Salut

Hello all. These last 3 weeks have been crazy. Two papers and one final project down. Three finals and ten pages to go. In my last blog I left you hanging because I had to go rock climbing with some friends and we were talking about NGOs in China. So the Chinese government has a lot of control over the NGOs and I don't think that is right. But maybe in time this will change. China is slowly changing each day into a more democratic nation. Just today on KLCC news I heard that Chinese bus and taxi drivers don't have to address their occupants as "comrade" and they now address them as Sir, Mrs, or Ms.. So maybe one day they will loosen the regulations on NGOs.

The last two weeks in class we have been talking about foundations. Foundations are the nonprofits that have a large amount of money and give grants to individuals and other nonprofits. I was really excited about the foundation section because I work at Annual Giving and we work very closely with the UO Foundations. However the guest speaker that came to class made me less excited. He worked for the UO Foundation and now works for the Oregon Community Foundation. I expected him to tell us how foundations operate and what it is like to have worked for two of the largest foundations in the state. BUT instead he spent the majority of time bashing the UO Foundation and speaking way out of line. I do know that the UO Foundation does have its problems but any foundation or company does. He only added to the classes obvious dislike of the UO Foundation. If he was going to point out all of the flaws of the UO he should have done the same for Oregon Community Credit Union.

An issue that came up during his lecture was that of transparency. I am all for knowing where the money goes and how much the expenses are but to disclose who the donors are is wrong. The UO Foundation is a registered 501(c)3. They file taxes every year. If you want info on them look up their 990. As for the donors of the University of Oregon Foundation their identity and information should be kept private. One reason people give to Foundations is to have a certain amount of anonymity. The donors trust us with a lot of personal information and disclosing who they are breaks that trust. At OSU some donor information was stolen and their donors freaked out. As a result giving went down and now the donors will always question the security of their information. The UO Foundation prides themselves in how secure donor information. If you want a sense of how has given to the UO look at building and center names, honor rolls which are located in almost every building, and public art that is on campus. The only thing good about the guest lecturer was that he told us about some of the interesting projects that the Oregon Community Foundation.

Its week 10 now and the class has come to an end. Throughout this term I have shared a part of my life and I would like to wrap up the loose ends. I am done volunteering at Nearby Nature but plan to return in the fall for school visits. I am leaving for New York in 16 days for a camp councilor position at a nonprofit called Fresh Air Fund. I am so excited about New York. Its getting harder and harder to focus which is making it impossible to study for finals. Next year I will be entering my senior year, kind of. I am taking a fifth year which I am OK with. Next year I will be taking History of Rhetoric, Public Speaking as a Liberal Art, Nonprofit, French and bouldering. I look forward to all of my classes and will resume blogging for my Nonprofit class in the fall. Thank you Bob and Sarah for being the spark that ignited many long class debates and providing us with your infinite wisdom about the nonprofit sector. I hope you all have an amazing summer!

Environmental Nonprofits and NGOs

So this blog is really late however I thought better late then never:) The reason it took so long to write was because I was not jazzed up about environmental nonprofits and slightly over whelmed by the amount of reading that was posted for environmental nonprofits. Which was sizable according to my standards, which means a lot coming from an English major.

Once I talked to Sarah, my GTF and who is amazing, she encouraged me to at least watch "The Story of Stuff" videos. They are so amazing they break down environmental concepts and policies to a kindergartner lever, which I personally didn't mind considering my biggest challenge with following the environmental movement is all of the jargon they use. Plus the narrator is absolutely amazing she has just the right amount of spunk. I strongly suggest watching these videos before proceeding further because I will be referring to them often.So after I watching "The Story of Stuff" I was really pumped up about environmental nonprofits and the work they do. This led me to pour over the lecture slides to get the demographics of the sector.

There are 27,000 environmental nonprofits in the US. I was blown away by this number because the birth of the sector was in the 1960's. After watching the "Story of Stuff" this number seems to low. Why low? For starters the sector encompasses a wide range of topics from Wildlife to Smart Growth and everything in between. That every thing in between is interconnected. "Story of Stuff" just reinforced the need for more Environmental Nonprofits because at ever level of production there is pollution and environmental injustice being done against the planet and people.

In class we looked at this study by Hoffman that was done in 2009 that examined the interaction between environmental nonprofits and corporations. Hoffman categorized organization based on there ties with corporations. They were categorized as followed:

1. Isolates: Which maintain purity of mission by not interacting with corporations. I am all about purity of mission however they have little influence on corporate policy.
   
2. Mediators: They are central to the corporate network and talk to everybody. This allows them to influence more policy however it also can jeopardize there true mission.
   
3. Bridges: Are also central to corporations however they maintain few ties with other environmental nonprofits.
4. Independents: Don't like to mingle with corporations but are social butterflies in the environmental nonprofit world.
5. Captives: they don't mingle with corporations or other nonprofits.

