Marking GivingTuesday with a neighbourly hug
Top: Last year, St. Marys mayor Al Strathdee raised the GivingTuesday flag as Julie Docker Johnson, chairperson of the town’s Won’t You Be My Neighbour campaign celebrates. Above: Laura McLaughlan and Cindy Taylor spreading the message during the GivingTuesday campaign in St. Marys. supplied
Generosity has the power to bring people together
GivingTuesday is about more than simply raising money for charities; it’s also about generosity of spirit as the town of St. Marys in southwestern Ontario has discovered.
Last year, the town’s GivingTuesday campaign theme, Won’t You Be My Neighbour, was so successful that it was repeated for this year’s campaign.
The focus last year was on helping out, meeting and caring for neighbours to reduce social isolation. The campaign saw 29 charities participating and 120 separate initiatives in the town of only 7,000 residents. Additionally, businesses empowered employees to help their community, and the community benefited from the social capital, ideas, collaborations and the collective impact created year round.
Julie Docker Johnson, chairperson of St. Marys GivingTuesday, says this year’s activities have included a community dinner, apartment buildings planning food drives, a Sparks/Embers group making Christmas cards and delivering them while carolling at a nursing home, and a company in town making special beds to donate to the Humane Society.
“We started promoting Giving-Tuesday 2024 in our local paper in the first week in September, and we have run a feature every week since,” says Ms. Docker Johnson. “We also used social media to get the message out, and we requested our Town Council to proclaim Tuesday, December 3 as GivingTuesday Day in St. Marys.”
Duke Chang, president and CEO of CanadaHelps, Canada’s largest organization for donating and fundraising online, says St. Marys rallied on GivingTuesday last year to do more and give a little extra. “The day was like one big neighbourly hug,” he says.
With loneliness and shrinking social networks on the increase – correlating with lower rates of charitable giving – Mr. Chang believes GivingTuesday can help unite communities through generosity and address some of the issues contributing to isolation and disconnection and inspire Canadians to make an impact in support of a cause they care about.
“While the COVID-19 pandemic saw a significant increase in online donations, the number of Canadians who donate to charities based on their tax filing data was on the decline even before the pandemic,” he says. “It is likely that the pandemic contributed to many Canadians’ sense of isolation and disconnection from one another, but it is certainly not the only factor.”
Mr. Chang notes that GivingTuesday is a global movement that has proven to connect communities.
“We know that it can play an even greater role this holiday season as the day follows after Black Friday and Cyber Monday and is used to celebrate and engage in acts of kindness and generosity,” he says.
Mr. Chang says the high level of disconnection and isolation reported by Canadians is also making it harder for individuals to see how they can make an impact.
“CanadaHelps’ 2024 Giving Report revealed significant declines in the number of Canadians donating to charities, while thousands of organizations struggle to meet heightened demand for their services. Yet, due to inflation and the high cost of living, nearly a quarter of Canadians said last year that they intend to use charitable services for food and shelter,” he says.
The good news, he adds, is that generosity has the power to bring people together.
“The simple act of being generous creates connections and reduces loneliness,” says Mr. Chang. “That’s why our theme for GivingTuesday this year is uniting communities through generosity.”
Learn more: canadahelps.org
To view this report on The Globe's website, visit globeandmail.com
To view the full report as it appeared in The Globe's print edition GivingTuesday