People from around the world booked 61,000 nights in Ukrainian cities via Airbnb in a social media campaign to get funds into besieged cities. The campaign saw $1.9 million raised for Ukrainians in just 48 hours. These bookings have amassed more than $15 million in aid, according to Airbnb. Out of the 61,000 stays booked at the start of March, 34,000 came from Americans, 3,000 from Canadians and 8,000 from the U.K. The company, which normally takes about 20% of each booking, waived its fees in Ukraine. Airbnb said they received more than $5.2 million in small-dollar, direct donations from a total of more than 59,000 individual donors across 92 countries.
Airbnb previously committed to setting up temporary housing for 100,000 Ukrainian refugees across Europe and North America. Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky wrote “We need help to meet this goal. The greatest need we have is for more people who can offer their homes in nearby countries, including Poland, Germany, Hungary and Romania.” Airbnb hosts that want to help need only register on the Airbnb.org Help Ukraine page. Within one day of the announcement, Airbnb hosts had answered this generosity with their own. More than 29,000 individuals have signed up to open their Airbnb-listed properties to Ukrainians, including 14,000 across Europe and 4,000 in the U.S.
The Utah Jazz Foundation is also partnering with Airbnb.org to provide more than 32,200 nights of temporary housing to refugees fleeing Ukraine, a number representing exactly 200% of the capacity of their Vivint Arena home stadium. Airbnb said they have contacted leaders in 14 European countries offering to place refugees in Airbnb properties. They are working closely with governments to best support the refugee housing needs in each country, including by providing longer-term stays. The United Nations reported that over 2 million Ukrainians, about 4% of Ukraine’s population, have fled to neighboring countries, more than 1 million of them to Poland. According to UNICEF, at least half of the 2 million refugees are children.
Celebrities around the world have also responded to the need for aid to refugees. Mila Kunis and Ashton Kutcher raised over $30 million and Ellen DeGeneres pledged to match $10 million in donations.
Harry Potter author J.K Rowling pledged to match up to $1.3 million in donations. Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively also pledged to match $1 million in donations. Bethenny Frankel’s disaster relief organization, BStrong, has raised more than $5 million in relocation aid, in addition to the $10 million the organization already pledged to support Ukraine.
South Korean actress Lee Young-ae made an $80,000 donation, Leonardo DiCaprio donated $10 million, singer-songwriter The Weeknd donated $500,000 and committed another $500,000 from his upcoming tour, David and Victoria Beckham donated $1 million and model Gigi Hadid pledged to donate her earnings from participating in Fall 2022 Fashion Week shows this month to support humanitarian relief efforts.
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JPMorgan Chase announced a three-year, $5 million commitment to support the Open Air Economy Collaborative, a partnership of LA community organizations including Inclusive Action for the City (IAC), California Reinvestment Coalition (CRC), Public Counsel, and East LA Community Corporation (ELACC). The commitment will help local Black and Latina street vendors strengthen their businesses.
It will provide economic opportunities for low-income and immigrant workers, and play an important role to promote food access across Los Angeles County. This three-year philanthropic investment in Los Angeles is part of JPMorgan Chase’s $30 billion, five-year commitment to advance racial equity.
The Open Air Economy Collaborative will provide 500 street vendors and other micro-entrepreneurs with one-on-one coaching and over 200 vendors with low-interest loans. The community organizations will also help the small business owners address barriers frequently encountered when navigating the permit approval process, overcoming financial obstacles, and accessing support services.
Small business owners across the county scrambled to apply for federal coronavirus stimulus funds but many street vendors didn’t qualify for relief. A study found that there are an estimated 10,000 sidewalk food vendors working in the City of Los Angeles yet only 165 have received permits in 2021. Thousands more vendors sell merchandise and other goods in the open air economy and face a variety of challenges throughout the process of seeking a permit, hindering the majority from formalizing their businesses and accessing critical business development opportunities and services.
Rudy Espinoza, executive director of Inclusive Action for the City, a part of the collaboration, says street vendors are essential to the local economy, but they have difficulty accessing capital. He said the grant will ultimately help out Black and Latina women, who he says are the majority of street vendors in L.A. Espinoza said “We’re emerging from a global pandemic that has disproportionately impacted Black and Latina street vendors and micro-entrepreneurs. For far too long, these entrepreneurs and community leaders have worked on the margins of our economy simply due to the nature of how they earn their livelihood in the open air economy.
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Former mayoral candidate and Chicago businessman Willie Wilson donated $200,000 in free gas across the city, causing a massive gridlock in the city. Every vehicle at participating gas stations received $50 until all the money was exhausted. Wilson is donating another $1 million in free gas this week.
