Skip to main content

Welcome to the Philanthropy and Civil Society Blog

Image
By David Campbell
What does it take to do good, well?  What does it take to make good giving decisions?  Is it possible to make bad giving decisions? How can I make the most difference with the money I have to give away?  How can I make the most positive difference in the Binghamton community? 

We will ask these and other questions this semester.  No doubt, you will sometimes leave class and wish you had shared an idea that came to you during the class discussion.  Other days, something important may occur to you days after a class discussion.  This blog is the place to have conversations outside of class.  Its goal is to contribute to your learning and make it possible for you to continue your conversations after you leave class.  Use it as a a resource to contribute to your learning and your growth as a class over the course of the semester. 

I look forward to your discussions hear and to learning from them!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Life After Philanthropy and Civil Society

By
Life After Philanthropy and Civil Society As our semester is coming to a close, we will all be departing our own ways and heading towards our exciting summer plans.   As I graduate Philanthropy and Civil Society, I am still left with many questions in my mind: Did we donate our funds to the right organizations? Did we explore every avenue possible in our research? Was the decision voting process even fair in the first place?   As many of these questions will go unanswered, it is crucial to always remain positive.   Of course we made the right decision, and we have all worked countless of hours in research in an effort to ensure our decision was perfect.   Not everyone may have gotten what they wanted, but the decision was made by all of us as a collective unit.   But now what?   Do we all just move on in our lives and forget about the inspiring journey we spent together?   The answer to this question is no.   Majority of...
8 comments
Read more

Reaction to the American Civic Association

By
This past Thursday our class had the opportunity to go on our first site visit to the American Civic Association. I found our visit to be extremely informative and eye-opening. Truth be told, I had very little expectations going into our first site visit. I assumed we would just receive a tour and have a discussion with the Executive Director. While we indeed had both of those elements, I was very impressed with the level of professionalism delivered by the staff. For starters, I certainly was not expecting breakfast, I found that to be a really thoughtful touch by their staff. I also really enjoyed the presentation they provided. It was well written and I appreciated the fact that they brought volunteers and board members from varying departments to speak with us. By giving these various individuals from their respective departments an opportunity to speak, I believe it provided a better understanding of what their organization does on a day to day basis.   ...
10 comments
Read more

My Changing Perspective on Philanthropy

By
Because this is one of the last blog posts for our class, I considered discussing our final donation decisions, possibly lamenting over the lack of funding for Meals on Wheels of Western Broome. However, as this class comes to an end, I think there is much more that we can take away than just our final decisions. Specifically, I want to talk about how this class has affected my view of philanthropy and how it will change the way I spend my time and money in the future. A couple of weeks ago I went to “Casino in the Woods,” an annual casino night that College in the Woods Council puts on in order to raise money for charity. I am not much of a gambler and generally don’t like the addictive nature of games designed to make you lose money. But since all of the proceeds were going to charity, I figured that the money I would ultimately lose at the event would be for a good cause. However, as the night went on, I couldn’t stop thinking about the implications of this...
7 comments
Read more