Our best hope of creating real change is to invest in the nonprofits that are doing the best job.  ~Money for Good II Report

“Money for Good II,” a follow-up project by Hope Consulting and GuideStar to the 2010 “Money for Good” study, researched donor behavior and how to drive dollars to high-performing nonprofits. Click here to learn three ways to donate more effectively.

If you’d like to help, you can find December Northfield donation opportunities and make an appointment at www.redcrossblood.org/make-donation or by calling 1-800-RED CROSS (1-800-733-2767).

“… According to a recent study by the congressionally chartered National Conference on Citizenship, there is a strong correlation between civic engagement and unemployment. In recent years, unemployment has risen less in states and cities where more people volunteer, register to vote, attend public meetings, and work with neighbors to address community challenges. For every percentage point increase in people who attend public meetings, the study found nearly a quarter percentage point decrease in unemployment. For every percentage point climb in volunteerism, unemployment dipped nearly a fifth of a percentage point ….”

Read entire article | USA Today 11.01.11

Thank you to all the sale site hosts, event Chair Therese Kitzman, Neuger Communications (maps and promotional materials), Northfield News (local and regional ads and promotion), Tim Jackson (webmaster), Northfield United Methodist Church (meeting space), College City Beverage (Banners) and all the other people who made this event possible.

Left over “goods” still went for “good” as they were donated to the Epilepsy Foundation, Used a Bit Shop, Salvation Army or were given away free to someone who needed them.

If your family, book club, sports team, church, non-profit organization, or neighborhood didn’t get the chance to participate in Goods for Good this year, mark your calendars for the May 4th & 5th, 2012 (weekend before Mother’s Day) and plan to participate in the 5th annual Goods for Good, Great Northfield Rummage Raid for Charity. Also keep in mind that you can host a garage sale anytime and donate the proceeds to charity. We would be happy to promote your sale on our website and e-newsletter as long as 50% or more of the proceeds are going to a charity or good cause for your choosing.

If you want more details, here is a recap of the sale site results:

1. The Builder’s Relay for Life Team raised $1217 for American Cancer Society. They did not price any of the items at their sale, instead they accepted free will donations.
2. The Women in Action site raised $164 for the Ronal McDonald House Charities.
3. The Taylor and friends site raised over $800 for the Northfield YMCA.
4. Habitat for Humanity held their Garage Sale Fundraiser in Northfield for the first time and raised $1500.
5. The Ensrud sale raised $162.50 for the Community Action Center.
6. Danielle’s sale in Dundas raised $600.25 for the Greenvale Elementary School. Her potted perennials and tomato plants were a big hit.
7. Mamie Tuma and Full of Pep 4H Club raised $157 for the Humane Society and $157 the Community Action Center.
8. Marilyn Nelson and her crew raised a whopping $348 at their bake sale to benefit Greenvale Elementary School.
9. Elizabeth Lathrup raised $100 for the Friends of the Library.
10. Congratulations to the Northfield Hospital Auxiliary on their grandly successful 50th anniversary Book Raid. They raised a record $56,000, which is up $6000 from last year.
11. The Union of Youth raised $626 from donated goods.
12. Ruth Hoekstra friends and family raised $232 for the Community Action Center and another $90 for various other charities.
13. The St. Dominic School site raised $2000
14. Kate Buckmeier raised $60 from their refreshment stand for their family foundation honoring her father-in-law which helps Minnesota families who are dealing with cancer.
15. Middleschooler, Raphaela Cogan raised $50 for Crohns and Colitis research and $50 for the TESS Unlimited, which will go towards cleft palette surgery for a young boy.
16. The United Methodist Church raised $1500 for women’s missions.
17. Nanny, Katherine Baty and her families raised $400 to benefit the CAC’s Christmas Sharing Program.
18. The Three Links Care Center partner with 5th Bridge again and raised $890 at their annual Rummage Sale.

Many of the sites also donated a small portion of their proceeds to 5th Bridge (over $200) to help us off set the costs of promoting this event. Thank you!

