The Problem with College Fundraising

By Leah Matchett on September 19, 2014

source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/be/UIUC_main_quad.JPG

On the rare, nice fall day at UIUC, it is not uncommon to see tables set up around Anniversary Plaza; Greek life and clubs handing out everything from pamphlets to condoms. There is a different bake sale every week, staffed by some student halfheartedly trying to convince you to spend $3 of the pocket money that you don’t have on a cupcake. You look unconvinced, and they reassure you, “It’s fine, it’s for charity.”

It has always astounded me the number of fundraisers that this campus can support. For the most in-debt class that has ever graduated, we sure do attract a lot of people standing on the corner with Pringles cans, or hawking baked goods. Apart from the irony inherent in selling baked goods wrapped in saran wrap to raise money for the environment, these fundraisers are ineffective because they are aimed at the wrong population.

As any one of us can tell you, college students have lots of time, and a lot of energy. What we don’t have is a lot of money. We’re poor. What little money we do have goes to paying for (ever-increasing) tuition, not to mention the astronomical price of textbooks. Yet I am continually approached by people asking me to donate money to their cause. The problem with this isn’t with the cause, or the desire to involve students, but rather the limited way in which they allow students to become involved.

Modified, original from http://forkedriverpres.org/wp-content/uploads/Cupcake-Tree.jpg

Fundraising is not only ineffective, it is probably the least empowering way for students to participate in charity. If you want to crush a student’s enthusiasm for a cause, hand them a collection tin. They’ll be bored and embarrassed in ten minutes. You want to engage students in helping make the world a better place? Give them a job, a task, a contribution that they can experience. Empower them to change things, and they’ll do it on their own.

This isn’t to say that charitable giving should be written off entirely, but rather that giving $10 will not solve all the world’s problems. When I give to charity it is usually on the small local scale, to a food pantry or local NGO, and most of what I give is my time. Because I can do more with my time and energy than I can with my (limited number of) dollars.

Dumping water on your head does not make you an activist. Finding a cause you care about and working to make it happen does. There are plenty of problems in the local community that college students can go a long way to fixing, from building a house with Habitat for Humanity to helping out at the food pantry. Engaged and empowered students can enact a lot more change in the world than cupcakes, even if they are chocolate.

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