Individual Giving

Rihanna is Harvard-bound—not to study, but to pick up the university's prestigious Peter J. Gomes Humanitarian Award. The Barbados-born singer will receive her award next Tuesday at the university. "Rihanna has charitably built a state-of-the-art center for oncology and nuclear medicine to diagnose and treat breast cancer at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Bridgetown, Barbados,"…

Philanthropy can be a funny business. Let’s say you’re a do-gooder in Malawi, and you hear about a little girl who has been attacked by a crocodile. She is badly hurt, but her family has no money for medical care at a private clinic. What do you do? The traditional philanthropic approach would be, approximately,…

Attention! There’s been a technological development—GuideStar, the largest database providing information on nonprofit organizations, has partnered up with Facebook to create Facebook’s charitable giving tools...

Today is Feb. 14th, so Happy Valentine’s Day! In celebration, let’s explore some information on how couples donate to charities. Fidelity Charitable recently released a report called “How Couples Give,” which was based on survey responses from 694 Fidelity Charitable donors who are either married or live with their significant other...

There is definitely the tendency in our sector to write off “in-memoriam” donors as one-time donors, yet I think we must understand the emotional connection and make an effort to grow that relationship—with tact and in the gentlest, most-loving way possible...

The philanthropy pie is growing, but the slices are getting bigger. Those slow to the table are going to be left hungry. The evolving behavior of philanthropists will also require an innovative approach from the nonprofit organizations and leaders that seek their investment. Focusing on improvement and activity in three key areas will best position nonprofits to win in an increasingly competitive market...

Rockets owner Leslie Alexander's team might have started the season on a roll that arrived sooner than he expected, but it could not win a championship in December. So on Tuesday, he concentrated on the other half of his mission statement. The Rockets announced that Alexander would give a donation of $4 million to eight…

Since I work for nonprofits, I figure everyone wants to participate in do-gooding. Predictably, I make contributions to charity on behalf of the recipients for gifts. Call them socially responsible gifts. It makes me feel good to do that. I always presumed it made the recipient feel good, too.

As Black Friday approached, I became very aware that our peak giving season is now here. For my organization, during the last four months of the year, we receive more than 60 percent of our donation revenue. I stopped for a moment the other day during lunch and wondered why giving at the end of the calendar year is so important...

The average American household is giving far less to charity than it did a decade ago. Over the past 10 years, charitable-giving deductions from lower-income donors have declined significantly, at almost the same rate that charitable giving from higher-income donors increased. Itemized charitable deductions from donors making less than $100,000 a year declined by 34…