The last two years, students from the Key sold usable items gleaned from the Northfield Clean Up Days to raise money for their youth programs. This was a great collaboration as it helped their organization and it prevented good useable items from ending up in the landfill. Unfortunately the dates for the Northfield Clean up Days and the Goods for Good event do not align well this year so we are asking for your help.

Drop off your good quality, usable items at “The Key”, their new location is 109 Sixth St. W. in Northfield anytime between 3pm and 8pm, Saturday April 23-Wednesday April 27^th, 2011.

Habitat for Humanity Rice County is hosting their popular garage sale fundraiser in Northfield this year as part of the Goods for Good community garage sale event. They too need your good quality items to sell at their Goods for Good site. They also want your clean clothes in good repair. Donations for the Habitat sale may be dropped off at their sale site, 203 3^rd St. W. in Northfield (former location of the Three Pines Gift Store and next to the Chamber of Commerce) weekdays between 9am & 4pm beginning this Friday. If you have a donation and can’t make those hours, call Dayna at 507-323-5167 to arrange an alternate drop off.

Interested in hosting your own Goods for Good sale site? Sign up on line at www.5thbridge.org or call Candy Taylor at 507-581-3017, but hurry, deadline to sign up is April 21^st, 2011.

“There is a season for everything. A time for flooding and a time for –”

Wait, that’s not how it goes. Although there is a time for sandbagging, there is also a time for planting and a time for uprooting. Years ago, Karen Adams had limited knowledge of planting and uprooting. Little did she know that what began as a volunteer project planting a garden at Sibley Elementary would grow and blossom into a job that she loves.

“When you see a need or opportunity in the community and you fill it, you get the satisfaction of a job well done. The benefits of connecting with individuals and community can take you places and teach things you that alone you would never think possible”, Karen believes.

Volunteering brought Karen connections to the Northfield Garden Club, gardening for the City of Northfield, Northfield in Bloom, and the Rice County Master Gardener Program. Ultimately her growth as a volunteer and her passion for gardening blossomed into a full time position gardening for the Northfield Retirement Community (NRC).

Through groups such as her church, 4H and the Girl Scouts, she and her daughters have had the opportunity to participate in interactive activities at different senior facilities in the Northfield area. They have seen and experienced, firsthand the positive impact that youth and the retirement community have on each other. So Karen hopes to create rewarding intergenerational volunteer experiences at the NRC though gardening.

“The older community has so much to offer,” she emphasizes. “They don’t always have the ability to go anywhere, so we need to bring the service to them.”

In order to do this, Karen is helping to organize the NRC Youth Volunteer Event*. It is the NRC’s first event of its kind, but it has potential to become a regular event. The idea is to gather youth from elementary school to the colleges and bring them to work on a simple project at the NRC. The first Youth Volunteer Event is set for Saturday, April 16th, from 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. The youth will be planting pansies, painting plant markers, and playing games like Wii with the residents there. Karen stressed that while not all the residents can go out and garden, they can benefit from the plantings and from the relationships with the young people that come in. The second Youth Volunteer Event is on Saturday, June 25th. On this day, the youth will be participating in summer garden work with the seniors. If your group or family would like to get involved, please contact Milosha Malecha #507-664-3472

Karen Adams experienced the magic of volunteering when her assistance in her daughter’s garden project led to the revival of a lifelong passion and the opportunity for a job that she looks forward to everyday.

Volunteering can awaken a joy in us that we never knew existed. If you invest your time in something as rewarding as service, you, too, may find its rewards can multiply and grow.

*Volunteer event is supported in part by the Northfield Healthy Community Initiative Mini Grant #SP012242-09, with funding from the Northfield Area United Way, Carlson Capital Management, and SAMHSA.

What might students think of a brand new class that no one had ever heard of? The administration might expect students to distrust it, or at least wait a few years for the class to gain credibility.

Not Service Learning.

Since its creation in 2005 by social studies teacher Sarah Swan-McDonald, the class has become an intriguing option for juniors and seniors looking for an interesting elective. To some, however, this class has become more than just an elective.

