Last week's post about Team Up for Nonprofits led several other groups to contact me and share what they're doing to encourage young people to get involved in community service. Each has a different strategy for tapping in to this new demographic.

One local nonprofit is Teens in Public Service (TIPS). TIPS selects teen leaders from local schools and places them as interns in charitable organizations throughout Seattle, matching their interests with the needs of the nonprofit. Nonprofits can request interns, and the teenagers apply in a competitive program to serve at one organization through the summer, earning wages (paid by TIPS) while helping the community.

BEAN is a fast-growing networking and volunteering group for young professionals that started in Seattle in 2002 and has branched out to 10 other chapters and more than 10,000 members.

KEN LAMBERT/SEATTLE TIMES

BEAN members (left to right) George Lamson, Christiaan Pre, Howard Wu and Ona Anicello sort donations at Food Lifeline in Shoreline.

Howard Wu, 31, started BEAN (originally the Business and Engineering Activists Network but now known just by its acronym) to appeal to people in their 20s and 30s. He found no single organization that did all of what he thought would interest them.

"Young professional groups" focus on networking and socializing. While there are many "drink-for-charity" groups, "that's all they do," he said. Networking groups are older, established, exclusive and expensive. Charity groups are very committed to their cause and need their volunteers to be committed.

Established civic groups with youth branches, such as Young Rotarians and Junior Chambers, have another style. "The message these groups conveyed to me is 'Here is a play pen, Junior,'" Wu said. "You can join us adults over here when we think you are ready."

So BEAN set out to reinvent service, or a "Civic Engagement 2.0" model, in Seattle and beyond. It combines volunteering, networking, socializing and giving. There's no cost to join the organization, which is run entirely by volunteers.

Shanghai is by far the biggest success story outside Seattle, Wu said. In less than two years, the chapter has grown to more than 1,500 members, won charity awards and received coverage on the front page of Shanghai Daily.

Other active chapters are San Francisco, San Diego, Phoenix, Minneapolis, New York, Philadelphia, Beijing, Seoul and Hong Kong.

Now Wu's vision is for BEAN "to take up the spiritual torch of the older Animal Clubs (Lions, Elks)" and to build new leaders. BEAN's volunteer work includes dental education at an orphanage in Shanghai, cleaning a shelter for homeless youth in Seattle and painting rooftops white to reduce energy consumption in New York.

BEAN is hosting a fundraising party tomorrow that kicks off its annual Think Global Act Local campaign. It will auction off dates with members, and proceeds go to local nonprofit Vittana, which supports microloans for aspiring college students. In fact, Vittana co-founder and CEO Kushal Chakrabarti is among the bachelors being auctioned. He pledged to take his date skydiving.

More than 20 years ago, David Battey started Youth Volunteer Corps (YVC) "to promote a lifetime ethic of service among young people," he said. In King County, it lists projects for volunteers ages 11 to 18, from the White Center Food Bank to The Nature Consortium.

For those interested in applying their energy to improve society as a budding entrepreneur, Ashoka Youth Venture now has more than 40 Seattle ventures started and led by young people.

Many nonprofits would like to get young people involved as volunteers and donors, but they're not sure how to reach them.

Ryan Hodgson is using music to open the door. His organization, Team Up for Nonprofits, is hosting its second event in downtown Seattle tonight to benefit Seattle Works. They're getting a boost from local speed skater J.R. Celski. After meeting him through a colleague, Hodgson heard that Celski wanted to do a musical event to give money to a nonprofit and asked him to join forces with Team Up.

Each monthly Gigs4Good event supports a different nonprofit and combines entertainment with raising money and awareness. This time, Rotary is sponsoring the bands, which also helps local Rotary clubs connect to potential new members.

HARRY HOW/GETTY IMAGES

Speed skater J.R. Celski, a two-time Olympic bronze medalist, is appearing at the Gigs4Good concert tonight to benefit Seattle Works. He's combining interests in music and community as an ambassador for Team Up for Nonprofits.

"What we want is to have this active group of younger individuals in the community, and each time they come they get exposed to a new nonprofit," Hodgson said. The goal is to help young people find a cause that resonates and stick with it over time. "We really want to foster philanthropy and make it a lasting opportunity."

Beneficiaries include the arts, environment and social justice, and both large and small nonprofits.

"We're going to try to spread the love," he said.

People in their 20s and 30s may not have the incomes to write big checks yet, but they make up for it in energy, as Hodgson's own all-volunteer organization shows. It's also the mission of Seattle Works to give young people ways to volunteer, donate and lead projects in the community.

Hodgson, 36, now has a day job at Comcast, but before that he took six months off to get Team Up for Nonprofits off the ground, and volunteer board members have been busy spreading the word online. Part of the group's mission is to help train nonprofits to use social media to expand their reach.

Tapping in to new supporters is critical at a time when donations are lagging. A GuideStar study of more than 7,000 nonprofits found that 40 percent of charities reported a decline in giving in the first five months of this year. Yet more than 60 percent of nonprofits reported demand for their services has increased.

Three months after its first event, Team Up is now getting two or three emails a day from nonprofits that want to partner with it, Hodgson said.

The first Gigs4Good was relatively small and raised about $2,000, Hodgson said. Momentum has been building and the group is starting to get more sponsors to offset the costs for the musicians, venue and advertising.

"You have to do the hard work and prove you're going to stick around before people get involved," he said. "We're hoping to raise a lot more than that tonight."

Events are also planned in September and October. September's show at the Triple Door will benefit Bike Works.

There's a point at which a cluster of organizations working on a problem starts to feel like more than the sum of its parts. That kind of multiplier effect fueled Silicon Valley's technology innovation for decades.

Is it also starting to help Seattle gain traction solving problems in world health?

When people in their twenties decide to throw a party to fight rotavirus, and more than 500 guests show up (with 200 more on the waiting list), something new is taking hold.

ARI SHAPIRO/DAUBER ART PHOTOGRAPHY

Hope Randall, program assistant at PATH, demonstrates an oral rehydration kit that can save children from death due to diarrhea.

"We can change the world every day, in everything we do, even partying!" was the optimistic mantra.

Who knew that one event in Seattle could help a country achieve a national health goal? (The event raised $13,000, enough money to fund Kenya's oral rehydration program). Who knew that childhood diarrhea would be the topic of conversation at a cocktail party?

"Diarrhea Happens" was the way one of the hosts, Anne DeMelle, summed it up in a Facebook entry for Party with a Purpose. "It's true - it happens even to the best of us. For a half a million children around the world every year this seemingly benign condition is caused by a preventable virus and kills them. But it doesn't have to."

Lacey Birk, 25, said she and roommate Kristen Eddings knew rotavirus was a good cause. Though they wondered: "Are we really ready to talk about diarrhea with all these people?"

KRISTI HEIM

PATH communication officer Deborah Phillips talks with party guests about rotavirus and other health issues.

The efforts of people working in the field are getting bolstered by students and young professionals, musicians and athletes, who are all mingling, sharing information and learning about problems or diseases they may never have experienced but that plague large parts of the world.

Thomas Hansen, the CEO of Seattle Children's Hospital, enthusiastically explained a low cost mechanical ventilator for children in poor countries to a crowd of young party guests.

"We're really at the tipping point," said Todd Leadens, 22, an intern at at Boeing and engineering student at the Rochester Institute of Technology. "We have the technology to understand the problems and we can do something."

Seattle is also benefiting from the experience of people like Sanna Nyassi, who survived two bouts of malaria growing up in The Gambia, and went on to play professional soccer.

In a lab room at Seattle BioMed, Nyassi sat patiently on a stool while a woman named Diane powdered his face.

"Sanna, I'm not going to tell your teammates about this makeup situation," said Kevin Griffin, director of fan development & community relations for the Sounders FC and Seahawks.

"At least it's not eyeliner," said Diane.

"They save that for Freddie Ljungberg," Griffin quipped, not missing a beat.

"Do you have something to wipe that off later?" Griffin asked the makeup artist.

MARK HARRISON/SEATTLE TIMES

Sanna Nyassi is stepping into the limelight to call attention to malaria.

Nyassi, the soft spoken 21-year-old Sounders FC midfielder, was about to make his debut in front of the camera as a spokesman in a public service announcement for the non-profit. He had just met researcher Stefan Kappe, the man who is leading work on a malaria vaccine, and taken a look at the parasite under his microscope.

Two film crews followed his tour through the building.
"Could you look straight into the camera?" the producer coached Nyassi. "Could you say 'Now that's a great goal?'" The filming seemed tedious but Nyassi didn't complain.

"I can do this again and again," he said. "I feel good my club is part of this."

Libuse Binder, who wrote a book called "Ten Ways to Change the World in Your Twenties," summed up what attracted her to Seattle and why she thinks what's happening here matters.

"There's a surge of educated, intelligent tech-savvy people who want to make a difference and know how to do it," she said. "We can spread the word really quickly and start a movement."

"I think because we have so much access we know what's a stake. We're concerned. We're the ones inheriting the world."

Benefit concerts tend to be one-time events, but a Seattle group wants to use performances in a new way to unite music and philanthropy.

MARIANGELA ABEO

Ryan Abeo, a.k.a. Ra Scion of the local hip hop duo Common Market, has a new solo project named for superhero Victor Shade and will perform in the inaugural Gigs4Good show.

