Give Like Bill Gates: Our First Quarter of Glocal Giving

Because every child should be as happy as ours

Our daughter Harper. When you become a parent you have less time to give to change the world, but more of a reason.

Last year I learned a lesson in giving by giving $10 every Tuesday for the entire year. Here’s what $520 taught me.

Now I’m searching for a better way to give. So, I’ve decided to start giving like Bill Gates.

No, no, I’m not going to single-handedly end a disease with my billions hundreds of dollars. What I mean is that I’m going to give smarter and more intentionally. I’m not privy to the inner workings of how the Gates Foundation works, but I’m pretty sure they don’t get a set of return address labels in the mail from a not-for-profit and decide on the spot to write a check for a few million in support of the cause. No, they have a budget and a goal for what they want their giving to accomplish.

We should too.

Quarterly Meetings

Annie, my Melinda, and I sat down at the end of the first quarter as we plan to do from here on out and discussed how much we want to give. We decided to give 4% of our income each quarter, splitting our income between a local and a global cause.

Global Mothers

Then we discussed what causes we want to support. Since Annie is due with our second child this month (Yikes that’s real soon! Do we have enough diapers?!?) we decided to find a global organization that supports pregnant women and reduces infant mortality. I was familiar with the good work that Partners in Health and Dr. Paul Farmer have done to help mothers and children around the world. We had donated to them before and decided to do so again.

We’re the lucky parents of a healthy two-year-old little girl already and hope to be the proud parents of a healthy little boy soon. Annie and the baby are healthy so far, with less than three weeks to go. While parents-to-be always have health concerns in the back of their minds, our biggest concerns are if we’ll have the nursery ready, the hospital bag packed, the diapers bought, and everything else ready to go. Health is so easy to take for granted, but the last thing that should be. Each year 350,000 mothers die from complications during child birth or pregnancy.

Instead of giving to Partners in Health in one lump sum, we opted to give monthly for a year. This gives PIH a better idea of what to expect from us next month and allows us to have a longer relationship with the charity.

Local Poverty

The local organization we chose to support was Teamwork for Quality Living. We’ve given to them in the past as well. I volunteer with the organization that runs the Circles program. Folks living in poverty take a 16-week “Bridges out of Poverty” class and then get matched with two to four members of the community interested in helping them (not financially) along their journey. I’ve see the amazing results and lives changed first hand.

I plan on creating and sharing a Glocal Giving Guide soon, but right now I should get to work. In order to be able to donate, you gotta make some money here and there. 4% of $0 = $0.

How do you give?

Join the Go Glocal Project

 
3 comments
Kristi says:

This is great, Kelsey. I have a sponsor child in Kenya that I give to monthly and it’s taken out of my account automatically. And I’ve donated my “blood and sweat” to the orphanage here in Peru haha. I’ve donated a lot to local organizations on the spot, but I love the idea of committing to an organization on a regular basis. It’s a great way to remind you to keep an on-going relationship with the charity. Good stuff, you’ve inspired me!

Sheik Farzana says:

Hi my name farzana i have no dad he was expired 4 years back we are two daughters for our mom she was not educated ,she do lot of work and leads our life. plz help us we dont have own house to live we are in so many problems now we want money to pay our bills we want indian currency rs- 20,000 plz help us pos responce my request plz

Let your voice be heard!

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