Climate March Update #5: SUCCESS!

Hey everyone, great news! The money I raised from t-shirt orders has completed my fundraising, and now I have actually over-raised money!

If you are still interested in supporting the cause, there are many other marchers who still have not reached their goal, some of which are marching right now! If you could help them out instead of me, all of us from the Climate March would be very grateful. We don't want anyone to have to drop out because they didn't have the funds. 

Here are some marchers who are still in need. All of those listed below are currently marching AND they are going the whole distance, from LA to DC! So, they have to raise at least $5,000.

Climate March Update #3

Hi everyone! I have lots of exciting news with this update!

With only 41 days left to go before the march starts, it's crunch time! I'm so excited for the people who are starting in California, and I wish I could be there with them as they take their first steps. May 23rd cannot come soon enough!

The Climate March recently received a donation of $20,000 to go toward a food truck. That is half of the cost, and the march is currently looking for an organization or business to sponsor the other half. If you know an organization or business that might be interested, please email Zach Heffernen, the Marcher Director, at zach@climatemarch.org.

As for me, I have reached 25% of my fundraising goal! I owe a very special thank you to an anonymous donor who gave $500 to my cause. Your generosity is above and beyond and if you're reading this, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. You can view a running list of my donors on my CrowdRise fundraising page. 

I have also received two more gold sponsorships! One comes from the Ithaca Hemp Company in Ithaca, NY, near my college. Ithaca Hemp Company carries lots of awesome hemp products, including clothing. Hemp is one of the most versatile and sustainable materials out there, and can be used to make over 25,000 products! Unfortunately, hemp gets a bad rep because of its close relation to cannabis — or marijuana — and currently it is illegal to grow hemp in the United States. To learn more about hemp and all of its awesome benefits, check out this past Viridorari post. To learn more about Ithaca Hemp Company and all of their epic products, check out their website. Thank you, Ithaca Hemp Company, for becoming the first business to sponsor my march!

The second gold sponsorship comes from the Palmyra-Macedon Rotary Club. This sponsorship is very special to me because I have been involved with Interact and Rotary throughout my high school career. Interact, the high school version of Rotary, inspired a love of community service in me and taught me invaluable lessons about leadership. I have learned so much about myself through Interact, and I look forward to becoming a Rotary member someday. I am staying involved and participating in my college's Rotaract Club. It means the world to me that an organization that has influenced me so profoundly has made a generous contribution to my march — which I'm sure will be a life-changing experience that will develop me even further. Thank you, Palmyra-Macedon Rotary Club, for becoming the first organization to sponsor my march!

I am walking 2,000 miles for the planet

I have some very exciting news. While at the Powershift conference in Pittsburgh, PA this past October, I signed up to march a section of the Great March for Climate Action, or the Climate March. The march begins in California in March of 2014, and plans to arrive in Washington D.C. in the following November.

Originally, I planned to only walk from Pittsburgh, PA to D.C. Since I signed up, plans have changed. Now, I am starting in Taos, New Mexico immediately following the end of my spring semester of college. That means I will be walking about 2,000 miles over the course of six months across the country to raise awareness for the global climate crisis and the urgent need for action.

I can’t tell you how excited I am. I will be following in the footsteps of Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., women’s rights activists, and nuclear disarmament activists. Yet, my fellow marchers and I will be carving out a path very separate from them. We are fighting a different fight from what our predecessors did, and our work to save the planet might prove to be the most important movement in all of history. We only have one Earth; we can’t afford to ruin it.

I am thrilled to be walking with so many inspiring and amazing people, with ages ranging from 6 to 82 and origins from all over America, as well as El Salvador, Canada, Belize, and Ecuador.

 

Picture courtesy of: http://yellowmaps.com/map/united-states-printable-map-468.htm 

Fundraising

However, I can’t simply join this cause for free. Each marcher is expected to cover his or her own expenses through fundraising, which equates to about $20 for each day we march. I have to raise about $3,800 for my section of the march, as well as the cost for my one-way plane ticket to New Mexico, and a little bit of extra to have on hand for spending/emergencies. Overall, my goal is to raise $4,500.

I need your help to make my dream to stand up for the world we love to come true. I would be eternally grateful if you could contribute to my fundraising in some way, no matter how big or small.