Team Up for Nonprofits aims to support Seattle philanthropy by producing "Gigs4Good," a series of concerts, each one benefiting a different non-profit. Producer Ryan Hodgson and a group of friends and colleagues started Team Up last year with the goal of giving people of any age a chance to meet and network with like-minded people, enjoy performances and contribute to a meaningful cause for the cost of a concert ticket.

Team Up for Nonprofits will kick off its fund raising efforts tonight with a concert at the Hard Rock Cafe that will benefit Seattle Against Slavery (SAS), a grassroots group working to fight human trafficking. Tickets are $25 at the door.

Ryan Abeo (Ra Scion) along with Alexei Saba Mohajerjasbi (Sabzi) formed Common Market, a duo that describes its music as "a critical, unapologetic world view that change is not only necessary, it is inevitable, and can only come about through having love for and serving the people."

Tonight Ra Scion headlines as Victor Shade, along with DJ B-Mello, Project Lionheart, Sol and Dice.

Next month, another interesting benefit concert will feature Starbucks General Counsel Paula Boggs, who is also a singer and songwriter, celebrating her debut CD "A Buddha State of Mind." She's donating all proceeds from the June 26 concert at EMP Sky Church to radio station KEXP.

Is Microsoft an incubator for social entrepreneurship?

Over the years, plenty of people have retired from the company to start a second career in philanthropy or to create new enterprises that address social issues.

Microsoft alumni have founded and supported more than 150 non-profit organizations and social ventures working around the world, according to its alumni foundation.

Employee giving and company matching funds totaled almost $90 million last year (employee charitable donations and volunteer time are matched up to $12,000 a year).

Such support has moved well beyond a fringe benefit. To attract the next generation of employees, making a social mission part of the company's DNA has become a vital recruiting tool, said Lisa Brummel, senior vice president for human resources. (She's seated at far left with four employees active in philanthropy)

It's also something she sees as an advantage over competitors.

"There are certain companies that give their employees 20 percent time to spend internally to make the company better," she said, referring to Google. "And there are some companies that give their employees 20 percent time externally to make the world better."

Brummel spoke last week at a first ever Microsoft Accelerator Summit, a round table discussion with media and non-profits focused entirely on corporate citizenship. The participants ranged from an employee of less than two years to CEO Steve Ballmer.

"If you go to employees and say why do you work here.. at the end of the day people buy in and participate in their own mind in our vision and they want to make a difference in society," Ballmer said.

Employees are running non-profits of their own, including the Jolkona Foundation, Givology and CRY America. Xiang Li, a Microsoft product manager and co-founder of education non-profit Givology, said the prospect of making a difference is more important to her than a higher salary.

"The amount of effort I see our employees doing is quite remarkable," Ballmer said. "We want to make sure we enable and support and encourage that."

In fact, the new organizational model that a younger, globally connected workforce demands is one that blends social and commercial goals, and attracts talent with visionary leadership and social mission, Seattle author Rob Salkowitz writes in his book "Young World Rising."

One of the key questions for any company, though, is how to align doing well for society with its business goals.

For Microsoft, areas where the two converge include health, science, education, workforce training and bridging the digital divide, Ballmer said.

In a project called PhotoDNA, for example, Microsoft researchers teamed up with Dartmouth College computer science professor Hany Farid to create a way to identify and filter out known images of child pornography from search engines, based on matching their digital fingerprints provided by law enforcement agencies.

Another project involved deploying 200 sensors throughout the Brazilian rainforest to measure temperature, water vapor and solar radiation, collecting data and designing systems to visualize the effects of climate change.

The Web site Microsoft Hohm helps people calculate their energy use and find ways to conserve, and it's planned in the future as a tool to help manage information about when and where to recharge electric vehicles.

The company's legacy of philanthropy took inspiration from Mary Gates, the mother of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and a leader of United Way. "It spread starting from Bill and his family to the company and it sort of became part of our culture," said Pamela Passman, corporate vice president and deputy general counsel (pictured above).

This year, the company ranked 14 on a list of the 100 best corporate citizens by Corporate Responsibility magazine, which evaluated performance on a range of issues such as environment, climate change, employee relations, human rights and philanthropy. Despite the generally favorable review, CR gave Microsoft a cautionary "yellow card" for its involvement in antitrust cases brought by the European Union and U.S. state governments.

Tim Cranton, associate general counsel who worked on the PhotoDNA project, described what he finds unique about the company's culture.

"Microsoft employees truly believe they can change the world with software, even sometimes in an arrogant way, but there is an abiding belief that we can change the world."

I wanted to understand what Ballmer thinks about the legacy of philanthropy in the company and what he plans to do with his own wealth.

"I don't start with what are we giving away but what are we trying to accomplish and what can we get done," he said.

Partnerships with NGOs around the world are key to that strategy, and they include groups such as NetHope, CARE, TechSoup and Goodwill Industries.

On the question of his own philanthropy, Ballmer said he wants to be anonymous and private. "My own world's my own world, so I continue to treat it that way," he said.

While he supports the kind of giving Microsoft is doing, he sounded more pragmatic than visionary. "If you stack it up next to the world's problems, it's got to be money that ignites action."

So what impact are these efforts having on business and society?

For one thing, by investing in IT training programs for unskilled workers, the company gets a lot more feedback about how its products can be improved, said Akhtar Badshah, senior director of global community affairs.

Microsoft is investing significant resources in a program called Unlimited Potential, which combines technology, education and economic development to improve conditions for the billions of people at the middle and bottom of the global economy.

Like many high-tech heavyweights, the company is providing resources to seed its next markets.

"There is no guarantee that that any one high-tech company will benefit in a direct way," Salkowitz writes. Their investments could end up developing fertile markets for their competitors, but it's not worth the risk of standing by while others gain a foothold, he contends. Either way, the beneficiaries are local consumers, businesses and entrepreneurs.

Nalini Gangadharan, chair of the CAP Foundation, said IT training programs funded by corporate partners have helped raise the marriage age in parts of India where more than half of girls traditionally get married before the age of 15.

"Before, girls were sitting idle and married off," she said. "Today the girls are saying as long as it's safe and secure, they are able to hold jobs and have decision-making status in the family. That is one of best outcomes."

This year's Global Social Entrepreneurship Competition at the University of Washington had so many promising business plans that picking just two winners proved difficult. So judges did something unusual: they ponied up their own money on the spot to award another $3,000 prize.

The contest, which had 161 entries from 36 countries this year, combines business, non-profit and academic work to encourage creative solutions to global poverty.

The top winning team taking home $10,000 was Nuru Light -- Charles Ishimwe from Adventist University of Central Africa and Max Fraden of the University of Massachusetts Medical School -- who also won the GSEC People's Choice Award and Investor's Choice Award. The team created a clean and affordable alternative to kerosene as a light source in Rwanda. The portable, rechargeable lights are the size and shape of a tape measure and the charger is a portable box with a bicycle-style pedal.

The UW Global Health prize of $5,000 went to ToucHb, a non-invasive finger scanner that measures hemoglobin levels to diagnose anemia. It can be used by low-skilled village health workers in rural India and eliminates the fear and infection risks associated with a needle prick. The team is made up of two doctors from the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences -- Yogesh Patil and Abhishek Sen.

The spontaneous Judges' Choice award of $3,000 went to Malo Traders for their plan to help small-scale rice farmers in Mali earn a better living by providing storage, marketing and other post-harvest services. Team Malo is two brothers who grew up in Africa and are now studying in the U.S. -- Mohamed Ali Niang, a business student at Temple University, and Salif Romano Niang, PhD student in political science at Purdue.

On Friday, the projects were on display at a breakfast hosted by the Seattle International Foundation, where students with ideas talked to executives with funds and experience.

ToucHb got tested by PATH CEO Chris Elias, while Microsoft veterans Rob Short and Will Poole wanted details about Nuru Light's business plan. Check out the video above with winners introducing their projects.

Camp Korey, a non-profit that operates free camps for children with serious illnesses, has sold its farm to the foundation created by the founders of Carnation Milk.

The foundation then granted Camp Korey a 30-year lease on the 818-acre farm for a nominal fee, freeing up money for the non-profit to expand its programs to more people.

The Elbridge and Debra Stuart Family Foundation said it completed the sale of the Carnation Farm on Wednesday for an undisclosed sum.

CAMP KOREY

Camp Korey in Carnation was created as a refuge for children struggling with serious illnesses.

The camp was started in 2005 by Tim and Donna Rose, who lost their teenage son Korey to cancer. They were inspired by actor Paul Newman's Hole in the Wall Camps, places where children fighting cancer and other life threatening illnesses could go for recreation.

Tim Rose, a senior vice president at Costco, knew about those camps through his relationship with Newman's Own food products. Paul Newman visited Carnation in 2007 to announce the sale of the farm to Camp Korey.

Owning the farm had become a financial burden for the camp, said Camp Korey spokeswoman Eva Conner. Nestle acquired the property in 1985 when it purchased the Carnation Company, and sold it to Camp Korey in 2008 for about $20 million, Conner said. That value included eventual interest over the life of the mortgage. The non-profit had about $5.7 million in revenue in 2008, and almost 60 percent of its expenses were going toward costs related to purchasing the farm.

