I don't write diaries that often anymore, but I wanted to take a moment to write this one for three very important reasons:
- People should know about this issue.
- If you choose to help, you could win a Wii.
- If you choose to help before Wednesday, you could have your donation matched by another generous donor.
Read on:
Short version:
The Van Nice family are trying to raise money to adopt Jacob, a special needs child, and bring him home. Every 10 bucks you donate before Feb. 5 gets you an entry to win a Wii game system. Every donation made before this Wednesday, Jan 28, 9:00 am CST, will also be matched at 1/2 value by another generous donor (I'm guessing there's probably an upper limit on this, but I'm not sure what it is).
The Van Nices are part of the Reece's Rainbow International Down Syndrome Orphan Ministry. The organization does advocacy and outreach, as well as the yeoman's work of matching special needs kids with adoptive families.
Longer version:
There are special needs children all over the world in need of homes. One of the organizations tackling this problem is Reece's Rainbow:
Reece's Rainbow is a registered 501(c)3 charity which promotes the international adoption and rescue of children with Down syndrome exclusively. We work to raise grant funds from individual donations to make the cost of adopting these beautiful children affordable for interested families. In only 2 1/2 years, we have found adoptive families for (135) children in (26) countries around the world.
That is to say, they are a direct action group. They work to match specific children with suitable adoptive families, and then they work to help finance the considerable expense of these adoptions. Through Reece's Rainbow, you can sponsor a specific child waiting for adoption, or a specific family who has already committed to adopting one of these children, or you can kick in to their general fund.
The Van Nice family is one of Reece's Rainbow's families. They have committed to adopting Jacob, a special needs child from Eastern Europe. In addition to the help they're getting from Reece's Rainbow, they are also raising money directly. This is where it gets good for you.
A couple of generous donors have pitched in some extras to sweeten the pot and help accelerate the fundraising for Jacob's adoption:
- Every $10 you donate before Feb. 5 gets you an entry to win a Wii game system.
- Every dollar donated before this Wednesday, January 28, 9:00 am CST, will be matched by another donor at 1/2 value. That means if you kick in $20, the other donor kicks in an extra $10 on top of that. (No link for the matching drive yet. It came through the Facebook group e-mail list. I suspect there is actually an upper limit on that, but wouldn't it be nice to test that?)
So you have a couple of ways to increase the awesomeness of your donation to Jacob's cause, and a couple of ways to help give special needs kids a loving home: help Jacob, specifically; or help Reece's Rainbow.
I do not represent or speak for Reece's Rainbow, but just so you can check to see if it's a legit operation, here is their 501c3 info page.
(One final note:
There's a decent chance that the Van Nice family and/or Reece's Rainbow have religious views that are different from your own. Please be nice. They're directly helping children in need. Getting into an argument on religion/parenting/whatever their blog is bad form and kind of a drag for everyone involved.)
Update:
Just to clarify: The Wii and the matching drive are being done through the Van Nice's direct fundraising on their blog, not through Reece's Rainbow. Donations to the Van Nice's directly won't be tax-deductible, but you could win a Wii. Donations to their Reece's Rainbow fund won't win you a Wii, but would be tax-deductible.