Catherine Miles
Fundraising Director
Anthony Nolan
13 Oct 2012

Hi Daniel, Lileth and Barb. Thanks for your comments. I totally agree that the current generation of 18-30 year olds are facing incredibly tough economic conditions, which are disproportionately impacting on them. This is obviously affects their ability to engage with charities on a financial level. However, our experience at Anthony Nolan is that this absolutely doesn't mean that they're not interested in issues or want to have an impact on causes they care about. We have a student arm, Marrow, which has volunteer groups in 39 Universities. Over the past year they've recruited over 9,000 young people to the bone marrow register (c25% of the yearly total), raised awareness, and raised £90k. I think what's important for charities to do is offer a range of ways, both financial and non-financial, for young people to get involved; and do this in ways that work for them, particularly via social media. It may well be that young people can't afford to give large sums or give at all initially, but they can be incredibly powerful advocates (particularly via social media and their peer networks), volunteers or campaigners. At the end of the day, our jobs as Fundraisers are to make it possible for people to make a difference to issues they care about and I think we can be better at helping young people to do that. I've written a bit more about this on my blog if it's of interest. http://bit.ly/zIVmQV

[Reply]

Barb
16 Oct 2012
Response to [Catherine Miles]

Catherine, I hear what you're saying but I still have doubts.
For starters, I disagree to include campaigning and involvement in fundraising. This point of view has led to strongly contested by many a theory by which all communications have principally fundraising meaning - and I agree it should never be the case.
Secondly, I agree with the point of the cultural shift - nobody can make people do something they may find slightly out of order (as many people of all ages find fundraising in general, to grief of many of those on the front of the service delivery). And it's fair if people are reluctant - the meaning of 'voluntary' extends in all directions.
However, I agree that fundraisers are respobsible, and should be encouraged, to raise resources in all forms, shapes and sizes. It will work as long as the targeted population will believe they are changing the world and not being trained to give. People of all ages do feel strong resistance to give to charities who otherwise don't give a damn whether donors even understand what are giving for (usual view of 'the moral majority', ask non-sector friends or read the press). For this reason they don't give because nobody likes the feeling they are being 'bled by manipulation'. Young people, raised in mostly false athmosphere that they live in actual participatory democracy and their voice count, have all rights to expect they will be respected and consulted on every step - it's not happening as we know. So say what you want against today fundraisers but benefits will be reaped when these young people will find themselves in the world around entering middle age anyway - and in few years time we will have the same conversation...
Naturally, I don't mind being proven wrong!

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Daniel
11 Oct 2012

Interesting take; and while I agree to an extent that fundraisers must adapt to appeal to younger generations, I think there is also an aspect of society now paying the price for a cultural shift in how charity has been presented to children over the last 10 to 20 years?

As a child growing up in the 80s I learnt from charities that small value and infrequent was acceptable. Whether it was a red nose, paying for non-uniform day, or twisting the arms of relatives to shell out on a sponsor forms, it was all acceptable and always rewarded (usually with a sticker, a certificate, or for the really adventurous a T-Shirt).

While that is a great mechanic to engage children in the important work of charities, I can't help wonder whether it also introduced bad charity habits now following this generation into adulthood?

Not once do I remember discussions around regular giving or support of charities in a deeper way, even as I got older and left school to spend 3 weeks in Kenya on a charity expedition - not the faintest talk of setting up a Direct Debit or doing more to help once I got back.

Let's not keep dumbing it down and going for the fast buck - children are smarter than we think and instinctly get and understand giving to charity.

Perhaps if schools, charities and parents worked together now to introduce better, more sophisticated models of engagement with younger generations, we might be able to reverse this worrying trend in future.

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Lileth
11 Oct 2012

She has raised some great points. How, specifically, is her charity going about engaging with young people and successfully raising funds from them? If someone has finally cracked this it would be great to know how.

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