Elbridge (Bridge) Stuart III, the great-grandson of Carnation Founder E.A. Stuart, said the farm has been a part of the family's history for a century.

"Re-acquiring it lets us support the good work of Camp Korey and preserve a part of King County and Washington State history while honoring our connection to the property," he said in a statement. "It is all of us working together for a single purpose."

Stuart and Ann Stuart Lucas, the granddaughter of E.A. Stuart, are on Camp Korey's board of directors.

Without a mortgage obligation, Conner said, the camp can use its resources to expand its capacity. It's holding seven week-long camp sessions this year, along with weekends and other recreation programs for children ages 7 through 16 dealing with cancer, epilepsy, Crohn's and colitis, heart disease and other conditions. The camp is supported by donations and is free for families and children.

JOHN LOK/SEATTLE TIMES

USA's Nicole Joraanstad, bottom, and teammate Natalie Nicholson, compete against Germany at a curling match during the Vancouver Winter Olympics.

VANCOUVER -- U.S. Olympic curler Nicole Joraanstad presented a $10,000 check to the Kent School District today, as one of five athletes supporting their hometowns through a partnership with Crest.

Joraanstad grew up in Kent and practiced at the Granite Curling Club, the only such club in Washington state. A 1999 graduate of Kentridge High School, she moved to Wisconsin when she was 18 to pursue curling. "I had a hunch it would get me in the Olympics someday," she said.

Joraanstad is co-captain of the U.S. Women's Curling Team and has a sponsorship deal with P&G, the maker of Crest toothpaste. The Kent district will receive the company's $10,000 donation for its health and physical education program.

It's one example of philanthropy happening at the Olympics, as athletes use their voices and resources to support various causes of their own and to help fellow athletes.

The gold medal for giving probably would go to snowboarder Hannah Teter, who is giving all of her prize and sponsorship money to charity, supporting work in Haiti, Kenya and Darfur.

After winning the gold medal in halfpipe at the Turin Olympics in 2006, she created a maple syrup called Hannah's Gold and has used proceeds to help fund charitable causes.

Teter has a partnership with the Christian charity World Vision, and has raised $185,000 so far for a project helping a community in Kenya with clean water and sanitation. About $130,000 of that comes from her contest winnings and another sizable chunk from Hannah's Gold.

Samsung, one of her sponsors, matches sales of her maple syrup dollar for dollar, and as part of its marketing deal gave $30,000 to her foundation last week.

Giving back is one of the main characteristics Samsung looks for in choosing athletes to sponsor, said Jose Cardona, communications manager for Samsung North America.

Teter also takes philanthropy where it's never gone before in "Panties with a Purpose." She created a line of underwear called Sweet Cheeks that gives $5 from every pair to a charitable cause -- this version helps Doctors Without Borders.

Scott Macartney, the ski racer and U.S. Ski Team member from Redmond I wrote about today in a story on sponsorships, has been supporting the World Cup Dreams Foundation, started by former team members Bryon Friedman and Erik Schlopy in 2005. The foundation gives members of the U.S. National Alpine Ski Team the chance to compete at the highest level by providing financial support and disability insurance coverage.

It makes sense that Macartney would choose to help others -- the two-time Olympian was raised by parents who volunteered in the ski patrol.

As we await news of what world leaders manage to agree on, if much of anything, in Copenhagen, it's worth taking a look at one organization in Seattle that is training environmental leaders around the globe.

COURTESY OF EARTHCORPS

Roshani Rai of Nepal cuts a log for use on a trail structure in Seattle's Colman Park.

EarthCorps has been around since 1993, but it has taken some time for its efforts to gain traction. That's starting to happen as its 750 alumni disperse and apply their skills to new projects, from an international volunteer program at Lake Baikal in Russia, to a "zero waste" recycling enterprise in India.

The non-profit has brought environmental leaders from more than 60 countries to work on projects in the Puget Sound area. Half of its members are from around the U.S. and half are from countries in the developing world, and they share knowledge and expertise.

Besides the main group of about 50 members, EarthCorps now has 11,000 volunteers in Puget Sound, executive director Steve Dubiel told me. The level of interest has jumped this year, with three to four times as many people coming to activities aimed at local environmental restoration. Its teams have worked to improve 100 parks and green spaces in the region.

About 75 percent of EarthCorps' budget comes from fees it collects for its environmental services, so it has a more sustainable model than nonprofits that rely on donations or endowments alone.

COURTESY OF EARTHCORPS

Roshani Rai of Nepal plants native trees and shrubs along the shoreline of Burien's Seahurst Park. The planting followed a seawall removal project and is an example of Puget Sound shoreline restoration.

One EarthCorps alumnus went home to create a program in India that cleans up the streets and helps marginalized people by employing them to collect, sort and recycle 200 different kinds of garbage. Nothing, not even waste, goes to waste.

EarthCorps also emphasizes training women as future leaders.

"We put chainsaws in the hands of women who aren't used to having power," Dubiel said. "It's life changing."

When he joined the organization 15 years ago, Dubiel said, "I don't think people knew what environmental restoration was. I would say 'invasive plant' and people would give me a strange look. Now tons of people are out doing this work."

One of its projects has been removing ivy from Seward Park, where the group has cleared the plant from 42 of 50 acres of the park's forests.

If problems seem overwhelming, it can be satisfying to "just start somewhere," he said. "Stop talking, pick up a shovel and do something."

EarthCorps members working in far worse circumstances inspire others to persevere.

One EarthCorps member is fighting against the odds to preserve a freshwater dolphin in an area of Pakistan where the Taliban is waging war.

"You could have a more lucrative career," Dubiel said, "but don't we owe it to them to do the best we can?"

For another look at how Washington D.C. can learn from Washington state's approach to environmental solutions, see this post.

Despite the lingering economic woes that most Americans are still feeling, only one in five plans to reduce donations to charity this holiday season, the American Red Cross found in a new survey. More Americans will cut back on travel, decorations, parties and gifts.

ELAINE THOMPSON/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Volunteers Ken Newman, right, and Caren Shepsky heft a 50-pound bag of rice at the Cherry Street Food Bank, run by Northwest Harvest. As hunger has worsened, Northwest Harvest's pantry is seeing more than 2,500 visitors on busy days this year, up from a peak of 1,800 visitors last year.

The results tell a somewhat different story than a recent Harris Interactive survey that showed charities will probably see a decrease in generosity this season. Some large charities are preparing for lower holiday giving.

Regardless of how they interpret the data, charities are downsizing their appeals and targeting smaller donations. They're also making the most of free social media sites like Twitter and Facebook and asking supporters to help them spread the word.

The United Way of King County recently launched its Give 10/Tell 10 campaign, which asks for $10 contributions to help struggling families hit by the recession avoid falling into homelessness. After making a gift on the site, donors have the option to pass on a message emailed to 10 friends, encouraging them give, too. The charity is also using Twitter and Facebook to network, post links and share facts, such as "$25 = a week of food for a homeless person in Washington."

"We really wanted to do something different to get the word out to people that the needs are so great right now and provide a low barrier way for them to get involved," said United Way spokesman Jared Erlandson. "The thought was what if we could get people to tweet not just about what they are doing tonight, but about how they just helped someone stay in their home for the holidays then we could really have an effective vehicle to get our message out."

Mercy Corps is getting creative around Thanksgiving with a new online tool that allows families and groups of friends to make donations together. The global charity is calling on people to match the amount they spend on their own Thanksgiving Day meal with a donation that fights global hunger. The average American family spent $45 on Thanksgiving dinner in 2008, Mercy Corps said.

Other interesting new twists include gift cards with a $5 donation to charity built in. The recipient can choose where to direct the $5 gift from among more than 5,000 charities.

Getting donor fatigue? Another option is to vote for your favorite charity and have a large bank pick up the tab. Chase is donating $5 million -- $25,000 each to the top 100 charities on Dec. 15, one $1 million and five $100,000 grants to others in February, and another $1 million chosen by an advisory board of active philanthropists.

Social entrepreneurship has caught on in Seattle in a big way. It takes two of the region's strengths -- its entrepreneurial streak and its humanitarian drive -- and forges interesting new hybrids. Think FareStart, VillageReach and many other examples.

KRIS HERBST

Bill Drayton, founder of Ashoka and pioneer of social entrepreneurship.

Now the man who helped pioneer that concept and expand its practice is visiting Seattle this week, judging the Microsoft non-profit awards and speaking at an event tonight.

Bill Drayton founded Ashoka, a global network that encourages and funds people to change society for the better. Started almost 30 years ago, Ashoka now has a network of 2,000 fellows in more than 60 countries. Some notable fellows include Grameen Bank founder Muhammad Yunus and Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Whales.

Similar to the way a business entrepreneur might create new products or services, social entrepreneurs create new solutions to social problems.

Ashoka has expanded its Youth Venture program to Seattle, and 40 new ventures have been started by students from around Seattle, including Jessica Markowitz.

One new local partnership between Youth Venture and the Jolkona Foundation is aimed at getting young philanthropists interested in supporting the work of other young people.

Jolkona will feature some of Youth Venture's projects in Seattle on its Web site, including a teen publication in Issaquah to encourage journalism skills and newspaper reading habits among youth, and American Youth for Equal Educational Opportunities, a project to provide education supplies to students in the Bellevue School District who are in need of financial aid.