Fifty gas stations across the city will participate in the free gas giveaway. Each station is also agreeing to lower their gasoline prices during the event to allow more families to benefit from Wilson’s generosity. The gas will be given out on a first-come, first-served basis starting at 7am Thursday
Wilson said “The need among the community is so great, soaring gas prices have caused a hardship for too many of our citizens. I am confident that with God’s help and wisdom we will get through these tough times together. This is our second gas giveaway in one week. The need is great, I want to help. If I can help somebody as I pass along this way, then my living is not in vain.”
Wilson, was one of the first African Americans to own McDonald’s franchises in Chicago back in the 1970s. He sold all of his restaurants in the 1980s and is president and CEO of Omar Medical Supplies, one of America’s largest distributors of disposable products for use in medical, industrial and foodservice areas.
He is no stranger to making headlines for his philanthropy. In 2018, he handed out checks for $100,000 to homeowners in danger of losing their homes. People lined up at the Cook County Building for checks from the Dr. Willie Wilson Foundation, a nonprofit organization. He also handed out envelopes of cash at a Southside church totaling $200,000.
In 2020, he donated 1 million face masks to hospitals across all 50 wards of Chicago and another 1000 masks to Chicago fire and police departments. Through his foundation, he also sent $100 to 10,000 people through Venmo and Paypal. Homeless people, senior citizens, and those who lost their job due to the pandemic just had to apply for the support.
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David Rush started breaking Guinness World Records in 2015 before challenging himself to an amazing one-year feat. Rush is in a hurry to set more Guinness World Records, all in the name of promoting STEM education to students. The man who holds 200 Guinness records set out on a mission to set 52 records in 52 weeks last year, and now all that’s left for a handful of them is to be verified by Guinness World Records.
The father of two boys from Idaho has been turning the Guinness World Records into his autobiography for the past seven years as a way to promote STEM education. He has an electrical engineering degree from MIT and works as a senior product manager at Cradlepoint, a technology company in Idaho. He recalled being rejected from a gifted and talented program as a young student, but persevering to get accepted to MIT by pursuing a STEM education.
Rush said “A student will struggle with math or fail a science test and say, ‘I can never become an engineer, it’s too hard, they have this fixed mindset. I wanted to give students this tangible example that if you set your mind to a goal, believe in yourself and pursue it with a passion, you can accomplish virtually anything and that’s when I started breaking records as that tangible example.”
Despite working a full time job and raising two children with his wife Jennifer, who is also an engineer, he has found time to break one Guinness World Record after another. Rush said the hardest of them all was achieving the fastest 100-meter run while juggling blindfolded. The easiest was popping 10 balloons between two people in 15.25 seconds.
Rush has a total of 49 world records recognized by the Guinness World Record with four other records still pending to be verified. “You can develop any skill, talent or ability. You can become better at math, you can become better at science, you can become a better friend, a better conversationalist, or better at breaking Guinness World Records, which is just the example I’m using to make it real for students” Rush said
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A college football player and NFL prospect’s touching act of kindness to a homeless pregnant woman has gone viral. Malik Willis, 22, a senior at Liberty University and a quarterback for the Liberty Flames, was in Indianapolis, Indiana for the 2022 NFL scouting combine when his deed was caught on video by a passerby.
Willis had just left a Nike event where the sportswear brand gifted him a suitcase full of new clothes when he saw a homeless woman and her son sitting on the sidewalk. He stopped and gave her some new shirts — completely unaware that an admirer was capturing the moment on camera from across the street.
The video was shared on Twitter by user Ryan Lacey, who recorded it while Willis’ kind act was already in progress. Willis was spotted on the sidewalk of Indianapolis talking to a person who was sitting on a milk crate and asking passers by for money. The Liberty QB opened his suitcase to hand over clothes to help. The video quickly went viral, and in just a day, it had been viewed over 3.1 million times on Twitter and shared with many commenters praising him for being a good person even when no one is looking.
Willis quickly became the darling of the 2022 NFL scouting combine and was asked about the act later that day on an NFL Network broadcast. ‘I walked past her on the way to the Nike suite and I chopped it up with them and I walked out with a suitcase and whatnot and I felt bad because I saw her son. It was a pregnant lady and she was homeless. And I was just like, “Shoot, I don’t have money, but I can give you a couple of shirts. I just felt like I had to do that. I mean, I’m at a position right now where I’m not worried about much of anything except getting better. So, if I can help her out in any way, I felt like I had to” Willis said.
