Give meaningfully: How to make sure your donations make a difference

After the shopping frenzies brought about by Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Giving Tuesday is meant to encourage sharing with those less fortunate, if you’re able.

While many are moved to give during the holiday season, it can sometimes be difficult to decide where and how to do so in ways that would make the most difference.

Here are a few things to keep in mind as the spirit of generosity moves you to charity this time of year.

Reach vs. impact

Raji Jayaraman, Associate Professor at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy and the Department of Economics at the University of Toronto says how many people a charity reaches and the impact they make are not necessarily the same metric.

“Often when you go to a charity’s website … they’ll say something like ‘we have impacted 10,000 people.’ And what they typically mean by that is that they’ve provided whatever service or good that they’re offering to 10,000 people,” explains Jayaraman. “That’s not actually impact, that’s reach. So the key is to figure out what the effect of whatever activity the charity’s engaged is on on its beneficiaries.”

For example, if you’re hypothetically donating to a charity that subsidizes education for girls and the organization says they’ve provided the subsidy for 10,000 girls to attend school, Jayaraman says that signifies the charity’s reach.

“[In this case] what I care about is — are girls going to school more than they would have if this charity hadn’t done whatever it is that they’re doing,” she said. “That’s tricky because it involves answering a counterfactual question — what would happen to these girls if the charity didn’t do what they were doing. And that’s really what I’m interested in — are girls going to school more and learning more as a result of this rather than ‘we reached 10,000 girls’?”

Fundraisers

Jayaraman says that fundraising campaigns and activities are an essential part of a charity’s functioning, but be mindful that there are costs involved that need to be covered.

“So if I give a dollar, I cannot reasonably expect that a hundred cents are going towards the intended recipients,” she explained. “It costs money to have an office, to have a website, to pay personnel. So some portion of your dollar is going to go towards overhead, so we need to accept that.

However, Jayaraman says to be cautious of “glitzy fundraising” and “big marketing campaigns” because while they may often be necessary to attract attention to a cause, they can also lead to wasteful overheads.

She says while it is difficult to track exactly where every cent goes, websites like Charity Navigator and Givewell help understand where your donations land up.

Grassroots giving

While large, worldwide organizations do a lot of good and have a significant impact, smaller charities that serve their local communities can go unnoticed because they do not have the same name recognition and advertising budgets.

Local causes

Jayaraman says the best way to determine how your local giving can be most impactful is by simply taking a walk through your neighbourhood and pay attention.

“We all live in communities. Walk through your neighborhood and see what people are doing. You could see who’s active in that community,” and give to those local or grassroots initiatives, she said.

International causes

“The biggest needs are arguably in places far away, where we can’t just walk to,” adds Jayaraman.

However, when donating to grassroots organizations abroad, it is difficult to personally vet them to determine if they are legitimate and donating your funds to those who need it the most.

“If I were to rank order places in the world that need money the most, sub-Saharan Africa would be at the very top of that list at the moment. And there, it’s a little trickier to figure out what’s going to be impactful,” she said.

The professor suggests organizations like Give Directly, who give the cash that you donate directly to people in need in underprivileged areas of the world through small, local, non-government organizations (NGOs).

“They have a very, very rigorous monitoring and evaluation unit behind that,” she added.

Cash or kind?

Jayaraman says while you want to help people in need, it’s impossible to know exactly what they require.

“So what is the best thing to do in that context? I’m afraid it’s something as unromantic as cash,” she said. “That’s going to be my number one, number two and number three recommendation — just give cash rather than giving in kind.”

Donating clothes

Jayaraman says it’s useful to give clothing to local charities within your city.

“If there are coats sitting in my closet that I don’t wear, absolutely they should be on the back of someone that needs it — it’s cold in the winter,” she said.

However she says sending clothing collected in Canada to developing countries is “tricky” because “these tend to destroy local markets.”

“So I’m hugely against sending clothes to developing countries. I’m a huge fan of donating clothes locally,” she said.

Donating food 

Donating dollars makes the most sense even to food banks, opines Jayaraman, because they know their inventory and the needs of the communities they serve best.

“If everyone is donating canned peas one week but no pasta, then they have to buy that pasta. So even with food banks, cash is so much better than food,” she said.

Donating your time

The holiday season tends to be a busy one for volunteering, but Jayaraman says an influx of volunteers only around this time can be more of a hassle for charity organizations than helpful.

“Trying to exercise not just sympathy, but empathy in terms of determining volunteer activities, I think would be useful,” she said.

She suggests keeping your chosen charity’s specific needs in mind throughout the year and volunteering outside of peak seasons can be more impactful.

Avoiding scams

One of the easiest ways to ensure a charity is legitimate is to consult the Canada Revenue Agency’s (CRA) list of registered charities to find out if it is “registered, revoked, annulled, suspended, or penalized.”

For other information about a registered charity that is not already on the CRA’s list, you can make an informal request for information using the CRAs form found here.