Celebrating extraordinary deeds performed by ordinary people on America's largest day of doing good.
|
What is Make A Difference Day?
Make A Difference Day is the most encompassing national day of helping others -- a celebration of neighbors helping neighbors. Everyone can participate. Created by USA WEEKEND Magazine, Make A Difference Day is an annual event that takes place on the fourth Saturday of every October. |
Millions have participated. In 2005, 3 million people cared enough about their communities to volunteer on that day, accomplishing thousands of projects in hundreds of towns.
Your project can be as large or as small as you wish! Look around your community and see what needs to be done.
Please send in an entry form so you will be counted among the millions of volunteers and be considered for an award.
Click here for an opportunity to Make a Difference with Michigan City's Annual Coat Campaign.
Who takes part in Make A Difference Day?
Anyone. Young and old, individuals and groups, anyone can carry out a volunteer project that helps others. It might be as ambitious as collecting truckloads of clothing for the homeless, or as personal as spending an afternoon helping an elderly neighbor or relative. USA WEEKEND features volunteers and their projects in articles and photos.
How do awards help charitable efforts?
Each year in April, hundreds of good deeds done on Make A Difference Day are selected for honors, headlines and charitable donations.
$10,000 to 10 projects
Paul Newman, who donates all after-tax profits from sales of Newman's Own products to educational and charitable purposes, continues his support of Make A Difference Day. Mr. Newman will donate $10,000 each to 10 selected projects.
These 10 honorees, plus hundreds of local honorees, will be spotlighted in an April 2007 issue, coinciding with National Volunteer week, and here on this Web site.
What are the rules?
If you want to participate, just help someone else on the next Make A Difference Day.
If you cannot participate on Saturday for religious reasons, you may do your project on Sunday.
If you volunteer regularly, great! On Make A Difference Day, give an extra push to your ongoing volunteer activity. For example, expand your regular tutoring by creating a special event for the students, such as a trip to the library where they volunteer, or the recruitment of new students.
If you don't volunteer now, here's an occasion to get started. You could clean up an elderly neighbor's house, or organize your block to replant and repair a local park. You could visit lonely, institutionalized kids or the elderly. You can join in on someone else's project listed on this Web site.
If you need more than one day for your project, still plan to do a good part of your volunteering on Make A Difference Day. For example, if you are rebuilding a community soup kitchen, you may have to do some wiring the week before or some painting the week after, but a significant part of the construction needs to take place on that Saturday.
If your volunteers are together only Monday-Friday (such as schools and workplaces), still plan to do a good part of your volunteering on Make A Difference Day. For example, if students collect food for the homeless during the school week, get a special group of students and teachers together on Saturday to hand-deliver the food to homeless people or a shelter. If it rains or snows, Make A Difference Day goes on. If your project is outdoors, have a contingency plan, or forge ahead.
If you are an employee of Gannett, The Points of Light Foundation or USA WEEKEND carrier newspapers, you are invited to participate in Make A Difference Day, but you are ineligible for awards.
If you are selected to receive an award, you must sign releases. The top-10 honorees participate in an awards ceremony.
If you are not in America, we still invite you to participate. Thousands of employees of multinational corporations have volunteered on Make A Difference Day. A large group of Moskovites participated a few years ago. U.S. military personnel stationed overseas are regular Make A Difference Day volunteers too.
If you participate but don't send in an entry form, we can't consider you for awards and can't count you among the millions of people who simultaneously reach out to help others.
What are some national groups that participate?
Aid Association for Lutherans - Altrusa International - American Association of Retired Persons - AmeriCorps - AMVETS - Big Brothers & Big Sisters of America - Boy Scouts - Boys & Girls Clubs of America - Camp Fire Boys & Girls - Campus Outreach Opportunity League - Capitol Records/Nashville - Catholic Family Life Insurance - Chase Manhattan - Citizens Scholarship Foundation of America - Delta Sigma Pi - ERA Realty - Farm Aid - General Federation of Women's Clubs - Girl Scouts - Golden Key National Honor Society - Goodwill Industries - J.C. Penney - KaBoom! - Keep America Beautiful - Kiwanis - Knights of Columbus - League of Latin American Citizens - LensCrafters - Lutheran Brotherhood - Miss America Organization - National 4-H Council - NetDay - RSVP - Salvation Army - Slovene National Benefit Society - Special Olympics - State Farm Insurance - Students in Free Enterprise - Telephone Pioneers of America - U.S. Air Force - U.S. Army - U.S. Navy - United Way of America - USA Harvest - Veterans of Foreign Wars - VISTA - World SHARE
How to get involved
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/howto.html
Planning Guides
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/tools/guides/index.html
Want to help, but don't know what to do?
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/ideas/idea_generator.html
Logos and Promos
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/tools/logospromos.html
Tips for Newspapers
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/tools/tipsnewspaper.html
Tips for Volunteer Centers
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/tools/tipsvolunteer.html
What Others Have Done
http://usaweekend.com/diffday/honorees/index.html
|