Swan-McDonald (affectionately called “Swan” by her students) set out to research this new kind of class for Northfield High School. She found it was an innovative learning approach that attached volunteering to academics. This new style of teaching adds to the students’ learning experience.

“The research these students do is extensive,” Swan said one day after school. She added that not only do they conduct research, but they also consider previous progress that has already been made concerning the issue, its history, and how their findings will connect to the work of other activists.

Students in Service Learning have two days out of the normal school week to participate in an on- or off-campus service project. It is a refreshing thing to break up the school day with direct volunteering. The yellow sign labeled “Service Learning – In the field today!” is a familiar sight on Swan’s door. The other three days in class are peppered with readings, speakers, and in-class discussion.

The few days devoted to note taking are the most crucial part of the entire course. Most people are familiar with service in its most common form – direct volunteering – but the notes include indirect volunteering as well as advocacy.

These “Do Hours” continue into second semester, but now instead of notes and classwork, the students are allowed to develop a project of their own. This project allows them to bring their notes about volunteering to life by informing or performing a direct service concerning an issue that is important to them. Alone, or in conjunction with others, each student studies the background information for their topic in order to understand why there is a need for their service. Their research points them in the direction where their time and energy will be most useful.

“For many of the students, it is the first time they have organized anything, let alone a service project,” Swan comments. “They have to deal with the roadblocks that come their way.”

And there are roadblocks. From mishaps to misprints to missing checks: all are bound to occur, and it is up to the students to problem-solve their way out.

Junior Annika Hanson knows firsthand the pitfalls of organizing an advocacy event. For her second project, she and four other girls began a Students Redefining Beauty campaign. The goal of their campaign was to stop students’ judgments based on looks, and raise girls’ self-esteem. To accomplish this, Annika & Co. began a No-Makeup Tuesday (with t-shirts to wear that day), made posters, and raised general awareness by giving detailed presentations to 8th graders as well as the community.

In their small window of time to complete this project, Annika and the girls faced issues with funding for t-shirt money as well as a desire to give more presentations at both the high school and middle school. Unfortunately, these goals were cutting into their school days. Certain sacrifices had to be made in order for their message to reach the most people.

“It was still worth it,” Annika says. “Even with the problems we ran into, we still made it to the Middle School.”

In creating this course, Swan has been satisfied with its effects. Service Learning creates a personal connection between a student and a project. Students and faculty alike are encouraged to be innovative – the wide range of events and ideas are proof enough of this. This class has inspired juniors and seniors to address community needs. Swan believes that high school students are empowered by leadership classes such as Service Learning because they provide a safe environment to try to organize a project. The faculty has little involvement with the students’ individual projects other than offering guidance. This trust encourages students to push their limits.

Most importantly, Service Learning incorporates student reflection into its curriculum.

The students look back on their volunteer projects and process the positives and negatives of their experiences. They reflect on what they have gained and lost from volunteering. The hope is that students in Service Learning feel a deeper sense of community and self-awareness. To Swan, this reflection is really a transformation. It is the key to growth and understanding. Swan’s students are not only providing a service, but internalizing every aspect the experience brought to them.

Still don’t think it’s a worthwhile class to add to a curriculum? Maybe you need to see the students’ faces when they teach math to a first grader, hang out with the ESL kids, or organize a fundraiser to benefit a cause. Their faces might tell you what words cannot: that volunteering means more to these students than they ever realized.

You arrive at a volunteer site. Somewhat aware of what you will be doing, somewhat anxious, you look around for where help is needed. Then someone approaches and takes whatever is in your hands away, saying, “You don’t have to ‘do’ anything. Just be with the people here.”

Volunteering is scary enough. Many times you fly blind just by showing up: that spontaneity and courage was enough. But now they ask more of you. They ask for a deviation from the script. They ask for you to be yourself, to be conversational. You freeze, heart stilled between beats.

This was not part of the plan. But in volunteering, what is?

This is the beauty of service. It defies the preconceived notion that volunteering implies a physical action. As people, we are wired to believe it is our actions that benefit others the most. Yet there are living contradictions to this mindset. Just ask the youth who sat with a frail, delusional old woman once a week. The greeter at a blood drive, too, might have something to say about how broad the definition of volunteering has become.