Social entrepreneurs help bridge the gap between philanthropy and business. On that topic, an interesting debate is going on with Intrepid Philanthropist blogger Phil Buchanan.

After the pounding that non-profits have received from some critics in the business world, it's good to see someone pushing back.

Community service helps veterans make an easier transition home, but the new generation of veterans is underutilized in their own communities,
a report released today by Civic Enterprises found. The report is based on the first nationally representative survey of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan.

"Veterans from a younger generation are returning from Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the world eager to assimilate back into their communities and campuses but often do not have the means to do so," said Army Reserve Staff Sergeant Brian Hawthorne, president of the George Washington University chapter of the Student Veterans of America, who has served two tours of duty in Iraq.

Starting today a program called Mission Serve will help connect veterans to volunteer opportunities near their homes, supported by a coalition of non-profits. The effort, led by the national campaign ServiceNation, involves more than 50 organizations in 36 projects to bridge the gap between service to the country and service to the community, and expand the U.S. volunteer movement.

MANUEL BALCE CENETA/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Veterans and their families can find volunteer opportunities using this Web site.

First lady Michelle Obama, along with Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden, kicked off the initiative in a speech at George Washington University, saying average Americans can honor veterans by volunteering, too.

Local participants included Steve Dubiel, executive director of EarthCorps, and Mark Fischer, Veterans Conservation Corps coordinator in the Washington State Department of Veteran Affairs. Organizations participating in the program include EarthCorps, Sierra Club, Veterans Conservation Corps and Big Brothers Big Sisters.

The initiative is interesting on many levels. Helping others is a way to address the trauma many veterans face after war, including high suicide rates. It also brings together diverse groups like idealist.org and the environmental movement, the American Legion and the American Red Cross to form partnerships between civilian and military service organizations. Idealist, an interactive site for exchanging resources and ideas, has Seattle non-profit expert Putnam Barber as its senior researcher and several staffers from Portland.

Soldiers who are part of the Warrior Transition Battalion at Fort Lewis will continue a program to build low-income houses through a Habitat for Humanity project.

Sierra Club is offering outdoor trips and environmental education for military personnel, their children and families.

Another event for veterans is taking place next week, when the RecruitMilitary Opportunity Expo opens on Thursday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at ShoWare Center in Kent.

More than 300 veterans are expected to attend the expo, which aims to connect recently returning troops, other veterans and their spouses with employment, entrepreneurship and educational opportunities. More information can be found here.

Norm Rice has only been on the job at the Seattle Foundation since July, but he aims to broaden the foundation's base from hundreds of wealthy donors to more than a million people in King County.

"Everybody can give, whether it's $5 or $5 million," he said.

BARBARA KINNEY

Norman Rice, former Seattle mayor and current CEO of the Seattle Foundation.

The Seattle Foundation is one of the largest community foundations in the country and the fifth largest foundation in Washington state, according to the Foundation Center, with assets of about $570 million.

With a staff of 26, the foundation has 1,200 funds under its umbrella, ranging in size from $30,000 to many millions of dollars. They include bequests from people who have made gifts to charity in their wills, and active "donor-advised funds," which help philanthropists invest their assets and make grants to charitable causes without the time and expense of running their own foundations. The foundation charges fees averaging 1 percent of the fund's balance.

Rice said he wants to get more people involved, with or without a fund. It's part of a sea change in philanthropy, a shift from passive donations to a new model shaped by a younger generation eager to see results and be personally engaged.

To broaden its appeal, the Seattle Foundation is revamping its Web site to offer detailed profiles and reviews of the non-profits and programs it funds, and allow online donations for the first time. The new Web site, expected to be launched early next year, will also have an Amazon.com-style recommendations feature to help people find programs related to their interests.

His goal is to reach as many as 1.5 million people over the next several years, getting them involved in some way with the foundation's programs. He'd also like to increase the number of donor-advised funds the foundation manages from the current 750.

Even without a lot of money to give, he thinks people can help support its long-term strategy to improve the community by working in seven areas: basic needs, the environment, the economy, education, arts and culture, neighborhoods and communities, and health and wellness.

Rice said he wants to focus particular attention on workforce development and early childhood learning.

Speaking to the Seattle Philanthropic Advisors Network (SPAN), the former Seattle mayor said he thinks "foundations are in an enviable place to be change agents" and show governments new ways to solve problems.

The foundation's assets, down 27 percent last year, have bounced back somewhat this year, growing 17 percent from January through the third quarter. While it has had to make significant cuts in its operating budget, Rice said he doesn't expect the foundation to reduce its grant making.

After taking a financial blow in the past year, non-profits have been forced to work with fewer resources. More than ever, it makes sense for them to consolidate, Rice said.

He suggested a "non profit mergers and acquisitions fund," where "those who come together get the dollars. I just believe some things we're funding are doing too many things that are alike."

"Every organization needs to look at themselves to see what they do best," he said. If someone else is doing it better, they should partner or concentrate on something else.

My story today tells about Jessica Markowitz, who at age 11 began a charity to help girls in Rwanda after she learned about a genocide that wiped out many of their parents.

She sends 22 girls to a rural school and is working on building a library there, using prize money she won for her efforts.

Two things seem to have been lost on some readers -- first that she is working with a local organization in Rwanda (FAWE), supporting them to take on the issue in their own country. That kind of grassroots social change can be much more profound than sending money from overseas.

LORI MARKOWITZ

Jessica spent time teaching English this summer to girls at a rural school she and her classmates are supporting in Rwanda.

And secondly that seeing the way kids live in places like Rwanda actually provides an invaluable of education for an American student. Kids in the U.S may have the kind of material wealth that is unimaginable to people in developing countries. Yet there is also an emptiness that leaves teenagers here sullen and depressed.

To experience what life is like in a poor country different from her own not only opens the eyes of girls like Jessica, it gives them a lifelong understanding of what philanthropy can do, which is worth much more than a $1,500 plane ticket. It creates a citizen who understands and appreciates her country all the more and its potential in the world. Seeing the fruits of her labor taking shape in the form of happier, smarter students trains a future social entrepreneur.

As Jessica said, the project has benefited her and her classmates as much as it has the girls overseas.

"A really nice thing happens when we tell people what we're doing," she said. "They say 'I never knew we could do something like that.' They jump in."

As for Rwanda itself, the country has made incredible strides in recent years, but with a war on its border and the global economic downturn reducing investment, its progress is fragile.

Last night Nicholas Kristof told the story of a boy on a beach who collected starfish washed onto the sand and threw them back into the ocean one by one. A man came along and told him he'd never make a difference, but the boy replied "It sure made a difference to that one."

What if there were thousands, or even millions of boys and girls on the beach, an entire clean up crew, and each one saved at least one starfish?

That is the possibility in cities like Seattle.

A city where each citizen is linked to another citizen of a city somewhere in the world that needs our help.

We have sister city programs where delegations of bureaucrats go visit each other and talk about expanding ties. That's the old paradigm. So here's my idea: take Seattle's enormous talents, compassion and global perspective, and scale it up.

Time for the younger generation to redefine this civic pillar and make it really meaningful.

Because something is happening here but you don't know what it is, in the words of Dylan. A whole generation is looking at the world in a new way and is hungry to change it. These are the students who pack auditoriums and line up for hours to meet their rock stars - the Paul Farmers and Kavita Ramdases and Nicholas Kristofs of the world.

Three years ago an 11-year-old girl, Jessica Markowitz, decided to help educate girls in Rwanda. She traveled back and forth, raised more than $30,000, and now she's expanding her partnership to high schools in Seattle and Kigali. At Bellevue High School Brett Mennella helped start a microfinance club, which raised more than $130,000 for a local non-profit helping poor entrepreneurs, and now five other high schools have followed his lead. There are countless other examples here and in cities across the U.S.

Everyone knows the wealth system today is unequal. As Kristof said, we who won the birth lottery buy lattes and iPods while kids overseas starve. But we as individuals have the power to change it ourselves right now, and even the technology.

The Kiva model has shown the possibilities for transformation when one person uses the Internet to send one tiny bit of her resources to one other person.

Joe Mallahan would like it, from what I hear about his ideas to use mobile phones for social business. Mike McGinn would like it, from what I hear about his enthusiasm for grassroots environmental movements.

Someone in Edmonds liked the idea, because he made sure every one of its 43,000 residents could give $1 to help Carol Schillios save girls in Mali.

Kristof also told us about a $10,000 bank mistake that saved a school in China that was able to waive $13 in school fees for each of the girls, who became accountants and sent money back to their town, which got a road built and attracted more investment, which made life better for everyone. A virtuous cycle.

What if we could change a whole town in a place like Cambodia or Cameroon, and create a new sister cities model for others? Take soft power right down to the local level.

We have 602,000 residents in Seattle, and most of them can afford a latte. Some school in some town with a poor girl who can't afford an education is just waiting for us to notice.

Philanthropic efforts, when combined with the possibilities of the Internet, are producing interesting hybrids, and crowdsourcing ideas for development is one of them.

The Peace Corps is testing such an approach with Africa Rural Connect (ARC), an online community where creativity and global collaboration are the goals, and the best ideas can win $20,000 in funding. See the current top 10 ideas here. Oct. 15 is the deadline for submitting projects for the current contest.