These classifications were really interesting and also served as a pleasant distraction from Modernist Lit. trying to come up with examples of environmental nonprofits for each category. You should try it, its a brain tease!. Well at least it was for me. I would love to link to his research however I don't know the study name or Hoffman's first name. I will ask my professor or GTF soon and link to it or at least cite it.

The freedom in the US nonprofit sector has allowed environmental organizations to be slightly abrasive towards corporations and government. I didn't realize that this was such a good thing until Monday's class. Our guest lecture was by Renee Irvin from the 3PM Department. She was amazing she talked about her research in China on Nonprofits. First thing I learned from her lecture was that NGO's and Nonprofits are the same thing. I feel really stupid for not knowing this. My friend Evan, you should read his blog as well, was equally surprised. The second thing I learned was that China a really strict regulations like a the person has to have a large amount of start up money, they have to have an established member base, the government doesn't allow there to be multiple nonprofits with the same area even if there is demand for more. In addition to this the government can deny a nonprofit for no apparent reason. Nonprofits and the government works super close together. This is seems so wrong! What if you are an environmental NGO with a mission of improving air and water quality. This type of organization doesn't always see eye to eye and often times have a bad relationship.....


I know that I am leaving you hanging but more will come tomorrow! Have to go rock climbing at the gym.

Final Paper Topic

I will be examining the opposing advocacy groups that were involved in the California Proposition 8 election. In particular the role the Mormon Church played in the election. Is it right for advocacy groups and religious nonprofits from another state to participate so heavily in another state's election? I stumbled apon this research topic/question while talking to a friend from California so was so fired up about the election that I decide to examine the issue. I though that it would be interesting to examine the role nonprofits played in proposition 8.

Sources:

California Supreme Court Archive: http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/opinions/archive/S168047.PDF

News Releases:

http://www.courtinfo.ca.gov/presscenter/newsreleases/NR29-09.PDF

Mormons’ Prop 8 protested:

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/nov/07/local/me-protest7

I AM NOT 21 AND I HATE POLAR BEARS

Advocacy is the smallest nonprofit sector. This sector employees 85,000 people and has countless number of volunteers and members. Advocacy nonprofits are unique in that they receive 31% of their revenue from donations which is larger then other nonprofit sectors: Social services 14%, health care Choice USA and National Right to Life. This is just one dichotomy of many in the advocacy sector.

So what does advocacy have to do with being 21 and hating polar bears? If you are a UO student walking past Lillis or the EMU you definitely know! This title is in response to the two main advocacy groups that annoy student on a daily basis,Greenpeace and some children's organization that I personally have been successfully avoided:) I love polar bears, children, the environment and I am 21 however advocacy can have really annoying fundraising techniques at times. I hate it when you are late to class and they try to stop you with heartstring lines like "Do you want to save a child today" or "Do you want to help save the environment" and you say "NO" or just ignore them. Afterwards you feel like such an asshole. I hate it even more when advocacy groups berate students while perusing the ASUO Street Fair. The Street Fair is a place for the student to escape from the world, eat amazing food, and barter with street vendors. On the off chance that you have time to talk or if you just can't say "NO" the fundraising asks and more importantly second/third asks are terrible. They have terrible fundraising skills if they worked at the AGP calling center they would not last a day! The only thing they have are heartstrings

Now that I have trash talked advocacy groups for a significant time I feel like I should redeem them. Advocacy groups are amazing they often single handily lead the charge on major issues world wide. They fight for ones or things that can't fight back. Think about it! What would the civil rights movement be without advocacy groups, or women's rights, or abortion or gay and lesbian rights, or environmentalism... the list goes on infinitely. I can't answer this question but maybe as a community we can.

Health Care

This week we talked and read about health care. The book’s section on health care was terrible the author just throughout a bunch of numbers at reader, which I quickly skipped over. Class on Monday was interesting. The main questions we discussed in class was: Is going to a Nonprofit Hospital better than going to a for-profit hospital? Personally I don’t think that it really matters. When choosing a hospital I look at the resources they offer and the doctors they employee. And If I had to choose I would choose a for-profit hospital because they are less constrained by money and often times have better facilities and higher caliber doctors.

We also discussed if hospitals should be nonprofit or for-profit? This is a tough question, my first reaction is no they should not be nonprofits because they charge so much for services and they only get 3% of their funding from donations. But then when I look at all the facts I think there should be both. Although nonprofit hospitals still charge an arm and a leg for service they are not allowed to turn away any person for service regardless if they can pay or not. This is an invaluable resource for lower class people. I could not imagine going to the hospital and being told they will not help me because I am poor! Could you?

I posed a question at the beginning of the term to my professor that he was unable to answer so I thought I would ask you guys. Nonprofits are usually in response to the current political times. The United States up until recently had terrible health care. 45 million people said they didn’t have health care in 2008. This is so astonishing. So when I read that health care is the biggest nonprofit sector it was not a big stretch. Given this what will happen to nonprofit health care organizations in light of the new health care reform bill? Will they decrease in number? Will they receive more federal funding?

