survey of Giving, Volunteering, and Participating (CSVP) and found clear connections between early life experiences and the rate of donating in later life. Specifically, the survey found that those who were involved with community activities as youth donated more than their peers as adults.
Unfortunately, the CSVP study also found that youth statistically get involved in philanthropy less than other ages. Not only that, but young volunteers (particularly 15 to 19 year olds), are more likely than other age groups to report that they dont volunteer because they were not asked, or because they dont know how to become involved. So what can we do to foster a greater culture of social responsibility in todays youth?
Where Charity CHAMPS comes in
Charity CHAMPS is building a social media application which will increase the involvement and education of todays Net Generation in social causes through microphilanthropy, particularly online.
Microphilanthropy is the perfect companion for youth because it allows students that are busy with school and strapped for cash to still get involved in social good, thus achieving the objectives above. Online microphilanthropy in particular is seeing rapid growth because of the ability of the Internet to lower the costs of communication and financial transactions.
Charity CHAMPS will attract and retain youth interest in social causes by making the entire process of online microphilanthropy fun. Using the same habit-forming characteristics of other popular online and social games on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media applications, Charity CHAMPS will let users build their own world of good, one good action at a time. Charity CHAMPS users simply sign up for with an account, and every time they perform an approved good action online, they will receive points or badges as a reward. Approved actions could be answering educational trivia, signing a petition, microvolunteering online, or making a microdonation on a partner site.
After collecting enough badges, users can cash-in for some sort of item, ability, or other asset in the Charity CHAMPS world. As the community and CHAMPS world grows, the attractiveness of the game increases, encouraging greater and greater involvement and education of youth in social good!Charity CHAMPS is a young non-profit organization registered in Ontario seeking charitable status.