PEACE CORPS

Molly Mattessich, pictured at right during her Peace Corps service in Mali, with her host, Niama Keita. She now manages an online site to take global ideas and apply them to problems she saw firsthand as a volunteer.

Anyone can submit an idea, endorse existing ideas and suggest improvements to them.

Hosted by the National Peace Corps Association, the site connects over 200,000 current and returned Peace Corps volunteers, African Diaspora, non-profit leaders, technology buffs and anyone else who has a solution for Africa's development challenges.

It uses a software called Wegora, designed to encourage a global exchange of ideas.

"We are excited about the caliber of ideas that have been posted on the site so far and we're really seeing the Wegora technology help foster a whole new way of thinking online about these types of issues," says Molly Mattessich, manager of Africa Rural Connect and a former Peace Corps volunteer in Mali. "The volume of posts from people and groups around the world has steadily increased and we hope to see that trend continue in the coming months."

The University of Washington again led the nation in the number of Peace Corps volunteers last year, with 104. Washington state has had more Peace Corps volunteers (8,087) than any other state except California and New York. A blending of humanitarian idealism with innovative technology seems to characterize perfectly this region's strengths.

Another such experiment with funding charity based on the wisdom of the crowd is Paul Buchheit's Collaborative Charity project.

Buchheit, the lead developer of Google's Gmail and founder of FriendFeed, introduced his project by declaring "I'm going to donate a bunch of money, but I want random people on the Internet to decide where it goes."

So far he has received 18,968 votes on 419 ideas from 3,274 people. Among the most popular ideas was the Talking Book project (with brightly colored Talking Books pictured above) by Seattle-based non-profit Literacy Bridge.

Seattle is building a reputation for using business to serve humanity. That kind of work used to be called "giving back." But for many young entrepreneurs, it's essential to their careers from the beginning.

Last year Nandie Oosthuizen, 19, founded Hand & Heart, a non-profit that funds an orphanage for kids affected by AIDS in her native South Africa. Before that she started a campaign at Bishop Blanchet High School to raise money and awareness about the crisis in Darfur. Now studying business and sociology at the University of Washington, she calls herself a change maker, social entrepreneur and youth philanthropist.

Oosthuizen is one of dozens of young entrepreneurs supported by Youth Venture, an organization that encourages people as young as 12 to use their creativity and passion to take on important social issues.

Since its start in Seattle in late 2007, Youth Venture Seattle has helped more than 30 student teams get up and running, some for more than a year now. They have each created projects around solving some kind of problem, from lack of clean water to sex trafficking to a community center focused on science and technology. Started by Ashoka, the global network for social entrepreneurs, Youth Venture helps the teams form a business plan, raise seed funds and launch their own enterprise.

COURTESY OF YOUTH VENTURE

Members of a group called American Youth for Equal Educational Opportunities in Bellevue collect school supplies for needy students with the help of Youth Venture.

Both Hand & Heart and Youth Venture will be represented tomorrow evening, along with the Vittana and Jolkona foundations, at a forum on social entrepreneurship sponsored by the World Affairs Council's Young Professionals International Network (YPIN). The forum starts at 7:30 p.m. at the Microsoft Auditorium in the Seattle Central Library.

Participants, including Jolkona co-founders Adnan Mahmud and Nadia Eleza Khawaja and Vittana co-founder and CEO Kushal Chakrabarti, will share stories about what inspired them, the challenges they have faced and advice for others interested in starting a social enterprise.

Says Jack Knellinger, director of Youth Venture in Seattle:
"Having a room full of young people share their experiences and what they see in the world in terms of what they want to accomplish... opens up the minds of all of our youth."

The Jolkona Foundation has added Seattle education and microfinance projects to its Web site, allowing people to reach local programs with targeted small donations.

The non-profit created by husband and wife team Adnan Mahmud and Nadia Eleza Khawaja launched its Web site in June, aiming at younger donors. I profiled their venture here.

Now Jolkona is partnering with the Technology Access Foundation (TAF) and the Washington Community Alliance for Self Help (CASH).

The two TAF projects aim to reduce educational disparities between students of different racial backgrounds in the Pacific Northwest. Donors can fund after-school programs for students of color in underprivileged neighborhoods in Seattle and Federal Way. For $50, donors can sponsor snacks and field trips for TAF's TechStart program, or sponsor student council activity and books at TAF Academy. Donors receive photos from students and lists of the books purchased.

The project with Washington CASH provides money for business training to micro-loan borrowers in Washington, where 26 percent of the population is considered "working poor." Donors can fund business training for borrowers for $30, or sponsor a client to attend the non-profit's eight-week Business Development Training course for $375.

"We love Seattle and we are glad that we can utilize our platform to assist TAF and Washington CASH in addressing some of the biggest needs in our hometown," said Mahmud. "We believe poverty and lack of education are not only problems in remote villages of Africa and Asia but also close to home."

Deborah Jacobs went from helping build Seattle's state-of-the-art Central Library to visiting libraries overseas with no heat or running water and budgets as low as $30 a month.

In her first year on the job at the Gates Foundation, she has directed an expanding program called the Global Libraries Initiative, which aims to improve free access to computers and the Internet in public libraries.

Today she is presenting a $1 million prize to a foundation in Medellín, Colombia, for its innovative use of technology in libraries to promote community development.

GREG GILBERT/SEATTLE TIMES

After more than a decade as City Librarian in Seattle, Deborah Jacobs now manages the global libraries program at the Gates Foundation.

In her travels over the past year Jacobs said she has seen "absolute heroism and commitment to what libraries can do," in places where "librarians are having to close the door to go across fields to their house to get warm water or go to the toilet or wash their hands."

"A million dollars feels like a lot of money to a library system," she said.

The Fundación Empresas Públicas de Medellín, or EPM Foundation, won the Gates 2009 Access to Learning Award.

The network of 34 libraries is part of a regional initiative to use technology to increase the transparency of government, create a competitive business environment and improve education. It serves patrons from low-income communities where people have no computers at home.The network includes five library parks throughout the city that serve as cultural centers with educational resources and training programs for how to use computers and the Internet.

The EPM Foundation's efforts have contributed to the revitalization of Colombia's second largest city, Jacobs said, and its work can be a model for other communities.

"As a librarian I really recognize that libraries with computers can open the doors to people, help people feel a sense of inclusion and greater connection with the broader world," she said. It has also made libraries busier than ever.

The number of library visitors in Medellín's network has jumped from 90,000 to more than 500,000 per month, and the program has helped reduce the individual-to-computer ratio from 140:1 in 2005, to 47:1 in 2008, according to the Gates Foundation.

The EPM program will use the Gates award to increase its library network, develop additional training programs and expand its services.

Apart from the annual award, the Gates Foundation has made about $230 million in grants to library programs in 10 countries as part of its Global Development program -- in Chile, Mexico, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Vietnam, Poland, Botswana, Bulgaria and Ukraine.

Unlike other programs where applicants themselves submit requests for grants, the foundation first identifies a country whose library system is suitable for the Gates program, Jacobs said, and then foundation representatives begin contacting government officials. The Gates Foundation targets countries making investments in their public library systems.

"The government has to show generally they are willing to prepare buildings for new technology," she said, which could include putting in new roofs and heating systems, bringing in furniture and providing last-mile Internet connectivity to the building. "We're seeing governments are really beginning to understand the importance of technology in their towns even under bad economic times."

In some cases, the library funding overlaps with other Gates Foundation work, such as financial services, agriculture and health. In Botswana, the global library initiative works in tandem with a comprehensive AIDS program that is also funded by the Gates Foundation, she said. The Botswana libraries offer books and training on HIV prevention and even provide condoms.

COURTESY OF THE BILL & MELINDA GATES FOUNDATION/PATRICIA RINCON

Professor Alejandro Lobo Santamaria helps students practice their computer skills in a library created inside a series of donated train cars. The program received a $1 million award this week from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. .

The Gates global library program has a partnership with Microsoft, which has donated software to all 10 countries where the Gates Foundation has made grants, totaling about $30 million.

After the Gates Foundation makes the grant for computers and training, the country has an option to request a donation of software from Microsoft, said Tom Murphy, public relations director for Corporate Citizenship at Microsoft. All of the libraries have taken the offer of software, made through Microsoft's technology donations program for non-profits, he said.

Rohan Paramesh, 16, combined his interest in mountaineering with his desire to help charitable causes during his summer break from school.

He just finished climbing Mount Rainier and used the trip to raise about $15,000 from friends and family members supporting his twin goals.

At a time when funds are tight but needs are great, creative approaches to fundraising and charitable giving are flourishing. Local groups are holding new kinds of events to raise money while sharing knowledge about what they do. Individuals are reaching out to personal networks, and businesses are identifying worthy customers to help during the recession.

COURTESY OF ROHAN PARAMESH

Lakeside School senior Rohan Paramesh climbed Mount Rainier to raise money for Seattle Children's Hospital and for a children's education project in India.

Following a passion for mountain climbing, Paramesh planned to try to summit Rainier this year. When he found out he had secured a spot in early August, he realized the training would make it hard to spend a lot of time volunteering for non-profits.

So he decided to turn his trip into a fund raiser for schools in India, where he spent time volunteering the summer before, and for Seattle Children's Hospital, which had helped his brother with bouts of severe allergies.

