Tag: amplify austin

Five Reasons to Amplify United Way

Amplify Austin Day 2016 is right around the corner. The citywide day of giving takes place on March 8th starting at 6 p.m. and ends on March 9th at 6 p.m. With more than 600 nonprofits participating, check out five reasons you should make a donation to UWATX on Amplify Austin Day.   We are research-based and results-driven. We say this a lot–because it is so important to us! We are not simply creating programs randomly and hoping for results; everything we implement is based off of our own or collaborative research, and we are constantly monitoring and tweaking our programs each year based on previous results. We also collaborate with other organizations to create a bigger impact. It is important to us to be able to prove that what we’re doing is making a tangible difference in the lives of struggling families and individuals…and we can. Check out some of our success stories to see this in action. We focus on the areas of Austin that need us most. Our Middle School Matters program serves students on three campuses where the number of students living in low-income households is 87% or more on each campus. These campuses sit in Dove Springs, St. John’s and Manor, three of Austin’s most disadvantaged neighborhoods. Our Financial Stability program provides free CommunityTHRIVE financial classes to low-income adults. These classes are held in neighborhood centers in low-income neighborhoods, making it easy for attendees to access the classes in their own neighborhoods even if they don’t have […]

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Amplify Austin “Power Hour”

Amplify Austin is only two days away! What sets this online give-a-thon apart from others is the chance to win incentive prizes from sponsors.    Hourly prizes: Awarded to nonprofits that raised the most dollars or had the most donors in a single hour on Amplify Austin Day: $1,000 awarded to nonprofit with the most unique donors every hour during Amplify Austin Day $1,000 awarded to the nonprofit that raises the most dollars every hour during Amplify Austin Day   Grand prizes: Awarded to a nonprofit on Amplify Austin Day: $5,000 to nonprofit with most dollars raised in first six hours (6 p.m., March 5 – Midnight, March 6) $5,000 to nonprofit with most donations from unique donors $5,000 to nonprofit with most total dollars raised $5,000 to nonprofit with most individual fundraisers   In attempt to maximize UWATX’s chance to win some of these prizes, we are designating 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. on March 5 as the Amplify St. John’s Power Hour! Because St. John’s neighborhood is in the 78752 zip code, we felt this was an appropriate time to raise the most money possible during Amplify Austin. Unfortunately, if you are scheduling your donation in advance, you cannot select a specific time you would like your donation to go through. However, if you have a spare 5 minutes on March 5 from 7-8, we highly recommend making your donation during this time–and your donation could be AMPLIFIED! This blog entry is part of our “Amplify St. John’s” series leading up to […]

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Volunteers Make St. John’s Greater

UWATX will focus on the St. John’s neighborhood during this year’s 24-hour session of community-wide giving through Amplify Austin in hopes we can expand our work in this community, as well as our other target neighborhoods including Manor and Dove Springs. Take a look at some of the projects volunteers completed in the St. John’s community within the last year! Webb students who participate in our Volunteer Project Leaders class have been busy improving their own neighborhood. For Valentine’s Day, they created cards and banners to show their appreciation for teachers at their school. VPL students also participated in our annual MLK Day of Service by working with members of the Young Leaders Society to create giant jenga and other games for the Big Game – Super Bowl XLIX watch party. Funds generated from the watch party will go toward the YLS $180K Challenge, raising money for full-time coordinators at Webb, Decker and Mendez Middle Schools. Last December, the neighborhood came together for our Community Tree Lighting held at Webb Middle School. UWATX volunteers gathered more than 1,600 books to give out to kids of all ages who attended the event. Many of the kids walked away with more books than they could carry. Our valued business partners have also been busy making St. John’s greater in the last year. Texas Mutual spent the day at Webb Middle School volunteering as part of the Insurance Challenge. Some volunteers worked to beautify the grounds, while others decorated and put together welcome boxes to inspire students for […]

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