Being a universally accepted truth in this day and age, shopping shall go hand in hand with any festivity celebrating goodwill. It is no surprise that America’s favorite holiday, Thanksgiving Day, is fleetingly followed by Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday.
Nonetheless, concerns about these three days of commercial exploitation overbalancing a single Thanksgiving Day allocated for expressing gratitude for one’s haves brought the New York-based community non-profit 92nd Street Y, together with the United Nations Foundation, to come up in 2012 with a cheeky answer: Giving Tuesday.
Giving Tuesday intends to turn attention from two days of consuming to a day of giving, as a counterpoint to Black Friday and Cyber Monday.[1] For a first, this year, Giving Tuesday is trying to go global, as UK millennials, the generation most thoroughly interlinked with American culture online, but also more broadly in Europe and the rest of the world, youth have begun to mark Thanksgiving as an opportunity for a “Friendsgiving”.[2] The idea has spread on social media in most countries, globalizing the concept. And despite that in many of these, fewer people overall may be aware of the push than in the US, those who are tend to embrace it even more emphatically. For instance, in India recognition hovers at 49%, but 94% of those participate.[3]
In this spirit of giving, the Mediaclip team has always been involved with our community and in the past we participated to “Make-A-Whish” and Movember initiatives. In the last couple of years, we took a liking in a non-profit initiative called Fées Marraines who’s mission is to promote school perseverance for young girls from disadvantaged communities.
By providing everything these high-school graduate needs to attend their prom, the organization provides them with a sense of belonging, pride in their scholar accomplishments. Fées Marraines, French for ‘Fairy Godmother’, provides everything including dress, shoes, make-up, jewelry during their Journées Boutiques, where each student is accompanied by a volunteer serving as their personal advisor in a fairylike setting making this day unforgettable and magical. Each young woman participating in the project has to demonstrate their determination and is sponsored by a teacher or social worker.
This initiative started 7 years ago, and more than 370 graduates were dressed in 2018. Last year the project added some Scholarships and conferences to promote even further the pursuit of post-secondary studies in these communities in needs.
You can contribute in different ways by getting involve in the project or by donating directly to them during this Giving Tuesday. Find the Donation form here.
[1] https://www.givingtuesday.org/about
[2] https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/26/opinions/giving-tuesday-goes-global-maltby/index.html
[3] https://www.fastcompany.com/90271843/how-giving-tuesday-became-a-worldwide-phenomenon