"I know it's more than if I went around to peoples' houses and asked for donations or sold key chains," he said.

"It was a unique thing to do -- an adventure I would tell people about. Climbing a mountain itself represents surmounting some huge obstacle. That is also representative of what I'm trying to help others do."

His conclusion? "One lesson was clear to me -- even a small, sustained effort can matter."
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Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center started the Innovators Network just over a year ago to recruit donors under the age of 45.

Tonight it's holding an event to review its progress, where prospective donors can meet and talk with leading researchers.

"This generation does things a little bit differently," said Christi Ball Loso, the center's media relations manager. "They're more hands-on. They want to be able to interact with the researchers, and they ask really good questions. They're interested in the science."

Earlier this year the non-profit eliminated 83 jobs, or about 3 percent of its workforce, as part of budget cuts in response to a drop in charitable donations. It's looking to establish a larger pool of younger donors now to fund cutting-edge research and get started early on philanthropy aimed at fighting cancer.

The program helps young donors increase their knowledge of scientific innovation and share the information about research with their own social and professional networks. Individuals make annual gifts of $1,000 or more to support some of the Hutch's most cutting-edge, high-risk, high-reward research projects, Loso said.

UPDATE: The group raised a $306,000 in its first year and 131 charter members were recruited, surpassing the original goal of 100 first-year members in the Innovators Network.

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Project Treehouse, a Seattle nonprofit that supports foster children with clothing donations, education fees and summer camps, used the demand for back-to-school clothes in a year of tight budgets to stage a unique fashion show on Wednesday.

Project Treehouse, wanted to highlight the needs of foster children while adding some clothes to their wardrobes.

People attending the event brought clothing and toured The Wearhouse, a supply store that provides free items such as clothing, shoes, school supplies, books, toys and bikes to 2,800 foster kids every year. Volunteers and foster families accompanied them to talk about their experiences.

The fashion show featured 14 foster kids modeling donated clothes as Seattle Seahawks' SeaGals cheered them down the runway. Guest received shopping bags to take home and fill up with needed items. Five local clothing boutiques listed on the Web site are still taking drop-off donations.

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Mywedding.com founder Rob Johnsen thought of a way to help couples during the difficult economy by holding a "wedding wish contest" monthly through the end of the year.

The contest's first recipients were a Bellingham couple, Megan Larama and Robert Ziesing, who were struggling to afford their wedding when unexpected costs arose from the adoption of a foster child. Larama said she was impressed by Ziesing's bighearted nature. The 30-year-old teacher had a house full of children and was on his way to adopting a third child.

The bride-to-be wrote a letter to the Seattle-based company explaining the situation. Johnsen worked with local vendors, who chipped in $2,500 worth of services, including a wedding cake, tux, transportation and a stay in a downtown Seattle hotel.

This post was written by Linda Shaw

Two early-learning efforts -- one in the Seattle area and one in Yakima -- received another $8 million in funding from Thrive by Five Washington and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The White Center Early Learning Initiative and East Yakima's Ready by Five each will receive $4 million over the next year. Those donations follow first-round grants last year of $11.7 million to the White Center initiative, and $5 million to East Yakima.

Both initiatives are working to substantially increase high-quality learning opportunities for children from birth to age 5.

In the past year, the White Center Early Learning Initiative broke ground on an early learning center that will open this winter. It also started the Outreach Doula program, a home-visiting program that supports Somali and Latino families with health, child development, and early learning information.

The Yakima program worked with the Yakima School District to bring kindergartners to school two weeks early to help them get acquainted with their teachers, classmates, routines and expectations. It also started a monthly program to help parents learn more about how to help their children learn.

Give up millions of dollars a year by declining a commercial logo on the chests of its celebrated players? It sounded like a bad idea to FC Barcelona's marketing department. Manchester United, which wore the AIG logo on its uniforms until January, made about $25 million a year from the deal.

But the decision to wear the Unicef logo instead, and pay Unicef almost $2 million a year for the privilege, was made by President Joan Laporta, and three years later, it has paid off well, says Marta Segu, executive director of the FC Barcelona Foundation.

"Now the marketing people have said this is one of the most important decisions we have taken," she said. The result is a unique global identity.

The team is promoting the fight against malaria on its jerseys (pictured at right) during its current U.S. tour. Tomorrow FC Barcelona visits Seattle to play against the Seattle Sounders FC.

"Before we had the same value as other clubs like Real Madrid or Chelsea. We have been winners, we make money," Segu said. "Now everybody knows that Barça has another value -- solidarity, social responsibility."

The club gives Unicef 1.5 million euros a year, and 0.7 percent of its revenue goes toward humanitarian causes. The budget of the club's charitable foundation, which was created in 1994 but basically languished for a decade without any real plan, tripled over the last six years to $6 million.

"In 2005 we started making new programs and projects," Segu said. "We decided not only will it be an increase of the brand, the brand will increase all over the world toward our humanitarian dimension."

FC Barcelona's humanitarian work includes a new partnership with United Against Malaria, a coalition supported by the Gates Foundation that I wrote about today (thanks to everyone for the Tweets!) That partnership includes Seattle-based global health non-profit PATH. For Seattle's global health community, so much is riding on success fighting malaria, from SBRI's research toward a vaccine to the Gates Foundation's grand ambitions to wipe out a disease that kills a million people a year.

In Los Angeles, the campaign picked up the support of Major League Soccer Commissioner Don Garber and the Galaxy's Landon Donovan, the best scoring American player (pictured with ball above).

FC Barcelona player Seydou Keita returned to his native Mali earlier this year to distribute bed nets to families there.

"To be able to travel back to Mali and to talk to my people about the importance of fighting malaria was a wonderful experience," he said.

"We're very lucky to have such dedicated fans--and one of the ways that we can thank them for that dedication is to help raise awareness. Since so much of the world pays attention to soccer, we have the opportunity to focus that attention on malaria as well."

DEAN RUTZ/SEATTLE TIMES

After surviving two bouts of malaria, Sanna Nyassi helped raise funds and awareness about disease for Nothing But Nets.

FC Barcelona became the first team to support the UN Millennium Development Goals and now has three partnerships with the UN -- with Unicef to help vulnerable children, including those affected by HIV/AIDS in Africa, with UNESCO to fight racism in sports, and with the UNHCR to provide sports and health programs in refugee camps.

Throughout Africa and in Mexico and India, the foundation set up centers for children that offer hot meals, help with homework, health care and sports and promote gender equality.

For Seattle Sounders FC player Sanna Nyassi, his most recent case of malaria back home in his native Gambia was so serious that he and his mother both worried he might not survive. But he got treated and pulled through, and ended up playing professional soccer for the Sounders the next year. Nyassi said he was a fan of FC Barcelona before, but after hearing about the club's work to help fight the disease, "I liked them more," he said.

Can Vittana prove there is a viable commercial market for educational loans outside the U.S.? Amazon.com veterans are betting it can.

The Vittana Foundation is a fledgling non-profit that aims to bring student loans to developing countries through person-to-person micro-lending.

While microcredit has made great strides, says Vittana CEO Kushal Chakrabarti, it hasn't lifted poor entrepreneurs into the middle class. That's usually left to the next generation, so the first chance borrowers get, they send their kids to school. He wants to make that step easier.

KRISTI HEIM

Kim Rachmeler (left) is a former Amazon.com executive who now advises and invests in the educational non-profit Vittana, started by Kushal Chakrabarti (right) and Brett Witt. .

Making small loans to poor entrepreneurs has been so successful (at least financially) that it has spawned microfinance institutions around the world and investment by commercial banks such as Citibank and Deutsche Bank.

Student loans, however, are not common outside the U.S. and Europe.

"There isn't capital flowing in because the model isn't being proven, and the model isn't being proven because capital isn't flowing in," said Chakrabarti, 26, a former Amazon.com engineer.

He and fellow Amazon.com veteran Brett Witt are hoping to use Vittana to show that loaning money to students in developing countries for education is a good investment.

And their former colleagues and managers are backing them.

Kim Rachmeler spent 10 years at Amazon.com as a vice president and senior executive responsible for everything from worldwide customer service to global supply chains.

She has been a big supporter of sites such as DonorsChoose and Kiva. With Vittana she saw a chance to get involved early on as a major backer.

Rachmeler joined Amazon when it had only 500 employees, building the company and striving to prove the online retail model.

Back then "everything we did was betting the company," she said.

After retiring from Amazon.com two years ago, she said "I don't have that shot of adrenaline every day," but backing a non-profit technology venture with big ambitions, "I get to experience a little bit of that again. It's an opportunity to make the world a better place."

The challenge is helping Vittana grow big enough to be self sustaining during the worst recession anyone has experienced.

Former Amazon executive Joel Spiegel is also supporting Vittana, along with his wife, daughter and son, who is one of the non-profit's seven volunteers.

In an art gallery near South Lake Union, several dozen people gathered recently to listen to Chakrabarti pitch the Vittana concept in an effort to raise more funds.

He tells them the story of a student in Peru putting himself through law school by working a year, then studying a year, then working another year to save tuition.

"People find amazing ways of scraping it together," he said. "Some people make it; some people don't."

