Office of Letters and Light Wins 2011 GuideStar-Kimbia Nonprofit Giveaway Contest

OLL’s mission is to help children and adults find the inspiration, encouragement, and structure they need to achieve their creative potential. OLL is the organizer of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), Script Frenzy and the Young Writers Program.

"The GuideStar-KIMBIA contest inspired our participants and volunteers to share amazing stories about the impact our free creative writing programs have had on their lives. And the prize money will help us encourage even more kids, teens, and adults around the world to discover their creative potential in 2011. We’re so moved by the thousands of heartwarming reviews we received from our supporters, and we're so grateful to GuideStar and KIMBIA for making the contest possible," said Chris Baty, Executive Director, the Office of Letters and Light.

Over 1,000 nonprofits registered to participate in the GuideStar-Kimbia Nonprofit Giveaway contest and over 18,000 reviews were submitted as a result. Contest rules stipulated that the nonprofit that garners the most new reviews between February 1 and February 28, 2011 from anyone who is not a paid employee of the organization will receive a $5,000 gift from KIMBIA. Runners up include Turning Point in 2nd place and Snowbird Outfitters in 3rd place, both with over 600 reviews.

Reviews Make a Difference
One inspirational and moving review from one of the participants in Office of Letters and Light’s National Novel Writing Month served in Iraq and inspired an Iraqi woman to take part in the program to complete a novel in one month as well. The reviewer writes, “Tirife wrote 51,204 words that November. By hand, on blank paper, on paper that had stuff printed on it, on magazine pages, on anything she could put ink on. She wrote her story as a novel. In the mountains of Iraq, in the squalor of the horrid building she lived in, with no power, no running water, in a country that had a war ongoing in it, she wrote a novel, and now she stood bouncing on her toes, her eyes barely visible, shining with pride, handing me portions of her book for me to read.”