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Canine CellMates is a rehabilitative program, designed to help rehabilitate incarcerated men using shelter dogs. Since 2013, the nonprofit has invited inmates at Fulton County Jail to learn to train shelter dogs for adoption in a 10-week program. The dogs get 24/7 socialization and training from the men in a special dormitory for trainers, who can learn valuable life skills as well.
Last year the nonprofit created the Beyond the Bars program: a sentencing alternative that keeps men out of jail. Instead of being incarcerated or proceeding further through the legal system, participants commit to training shelter dogs for a year at a new Canine CellMates facility, leased with a grant from the nonprofit Best Friends Animal Society.
More than 400 men have worked with Canine CellMates and more than 150 shelter dogs have been adopted, according to Susan Jacobs-Meadows, the nonprofit’s founder. The goal is to offer repeat offenders a chance for personal growth. “Once somebody’s in the system once, it’s bad. But once they’re there for the second or third time, their opportunity to get out of and stay out of the system is small. There are almost no resources for those men. Society is done with them… so they’re the ones who really have my heart” Jacobs-Meadows said.
The program is also giving the dogs a second chance. They’re typically pulled from Fulton County Animal Services, an open-intake — and often overcrowded — municipal shelter. Jacobs-Meadows said “The magic of our program is the dogs, they are what starts the process for positive change.” The Canine CellMates team offers long-term support to adopters and supports graduates of its programs.
Jacobs-Meadows stays in touch with many of the program’s graduates who befriend her on Facebook, call or drop by the dog-training facility. Often they have recovered from drug and alcohol addiction, and work jobs, volunteer and reconnect with estranged loved ones. Numerous studies have shown the positive impact of dog-training programs in correctional facilities gives the participants a sense of being connected to a community with training as an act of service while they experience less anxiety and improved mood, leading to lower infraction rates while incarcerated.
Atlanta resident Ray Keith, still participates in the Beyond the Bars and was one of seven men to graduate on Dec. 16, 2021, from phase one of the first class of Beyond the Bars. After a year of participating in Beyond the Bars, his criminal record will be wiped clean. In the meantime, Canine CellMates helped him find a job as a “bark ranger” at a dog park with a popular bar. “Coming from where I’m from, it helped me get a second chance at life,” he said. “The program is definitely giving me a second chance and also giving the dogs a second chance.”
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HOPE Chicago has committed to raising $1 billion in support and funding over the next decade for scholarships for students at five Chicago Public Schools. The unprecedented scholarship program in Chicago will award 4,000 students across five high schools — and their parents — college scholarships at about 20 Illinois state universities and city colleges.
The multi-generation scholarship program is being launched by Hope Chicago, the nonprofit led by former Chicago Public Schools CEO Dr. Janice Jackson. They have raised $40 million already with funding partners that include several corporations, financial institutions, and private family foundations. 4,000 students at Benito Juarez, Al Raby, Morgan Park, Noble-Johnson College Prep, and Farragut Career Academy will get their post secondary education fully funded.
The scholarship will go toward tuition, room and board, books, and fees — making it easier to pursue a higher education without the financial burden often associated with a college degree. Unlike free scholarship programs, there’s no minimum GPA requirement to qualify.
“As a life-long educator, I understand the barriers that college students face as they enter the higher education system. Many of those — financial, social, psychological and emotional — have been further exaggerated by the COVID-19 pandemic hindering student success. By working with community, civic, and business leaders, this is an opportunity to redefine the education landscape in our city,” Jackson said. Jackson made the life changing announcement inside the auditorium at Benito Juarez Community Academy and students erupted into applause, some of them cried as they embraced each other.
National data recently emerged showing plummeting numbers of students enrolling in college amid the pandemic. Despite the pandemic’s disruption, Chicago Public Schools saw an increase in students graduating compared to the previous year. And while more of the district’s students are enrolling in college, there have been dips in college persistence as students don’t stay enrolled.
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The LEGO Foundation has announced it is donating another 600 LEGO kits to hospitals worldwide for miniature MRI Scanners—to help children cope with the intimidating process of having a Magnetic Resonance Imaging scan. The 500-piece sets allow clinicians to help patients understand what the large and complex MRI machine is all about.
The 500-piece sets allow clinicians to help patients understand what the large and complex MRI machine is all about. The model facilitates both role-play and dialogue so that the child feels safe and can build confidence and resilience before the actual journey. By reducing stress and anxiety the LEGO kits also reduce the use of anesthesia.