Vittana offers loans to send a student to school for a year in Peru, Nicaragua or Paraguay for less than $1,000. It works through local microfinance institutions (MFIs) such as Fundacion Paraguaya, to administer the loans. The money cycles from the individual lender to Vittana to the MFI to the student and back. The MFI charges borrowers interest on the loan of about 10 to 15 percent APR to cover its operating costs.

People attending the presentation wanted to know how long it would take to be repaid (in three years lenders get back the loan amount but without interest), and how Vittana can stay in business since it's not taking a cut of the loan. Vittana plans to support its operations through donations, which it will request and handle separately from the loans, similar to Kiva's model.

The non-profit has already drawn interest and investment from Facebook, which chose Vittana to participate in its incubator program.

"People have this image of what a poor person looks like." said Chakrabarti. "They should be wearing rags. They should be living in huts."

That's not always the case, he said. Students Vittana has helped fund have jobs at radio stations, they spend time on the Internet, they study banking and chemistry, and they dream big.

Add philanthropy to the growing list of applications for mobile phones. One of the newest and most interesting innovations to combine philanthropy and technology is mobile giving.

Donating by text message is a new phenomenon, one that a Bellevue non-profit is pioneering by providing the platform to link donors to charities, as a story I wrote describes in detail today.

Mobile phone users can text a word such as HOPE (American Cancer Society), RIGHTS (Amnesty International), NET (Malaria No More), MEALS (Food Lifeline) or many others to a designated short code and contribute $5 or $10 to a cause. The Bellevue-based Mobile Giving Foundation acts as a clearinghouse for donations, helping non-profits set up codes and settling the billing between carriers and charities. The charges appear on donors' cell phone bills.

Mobile Giving Foundation CEO Jim Manis, a wireless industry veteran, got started helping set up a system for people to send donations for emergency relief efforts following Hurricane Katrina and the Asian tsunami.

GREG GILBERT/SEATTLE TIMES

Jim Manis is working to expand mobile giving.

The system gave people a way to take action immediately in response to a need. Manis also saw it as a way to reach younger donors.

He persuaded U.S. mobile carriers to agree to process the donations free of charge (though they do earn something from text messaging charges). The foundation also works with a dozen service providers that create mobile fund raising campaigns for non-profits.

Text donation campaigns have been gaining momentum since the Super Bowl in 2008, which featured a commercial to text $5 to help a United Way youth fitness program.

Political campaigns have made extensive use of mobile phones and the Internet, and earlier this year the U.S. government started a drive to adopt new media in support of foreign policy by calling on Americans to text pledges to people in Pakistan through the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.

In the future, there may be a way to text $5 directly to the phone of someone you want to help.

Mobile giving is just starting to catch on, but considering there are more than 270 million mobile subscribers in the U.S alone (and more than 4 billion worldwide), it has the potential for power in numbers.

For a group of recent business school graduates from the University of Washington, job hunting in the current economy proved grueling.

So they decided to give up searching and start their own non-profit -- Lumana Credit, which provides micro loans and business training to entrepreneurs in rural Ghana.

COURTESY OF LUMANA

Lumana founder Samantha Rayner (left) and Beaulah Tettey, a local staff leader (center), present Comfort Afornorpe with a certificate for completing entrepreneurship training in Ghana.

Samantha Rayner, 21, started the effort last year with $3,000 and an idea to help Atorkor Village in Ghana with a microloan project. She spent the summer working on a pilot program to train 30 local entrepreneurs and provide each with a small loan.

Lumana Credit has partnerships with the Atorkor Development Foundation in Ghana and Village Volunteers, a Seattle non-profit that connects volunteers with grassroots organizations in Ghana, Kenya, India and Nepal. Lumana gives borrowers access to funds and manages repayment of loans through Anlo Rural Bank in Ghana.

With a team of nine people, Lumana is expanding and introducing the organization to potential supporters, volunteers and others in Seattle. Lumana will hold a fund raising event at 7 p.m. tonight at BoConcept Seattle.

The country is facing a new and painful economic crisis, but "we've been in an education crisis for decades," Bill Gates told a conference of lawmakers today.

Educational performance at every level, from primary school to college, is dropping against the rest of the world, he said. The United States has fallen from No.1 to No.10 among industrialized nations in college graduation rates.

And U.S. high school graduation rates have not improved for 40 years, said Gates, who is co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. More than 30 percent of all students drop out, including almost half of minority high school students.

MATT ROURKE/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Bill Gates, who dropped out of Harvard to start Microsoft, is calling on lawmakers to reform education and raise graduation rates.

"Success in this century will depend on how well America does what we have so far done very badly -- give low-income and minority students a world-class education," Gates said in a speech at the National Conference of State Legislatures in Philadelphia.

Difficult times can often spark needed reforms, he added.

He called on lawmakers to use $100 billion in federal stimulus money to change the way schools are run, creating new ways to measure and reward graduation rates instead of enrollment rates, for example, and tracking which colleges prepare students best for the job market.

"Colleges are not entitled to escape scrutiny at a time of a plunging educational performance and permanent fiscal pressure," Gates said.

He also advocated linking financial incentives such as state funding, financial aid and other programs to school performance.

Adding financial incentives for graduation can encourage colleges to offer schedules that make more sense for students who have to work, courses and counseling that guide students toward specific job goals and more innovative use of technology, such as online lectures, Gates said.

Teachers play the most important role in student achievement, so effective teachers should be identified and rewarded.

"We reward teachers for things that do not identify effective teaching -- like seniority and master's degrees," Gates said.

He criticized a law passed last year in New York that bars student test scores from being considered in teacher tenure decisions.

"That was a strategic win for people who oppose reform -- because no real reform will happen until we can evaluate teachers based on their students' achievement."

Gates encouraged lawmakers to support the state-led Common Core State Standards Initiative as a way to create higher standards for students across the country.

Linking common standards to curriculum can unleash creativity in new teaching materials, such as online tools and videos of every required course, he said. Gates said he and his wife have used online videos to help their own children with school work.

"Imagine having the people who create electrifying video games applying their intelligence to online tools that pull kids in and make algebra fun," he said.

The Gates Foundation has focused its U.S. grantmaking program on education, but its initial push for small schools produced mixed results and led to revamping of its strategy.

The foundation recently announced a new post-secondary initiative with a goal of doubling the number of low-income students in the United States who graduate from college or other post high-school programs by 2025. The foundation is funding pilot programs at community colleges and technical schools to help low-income adults with full-time jobs get through college.

Of the $20 billion the Gates Foundation has given away over the past 15 years, about $5.2 billion has gone into U.S. programs, mostly for education.

Brett Mennella, a senior at Bellevue High School (at right), helped start the school's Microfinance Club, which focuses on learning about the global effect of microcredit. The club raised more than $130,000 in the last two years to support microloans, and decided to invest the money in Esperanza International, a global microfinance institution based in Bellevue founded by former Mariners catcher David Valle. This is the second post he's filed from the Dominican Republic, where he is doing volunteer work.

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After another day in the country, I have gained even more insight into the Dominican culture and frustrated economic situation. I attended another Esperanza International microcredit bank meeting this morning that was regrettably not as efficient as the meeting I went to yesterday.

The meeting took place in a bank leader's home in Hato Mayor, the town where I am staying. All 25 associates were present or had an excused absence except one woman. Unfortunately, this particular woman did not send her money with another associate, so the other women in her bank had to cover 1,000 pesos (about $28) for her before anyone could leave.

This was a very uncomfortable situation because all the other women had been responsible and made their biweekly payments, but they also had to support their fellow associate who had failed them. This group solidarity model is the main reason micro loans have such a high repayment - more than 98 percent worldwide, and a very similar rate here in the Dominican Republic.

BRETT MENNELLA

Carmen Mota received a microloan from Esperanza International to support her small shop in Hato Mayor, Dominican Republic.

Borrowers know the importance of education. All the people I have talked with so far assured me that their children are going to finish high school, and many have said that they want their children to attend a university. However, affording a university education is a completely different issue.

I interviewed several entrepreneurs, including a woman named Carmen Mota. She was extremely proud of her business and wanted to take me there to show me how she was making her living. Next to her house she had a small "colmado," or food stand, which she operated with her husband and brother. She gave me a soda and valiantly refused to accept any money from me in return, even though she was already living on so little. She was saving to put a cement floor in her business to replace the existing one made of dirt.

This type of generosity and the overall sincerity of the Dominican people continue to inspire me.

BRETT MENNELLA

Pascual Nieve, 57, has received seven microloans from Esperanza International, which he used to develop his horse saddle business.

Although the people here are all very sociable, the men and women associated with Esperanza and other such organizations seem to be exceptions from the vast majority of the population in terms of their independence, economic stability and plans for the future.

For those seeking a way out of poverty, taking out a microloan or other source of financial assistance has had another, more subtle benefit -- it teaches them how to dream.

The culture itself seems to be a bit confused. Technology comes off as a surprisingly high priority in society. Men, women and children watch hours of television each day and music is always blaring out of home radios and cars. Kids have cell phones at such a young age you would think you were living in the States. Still their families struggle to eat every day.

The unemployment rate of 15.4 percent, according to The World Factbook, is not representative of the real number of people without jobs. Three or four people often work a one person job just to be doing something productive. There are men on "motos," mopeds and street-designed dirt bikes, on every corner when most people can walk anywhere within the city limits in about 20 minutes.