The way I see it, our society today is faced with two contradictory messages. One expounds “just do” while the other suggests “just be.” And for us, it is much simpler to “do,” because it involves giving something we know we have. “Just be” asks a person to take off the volunteer hat and become someone who is willing to listen.

A friend shared a story about an old man she met in the hospital. He was an irritable old man, and no one ever wanted to take care of him. Yet she brought her knitting one day with the intention to sit with him awhile. While there, she discovered he was quite a talented basketball player when he was young. They sat and discussed basketball for a while until she left. Her presence changed his demeanor that day. In this case, the old man did not want people to come in and do things for him – he just wanted someone to be with him. The two were able to talk conversationally about nothing because that was what the man’s soul needed. A listening ear was a blessing to him that day.

So, for those of you out there who tilt more toward being than doing, know that the arms of volunteers are large enough to encircle you and the person who simply yearns for your presence.

“You are such a phenomenal leader – would you consider being on the Board?”
“–the Boy Scouts need a leader, could you –?”
“It’s just the Silent Auction Committee –”
“And could you –?”
“Would you mind–”
“–volunteering–”
“–taking some time–”

These conversations are not difficult to imagine. One thing leader to another and everything snowballs out of control.

John Noack certainly did not have to agree to coach baseball, act as a Cub Scout leader, or attend any of the numerous board meetings that occupy his time outside of dentistry. Jean Noack is not obligated to coach the 7th and 8th grade girls’ basketball team at St. Dominic’s School, be an active member of Women In Northfield Giving Support (WINGS), nor hold positions on the Auction, Athletic, and Education committees at St. Dominic’s. For some, volunteering is obligatory. To others such as the Noacks, it stems from familial values. The Noacks offer two viewpoints as to the origin of the value of volunteering: parental influence and community influence.

John was raised in a family where his parents volunteered frequently. He found himself naturally gravitating to the opportunities provided by his local church, along with service projects in the area. Though his parents may have prompted these habits, John made the choice to continue volunteering as he grew older.

In contrast, although Jean’s parents volunteered as well, she discovered more of her volunteer opportunities as a mother. “When the kids were younger, I was very involved in their lives,” she comments. But as her children grew older, Jean broadened her focus to explore contributions she could make to the larger community.

In continuing their volunteer work, the Noacks hope to inspire their children to do the same. By nature of leading by example, the Noacks use volunteering to encourage healthy habits for their children. It also helps that volunteering is a continual presence in Northfield. Sites such as 5th Bridge encourage John and Jean’s scope of volunteering by offering both new ideas and a visible place for would-be volunteers to find where they are needed. The website includes a list of three hundred ways to volunteer, a calendar of upcoming events, photos of past events, and volunteer stories.

Both parents agreed that their children were a natural means of finding opportunities to volunteer. John and Jean would bring their kids to volunteer events, though they admitted, “sometimes [the kids] came more willingly than other times.” The task is to determine how to inspire Adam, Gabbie, and Clara to volunteer. One way John and Jean work to inspire their children is through linking philanthropy and volunteering by sponsoring a child in a third world country. Deciding where to donate their money revolves somewhat around their relations with the organization or group.

“We certainly give to organizations we have connections to,” John said. This could range from the sister church that St. Dominic’s is paired with to local or international organizations. Their philanthropy extends to Maltrata, Mexico, where John joined a relationship-building mission trip with Adam’s class.

Whenever there has been a need, Northfield’s volunteers turn out in massive numbers. It is up to organizations such as 5th Bridge to consolidate this wealth of volunteers and focus their energies on certain projects. The organization appeals to families, such as the Noacks, who use 5th Bridge as a resource to seek out creative opportunities.

For better or for worse, parents remain models for their children. The argument is not if children will follow in their parents’ footsteps, but how they choose to do so.

Service is always at the ready, as thousands of volunteers have discovered. Maybe just this once, life in a family can revolve around the children.