The idea was started in 2015 as a passion project for LEGO employee Erik Ullerlund Staehr and a Denmark hospital but is now being scaled and piloted with new training material for hospital staff. “I’m extremely proud of this project and the positive impact it’s already had,” said Erik. “I’ve seen first-hand how children have responded to these models; feeling more relaxed and turning an often highly stressful experience into a positive, playful one.”
Close to 100 hospitals across the world have already benefited from the pilot program. Last month, in order to create an even bigger impact, the LEGO Foundation scaled the project by encouraging hospitals across the world to apply for one of 600 models they made available—to be shipped completely free of charge to the hospitals. They opened the application process and received 1500 applications in one day.
The radiology department team at Odense University Hospital has been using the LEGO MRI Scanners as part of their playful learning approach to help over 200 children aged 4-9 annually.
“MRI Scanners make a lot of noise which can be very daunting for children. Our team has found that using the LEGO model has led to more positive, calm experiences for many children. This also benefits the quality of the MRI scan, which relies on the person being very still for up to an hour to work” said Ulla Jensen from the Department of Radiology.
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Last year, “Humans of Bombay” shared a story about an auto rickshaw driver who sold his house to pay for granddaughter’s education. In his interview with Humans of Bombay (HOB), Desraj Ji, 74, revealed that after losing both of his sons, it was the responsibility of providing for his grandchildren and daughters-in-law that gave him the strength to keep going.
Six years ago, his oldest son left for work as usual but never returned. His body was found a week later. Two years later, he lost his other son to suicide. When his granddaughter asked if she would have to quit school, Desraj assured her that she would be able to continue her education. He started working longer hours, leaving home at 6 a.m., driving his auto rickshaw until midnight.
But when his granddaughter said that she wanted to travel to Delhi for a B.Ed course, Desraj knew he wouldn’t be able to afford it on his current income. “But I had to fulfill her dreams… at any cost. So, I sold our house and paid her fee,” he said. His wife, daughter-in-law and grandkids stayed with a relative in their village while Desraj stayed in Mumbai to work and slept in his car.
It was a sacrifice he was happy to make for his granddaughter’s future. “I can’t wait for her to become a teacher, so that I can hug her and say, ‘You’ve made me so proud.’ She’s going to be the first graduate in our family,” he said. The story of Mr Desraj’s selfless deed touched thousands of hearts after it was shared online. Offers of help poured in and his story was also posted on Twitter by the Congress’s Archana Dalmia with an appeal to Mumbai residents to help the auto driver.
A Facebook user named Gunjan Ratti started a fundraiser for Mr Desraj, which exceeded its goal, raising a total of 24 Lahk ($32,000 USD) for him. Thanks to the love and support of internet strangers, the grieving elderly father has a roof over his head and can pay for his granddaughter’s education. The Humans of Bombay page shared a video of Mr Desraj receiving his cheque and thanking his supporters for the love they showered on him.
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When an Instacart shopper decided to go with her gut she may have saved a couple lives in the process. Jessica Higgs, a mom from Georgia, opened up about how she listened to her intuition during a recent food delivery. In a viral TikTok that has garnered over 16.5 million views since being posted on Feb. 1, Higgs talked about the incident.
It started as a normal delivery, ordered by a woman in Atlanta for her dad in Crandall, Georgia. The customer instructed Higgs to leave the bags on his porch. “I got there and something was telling me, ‘You’ve got to help this man out,’” she recalls in the video. “You’re not supposed to go inside someone’s house, but I used my judgment and I brought the groceries inside.”
That’s when Higgs noticed the man was not well. “I could not leave. He just was stumbling all over the place, and there was something different about that,” Higgs said. Higgs said there was a potent smell inside and she noticed a propane tank. She messaged the customer’s daughter to let her know that he “looked sick.” She also mentioned that there was a propane tank in the home and there might be a gas leak since she felt dizzy while inside.
The woman responded that she would have her son stop by to check it out. After the leak was confirmed, the customer credited Higgs with saving her dad’s life, left a five-star review and increased her tip from $14 to $100. In the video, Higgs breaks down while recounting what happened next. “I’m crying because of what she commented this morning,” she says. “‘Thank you so much. Once my son went to check on my dad it turned out it was definitely was leaking, you definitely saved my dad and my younger son’s life!!!”
In the video Higgs says through tears “I’m just an Instacart worker but if you see something, say something. I’m so happy I did.” Hundreds of thousands of people have commented on Higgs’ video praising her for her actions. Instacart also issued a statement praising Higgs’ actions.
“We are constantly inspired by the incredible people who choose to be Instacart shoppers and intentionally make a positive impact in the lives of others. This story touched our hearts and we are grateful for shoppers like Jessica.”
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