BRETT MENNELLA

Shacks with walls and roofs made of corrugated metal in a village in the Dominican Republic.

Another problem that I see as probably the most detrimental in the long run is the lack of variation of businesses in the economy. Everyone seems to run a colmado, fantasia or clothing store, none of which require skilled labor. One woman told me that she started a colmado because "everyone lives on this earth and everyone has to eat." This simple thinking seems to work because although many people are only just getting by, these businesses are still bringing in an income.

If the Dominican Republic wants to push into the modern world economy, it needs to develop business variation or possibly find new successful cash crops. The economy is heavily reliant on sugar cane, but thousands are out of work when there is not a harvest. The development of the nation is dependent on the people as well as the government and all of its systems. Poverty is obviously not a quick fix here, or anywhere else for that matter.

Brett Mennella, a senior at Bellevue High School (at right), helped start the school's Microfinance Club, which focuses on learning about the global effect of microcredit. The club raised more than $130,000 in the last two years to support microloans, and decided to invest the money in Esperanza International, a global microfinance institution based in Bellevue founded by former Mariners catcher David Valle. This is the first of several posts he'll be filing from the Dominican Republic, where he is doing volunteer work.

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Despite its growing economy, the Dominican Republic is only a tourist destination for most of the Western world. It has 1,288 kilometers of coastline, much of which is made up of brilliant sandy beaches and resorts. However, more than 30 percent of the country lives below the poverty line of $2,326 in annual income according to USAID, and a majority of the others are not too far above it. I have been in the Dominican Republic two weeks now and most of what I have seen is far from the lucrative tourist lifestyle.

I spent my first week with the Bellevue High School Microfinance Club. We have loaned to over 1,400 people to date in the San Pedro area through Esperanza and were able to visit many of these people during our stay. We also worked on a school in a very small town outside of San Pedro for two days, which is not easy to say the least in 95 degree heat with 75 percent humidity.

I am currently staying with a host family in the town of Hato Mayor, home to about 100,000 people, which is a very populated area relative to the rest of the country. It thrives around the town park, the center of social interaction, and the various Christian churches located throughout the town. The poverty of the Dominican Republic is apparent in the deteriorating streets and undeveloped buildings.

The public water system often shuts off for days, even weeks at a time. Despite this, there is relatively easy access to water and almost all homes have big rainwater collectors on their roofs which they then chlorinate and can use for household activities.

There is a large supermarket in town and dozens of other "colmados," which sell a variety of food from fresh fruit and bread to soap and cleaning supplies.

These are the realities of Dominican life that I have been able to experience during my stay here.

This morning I visited an Esperanza microcredit bank meeting in Bejucal, a small, poor community about 45 minutes outside of Hato Mayor. I rode there in a "Gua Gua," the Dominican term for a van or bus. This one normally seats 12 people, but the driver had somehow managed to pack 24 of us into the vehicle.

All bank meetings start at nine in the morning and associates are required to attend these biweekly meetings to make their payments. In this particular meeting, some associates did not show up so they sent their payment money with others in the same bank.

Attendance is very important in the world of microcredit because its solidarity is based on ideals that all people in the group should support each other and are accountable for each other. Their absence was a problem that is a constant focus in microlending because it does not encourage the trust and responsibility needed for a microcredit bank to be successful.

I interviewed a man named Juan Sosa, who was the main connection between the Esperanza officials and the bank. He buys and sells cacao, a plant native to the tropical Americans and Caribbean, and is currently paying back his ninth and largest loan thus far with Esperanza, about $425. He is married and has two daughters, ages two and nine, and two sons, ages three and eight. He plans to take out another loan after he has paid this one back in order to continue developing his business. His goal is to buy a cement house because the one he is currently living in is wooden, making it susceptible to hurricanes which plague the region annually.

However, this is not the norm for microfinance or for the Dominican Republic. Many people are only able to make minor, subtle changes to their life, but they are at least able to do so thanks to microfinance and other philanthropic causes. They might put a cement floor in their house when they have been sleeping on dirt all their lives. Or maybe they can start buying meat when their diet normally only consists of rice and plantains.

Poverty here is not only rooted in the low income that people take home each year. The education, health care, transportation and other government systems are all underdeveloped and do not seem to be improving anytime soon.

From what I have seen so far, this seems to be a classic case of "the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer."

Adnan Mahmud's inspiration to create a new kind of charity started when he passed a stranger at a cemetery.

He was in Bangladesh visiting his grandfather's grave when he saw a man who clearly didn't have money for his own son's funeral.

The man was carrying his dead son, dressed only in a pair of shorts. He couldn't afford the traditional white cloth used to shroud the dead for a proper Muslim burial.

"There were vendors selling cloth for 50 cents or a dollar," Mahmud said. "I could have helped him, but by the time I came to the realization I was already back home."

MIKE SIEGEL/SEATTLE TIMES

Adnan Mahmud and Nadia Khawaja are founders of Jolkona, a non-profit designed to encourage young philanthropists.

Even a small amount of money can make a huge difference in the life of another person, he thought, but the problem was how to connect them.

"I couldn't have saved his son, but I could have at least helped ease the pain a little bit," he said.

Mahmud, 31, a program manager at Microsoft Research, thought about the many young professionals he knew who want to do some good but don't have the resources of Bill Gates.

"They'll all tell you 'I want to make a difference, but I don't know what I can do,'" he said.

The solution was to create an online space for people to get excited about philanthropy with just a couple hundred dollars a year.

So in 2007 he and his wife, Nadia Khawaja, created the non-profit Jolkona Foundation. Jolkona is a Bengali word meaning "a drop of water."

"Small drops of money can add up and make a ripple of changing the world," said Khawaja, 26. She was drawn to social service after a stint as a volunteer math tutor in South Central Los Angeles during college. "I don't want to just work in the corporate world, not feeling like I'm making a difference when there's so many problems going on."

After six months of testing, their Web site went live this month. Similar to Kiva and Global Giving, it lets people channel funds to specific people and causes. It also gives them new tools for monitoring their impact. Mahmud said he was put off by large conventional charities because it was hard to choose specific programs or know exactly how contributions were used.

"It goes into this black hole," he said. "I don't know what happens to it."

Jolkona's founders are part of a growing number of young people demanding more control of their philanthropy. A generation used to connecting around the world through Facebook now wants a face and a direct connection to someone they're helping.

Donors can pinpoint countries where they want to contribute and choose from five categories: cultural identity, education, empowerment, environment and public health. Projects can be filtered by the amount of dollars needed, going down to as little as $5, and the duration, from less than a month to six years.

"For young professionals, you're so busy it's hard to do research," Khawaja said. "You just get lazy. It's on your list to do, but it just doesn't get done."

"Our goal was to use technology to engage youth and make it as simple as possible to donate," Mahmud said.

The site also offers what it calls "tangible proofs for every gift."
"If you give $50 to buy library books, you'll actually know what books they bought with your donation," Mahmud said.

A person's donations are broken down into charts and graphs that look as detailed as a 401K portfolio, pages that Mahmud calls "a resume of good."

Mahmud opens up his account and sees an update on a project he's been supporting in India, helping a pregnant woman in a Calcutta slum. "Look, on the 20th she had her baby," he said. "Adopting" a mother and her baby costs $235, and donors can follow their progress for three and a half years.

In Afghanistan there's a school for girls, where $40 provides 10 months of educational expenses. Donors can see the name of a girl and "at the end of 10 months you'll see the report card," Mahmud said. For $30 you can buy seeds, tools and training for women farmers in Sudan.

Some non-profits might loathe such micro-management by donors. Mahmud acknowledges that the model isn't for every one. But for small non-profits without budgets for IT departments, it's a way to supplement other funding and reach a new generation of donors. So far they've found 19 partners and 39 projects.

Jolkona has raised $3,000 from 50 friends in six months of testing. The couple has funded the non-profit themselves, with help from volunteers and one paid software developer. Since all donations go to the charities, they created a separate button for donations to offset operating costs.

Mahmud says the next step is to get more people involved, using online tools like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. A small group of volunteers will be traveling to different countries and blogging about their experiences on the Jolkona site, hoping to inform and inspire others.

Soccer Saves, the Seattle non-profit affiliated with Seattle Sounders FC and Save the Children, is starting its first program targeting kids in Ethiopia. I profiled the organization here.

Using the magnet of soccer, the group aims to teach disadvantaged youth about healthy lifestyles by partnering with humanitarian organizations promoting HIV/AIDS education, nutrition, gender equity and reproductive health.

This week co-founder Cliff McCrath is blogging from Ethiopia, where he says Africa's second most populous country now has 5.5 million orphans and vulnerable children. Most have been orphaned because one of both of their parents had HIV/AIDS and died.

Closer to home, the second annual Puget Sound Soccer Challenge kicks off at Qwest Field on Saturday. Employees from Boeing and Microsoft have been competing since 1997, but last year they expanded the event to include more teams and raise money for philanthropy. At 11 a.m. team Boeing plays against Microsoft, followed by Starbucks vs. Expedia at 1 p.m.

On Thursday evening, organizers are throwing a pre-match auction and dance party at the Highway 99 Blues Club in Seattle, with Sounders FC player appearances. All proceeds from both public events will go to the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Western Washington & Alaska.