How can we help – modern stories

Fit for a king

April 24, 2023 patushka

How can we help: Why we give, and how we might do it better

Britain is crowning a new(ish) King next month, so we’re all being encouraged to spend a once-in-a-generation bank holiday doing something nice for each other. But the Big Help Out, which promises to “give everyone an opportunity to join in”, has already prompted concerns that it will flop, further undermining efforts to recruit and engage new volunteers.

If that all sounds a bit gloomy, it’s because volunteering in England has dropped to its lowest level of the past decade. The issue isn’t only here: shortages have also been reported in Australia and in the USA, and just last week, Volunteer Canada was campaigning to reverse a “dramatic decline in volunteers”, with 65% of volunteer-supported organisations short of people, even as a third report increased demand for their services.

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Mega(phone) motivation

February 22, 2023February 22, 2023 patushka

Youth media projects matter because they give young people “a voice”. Funders, nonprofits and facilitators emphasise this as their goal; participants celebrate it. And standard-setters expect it: a 2006 guide by the Open Society Institute, a significant early philanthropic backer of youth media in the US, says a key feature is that it “conveys the authentic views and voices of young people”.

But whose view is being conveyed? One academic study looked at a project where young participants could explore any issue of importance to them. A surprisingly large number chose gang culture, even though few were directly affected by this issue. Facilitators, whose role includes helping participants to challenge stereotypical, negative media representations of youth, were in a difficult position. Do they stop them from making films about a certain topic if it appears they’ve chosen it out of a sense of obligation or a need to conform to expectations? Or do they respect this as their authentic voice? Youth voice, it turns out, can be “a double-edged sword”.

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Royal recognition

September 27, 2022 patushka

How can we help: Why we give, and how we might do it better

*Remembering the late monarch with a selfie*

“Well, they do a lot for charity…”

It’s a common response when you ask people what purpose the British royal family still serves. For some, good causes are the monarchy’s primary purpose: according to recent research from Charities Aid Foundation, a third of Brits believe that the royals’ most important role is supporting charities. (It’s not clear what the remaining two thirds feel is most important.) And a quarter think they first heard about a campaign or cause thanks to royal support.

But do they really do a lot for charity?

Analysis in 2020 by Giving Evidence of the apparently rather opaque world of royal patronages found no evidence that these increase a charity’s revenue (in some cases, they may even cost them money), nor that royalty increases generosity more broadly.

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Despair as a teddy bear

April 20, 2022 patushka

How can we help: Exploring how and why we give, and how we might do it better

Bad things seem to pile up: the slow grind of dishonest politics, the sharp horror of war, the unfathomable end of life on earth barely registering on our front pages. You want to make the world a little bit better, but amid all of this, is there any point?

Much has been written already about the risk of burnout among activists, charity workers and healthcare workers. Many have repeated the advice to put on your own oxygen mask first, to practise ‘self-care’ (a term that I find off-putting for some reason, even if I agree with the concept).

But aside from looking after yourself (time off, getting into nature – whatever works), I wonder if it’s most important to find a kind of acceptance, to see despair as the inevitable other side of the coin.

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Sticking around

March 23, 2022April 3, 2022 patushka

How can we help: Exploring how and why we give, and how we might do it better

A former colleague told me recently that he’s started mentoring a kid. It’s not just the occasional phone call or a few trips to the cinema, though: he has signed up to a programme that commits you to meeting up with the same child on three weekends out of four, for a minimum of two years.

How many of us stick at anything, consistently, for a full two years? It’s so easy to set good intentions, then find that other stuff – work exhaustion, family demands, travel plans, life admin – gets in the way. I’m hugely impressed by the volunteers who sign up for two years, but also by charities that aren’t afraid to require it of their volunteers, because they know that for vulnerable kids, consistency matters.

A day after that conversation with my former colleague, I got a handwritten thank-you letter, out of the blue, from the kids’ charity where I’ve been volunteering on and off for some years. It was completely unexpected, and also unnecessary – like many other volunteers, I do it because I enjoy being there, because I love what the charity does, and because I’ve grown to feel proud to be part of a lovely little community. (Other volunteers include primary school teachers who give up their Saturday mornings to spend more time with excitable children; another, a writer, recently turned up directly off an overnight flight from the USA – she could easily have skipped that session, but said volunteering was the highlight of her week.)

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Everyone’s a philanthropist… once we get around to it

February 16, 2022April 3, 2022 patushka

How can we help: Exploring how and why we give, and how we might do it better

*“Instantaneous generosity”: it could be good for you*

A family friend told me recently that he and his wife, both writers, wanted to get into philanthropy. It’s not something I often hear, outside my professional bubble. Giving makes you feel good, so why don’t more people do it regularly?

Partly, I think, because there’s an assumption that philanthropy is only for the very wealthy.

Donations from the likes of Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos get heaps of attention. The scrutiny is important. But it also means that the central characters in most philanthropy stories are business moguls, sports champions and Hollywood stars – no wonder the field can feel as distant a prospect as owning a superyacht.

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“They don’t know how smart they are. You can tell them.”

November 11, 2020July 10, 2022 patushka

How can we help: Exploring how and why we give, and how we might do it better

*Who encouraged them to keep writing? (Photo: Unclaimed exhibition, Barbican 2019)*

Much of my work involves moulding and tweaking other people’s writing into shape. But with R and C, I never fix spelling mistakes or question confusing sentence structures. I never wince when they go off topic, never strike through nonsensical ideas.

R and C are writers – nine and ten-year-old ones – who I’ve been working with at the Ministry of Stories, an east London charity. It’s quite a contrast to my day job, which generally doesn’t involve learning about a monster’s detachable limbs or the newly-discovered land of Japina. Nor does my day job often allow the luxury of focusing entirely on one person and one task.

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Speaking up

October 6, 2019July 10, 2022 patushka

How can we help: Exploring how we give, and how we might do it better

The first speaker’s voice barely carries above the hum of the crowd. Even with a microphone, it takes a while for the 200 or so people gathered to notice she’s addressing them.

When she’s done, others climb onto the fountain steps alone or in pairs, reading aloud from notes on their phones. Not understanding the words, I watch the body language: a few hold themselves confidently, most less so. One, clutching a diamanté-embellished phone, tries hard to control a visibly shaking hand. Continue reading “Speaking up” →

Talking it out

October 1, 2018February 20, 2022 patushka

Working with London schools and colleges is one way to appreciate this city’s diversity.

While preparing Exposure’s latest podcast on gender and feminism, participants talked about their family lives, and inevitably got onto discussing how culture and upbringing affects your views of a woman’s role in the world.

It made for an interesting debate: we had one young person who’d grown up in Iraq and Sweden, another raised in Zambia by his grandmother, two with an Asian parent, one Jamaica-born Christian, one daughter of a Rastafarian, another whose dad was Algerian. Continue reading “Talking it out” →