Unfortunately I was unable to go to class on Wednesday. I really wanted to go because we had a guest speaker. Read my classmates’ blogs to find out what she talked about. I was not able to attend class because I volunteered at NearbyNature, the nonprofit I am involved in. It was so amazing we had an event at Cozmic Pizza in Eugene. Franny the Frog made an appearance. I got to be Franny so I was pretty excited. The children love Franny the Frog! There was this little girl that followed me around the entire time asking me frog questions. I also helped make dragonfly bracelets with the children at the event. We had a pretty good turnout.

Next week we are discussing the arts and administration sector. I am pretty excited because I love the craft center at the UO. Also my dream job is to work be a director of a nonprofit community craft center!

Religion & Social Services

So I forgot to post a blog about chapters 1&2.Sorry. I will recap what I thought was interesting. Non-profits make larger companies and government more responsive(p.41). If you are fallowing along in the book I will be putting page numbers next to key ideas. A good example of this is the UO foundation. 20% of Oregonians give to the university.The more support we get from donors the more state support we will obtain. When I started calling,Oregon gave the UO more money in response to amount of support we got from Oregonians. Of course this was only a piece in a very large puzzle however one piece can make a difference.

Well for chapter 3&4,lets just start out by saying that I hate religion and religious institutions. So reading about religious nonprofits was a little difficult for me to do and pretty much anything said in chapter 3 I made a negative argument against. The first thing that I found really annoying was that religious institutions don't have to file a 501(c)3. This does not seem right. They should be required to because they are just like any other nonprofit, they help people that need help! I think that this makes churches seem like they are better then any other institution. This seems to be a common theme among churches and church goers. It also seems like it could open up a door for corruption since no one holds them accountable. Ok. Enough ranting. Most religious institutions do file a 501(c)3.Our professors said about 95% do however I am still questioning this figure because of the lack of accurate information. I was so excited to finished this chapter. And when I started reading about social service nonprofits, O'Niell could have said anything and I would have agreed with him. Social Services are amazing I could not imagine a place without them. One of my favorite ones in YMCA. For one the gym in the YMCA on Patterson rocks. For two, I have very fond childhood memories about swim classes and day care.Thank you YMCA for providing cheap day care for my parents. YMCA is able to offer reduced rate day care which means it competes with privately owned and operated day care centers. The book noted that small business have often complained about this because they have an unfair advantage. I agree this can occur however childcare nonprofits provide a great alternative for parents that don't have enough money to put their child in a private daycare and insures that just because they are playing less doesn't mean that their child is going to be in danger.

One of the most unique things about Social service nonprofits is the relationship they have with the government. I applaud our government for acknowledging that nonprofits can operate more efficiently and do a better job at providing the services that people need. From here on out I will be referring to social service nonprofits as SS nonprofits for one simple reason I am tired of typing it. SS nonprofits are more connected with the community.Not all communities need the same services. SS nonprofits also have more latitude to try new things and don't have to deal with red tape.

Good news readers!! I got the intership I applied for in New York! I will be doing my research project on the nonprofit I will be working for which is.... I know you are all on the edge of your chairs The Fresh Air Fund. I will be talking about them in this blog. Interesting fact The Fresh Air Fund was started by a church parish. Maybe the Fresh Air Fund can help disolve my hate of religious institutions. Maybe

Salutations Non-Profit Sector

Hello everyone, my name is Sarah. I am a junior at the University of Oregon majoring in English and Minoring in Non-Profit Administration. I am an outdoor enthusiast, coffee fiend, bookworm and craft center nut. I would encourage all students and the Eugene community to take advantage of the UO Craft Center. It's an amazing place! I I work for the Annual Giving Program at the UO as a student intern and volunteer at Nearby Nature, a local environmental education non profit. I have been working for Annual Giving for three years now and I LOVE IT! Many people might not know this, but the University of Oregon Foundation is a non-profit. Annual Giving is a program within Development that works in conjunction with the foundation. Annual Giving receives small gifts from alumni, parents, and friends of the University. I started out working in DuckCall, which is the student calling program. We call alumni, parents and friends to update information, share events/happenings on campus,and fundraise for the University of Oregon. Calling donors, alumni, and parents was amazing but I found my true calling working behind the scenes of the Annual Giving Program doing small research projects, compiling information about the University of Oregon, and helping update the Annual Giving website.I find myself verbal vomiting UO factoids which can be somewhat awkward at times. My main duty at the AGP is compiling information about schools and college, research institutes, and factoids about the university. With all of this information I have compiled a PDF File called the Greenbook. The Greenbook is a tool the callers use everyday in calling. And is also the Title of my blog because I will be compiling information about the Non-profit Sector for my PPPM 280 class. I will be reacting to reading from Non-Profit Nation by Micheal O'Niell, lectures and guest speakers. Join me in my journey through the nonprofit sector and grab a book! Tune in Thursday 4/7 for my reaction to Chapter 1 & 2.