Power Play: How Video Games Can Save The World

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From Amazon:

The phenomenal growth of gaming has inspired plenty of hand-wringing since its inception–from the press, politicians, parents, and everyone else concerned with its effect on our brains, bodies, and hearts. But what if games could be good, not only for individuals but for the world? In Power Play, Asi Burak and Laura Parker explore how video games are now pioneering innovative social change around the world.

As the former executive director and now chairman of Games for Change, Asi Burak has spent the last ten years supporting and promoting the use of video games for social good, in collaboration with leading organizations like the White House, NASA, World Bank, and The United Nations. The games for change movement has introduced millions of players to meaningful experiences around everything from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the US Constitution.

Power Play looks to the future of games as a global movement. Asi Burak and Laura Parker profile the luminaries behind some of the movement’s most iconic games, including former Supreme Court judge Sandra Day O’Connor and Pulitzer-Prize winning authors Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn. They also explore the promise of virtual reality to address social and political issues with unprecedented immersion, and see what the next generation of game makers have in store for the future.

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Capital and the Common Good: How Innovative Finance Is Tackling the World’s Most Urgent Problems

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From Amazon:

“Despite social and economic advances around the world, poverty and disease persist, exacerbated by the mounting challenges of climate change, natural disasters, political conflict, mass migration, and economic inequality. While governments commit to addressing these challenges, traditional public and philanthropic dollars are not enough. Here, innovative finance has shown a way forward: by borrowing techniques from the world of finance, we can raise capital for social investments today. Innovative finance has provided polio vaccines to children in the DRC, crop insurance to farmers in India, pay-as-you-go solar electricity to Kenyans, and affordable housing and transportation to New Yorkers. It has helped governmental, commercial, and philanthropic resources meet the needs of the poor and underserved and build a more sustainable and inclusive prosperity.

Capital and the Common Good shows how market failure in one context can be solved with market solutions from another: an expert in securitization bundles future development aid into bonds to pay for vaccines today; an entrepreneur turns a mobile phone into an array of financial services for the unbanked; and policy makers adapt pay-for-success models from the world of infrastructure to human services like early childhood education, maternal health, and job training. Revisiting the successes and missteps of these efforts, Georgia Levenson Keohane argues that innovative finance is as much about incentives and sound decision-making as it is about money. When it works, innovative finance gives us the tools, motivation, and security to invest in our shared future.”

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The Philanthropy Reader

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From Amazon:

“Philanthropy is both timeless and timely. Ancient Romans, Medieval aristocrats, and Victorian industrialists engaged in philanthropy, as do modern-day Chinese billionaires, South African activists, and Brazilian nuns. Today, philanthropic practice is evolving faster than ever before, with donors giving their time, talents, and social capital in creative new ways and in combination with their financial resources. These developments are generating complex new debates and adding new twists to enduring questions, from “why be philanthropic?” to “what does it mean to do philanthropy ‘better’?” Addressing such questions requires greater understanding of the contested purpose and diverse practice of philanthropy.

With an international and interdisciplinary focus, The Philanthropy Reader serves as a one-stop resource that brings together essential and engaging extracts from key texts and major thinkers, and frames these in a way that captures the historical development, core concepts, perennial debates, global reach, and recent trends of this field. The book includes almost 100 seminal and illuminating writings about philanthropy, equipping readers with the guiding material they need to better grasp such a crucial yet complex and evolving topic. Additional readings and discussion questions also accompany the text as online supplements.”

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We Are Sew Powerful: How A Global Community Of Seamstresses Is Changing Zambia One Girl At A Time

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From Amazon:

“Jason and Cinnamon Miles take you on a riveting journey around the world as they meet seamstresses and launch their struggle to help widows and orphans have a better life. From Romania, to Honduras, to Zambia – discover the reason behind their crusade to keep girls in school and mobilize seamstresses around the world to make a difference.

Jason & Cinnamon Miles are the founders of Sew Powerful, an innovative non-profit that is combating extreme poverty in Zambia with purposeful products that empower educational achievement. All proceeds from the sale of this book will go to directly support Sew Powerful programs.”

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Data Driven Non-Profits

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From Amazon:

“Big Data is completely transforming how companies drive their decision making, but many nonprofit organizations are unprepared to make the most of this opportunity.

Nonprofit organizations are vital to making meaningful change in the world and they have significant amounts of untapped potential in their data. Unfortunately, many nonprofits lack the strategies, skills, and guidance to make better engagement, fundraising, advocacy, and program decisions based on their data.

Data Driven Nonprofits is a guide book for nonprofit organizations that want to improve their performance and increase positive change in the world. Learn from industry leaders and nonprofit professionals that have unlocked the keys to becoming more data driven.

Data driven nonprofits accelerate change in the world when staff use data to influence strategy and inform decisions that produce value and impact. Author Steve MacLaughlin is a respected nonprofit industry, fundraising, and online giving expert. He explores how data driven nonprofits are shaping the world and what makes them successful.

Data Driven Nonprofits will help you understand:

  • Why data is important to you and your nonprofit organization
  • How the nonprofit sector, technology, and big data are converging
  • What are some of the challenges to becoming more data driven
  • Why the culture of a nonprofit organization plays such an important role
  • How organizations of all sizes and causes have become more data driven
  • What the future holds for nonprofits that embrace a data driven mindset

Data Driven Nonprofits contains insights and interviews from more than 20 respected charity sector experts. First-hand stories from not-for-profit organizations like Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, University of South Dakota, Indiana University, Worldwide Cancer Research, SCIAF, Royal National Institute of Blind People, Project HOPE, Denver Rescue Mission, Florida State University, Humane Society of the United States, VolunteerMatch, Crisis Text Line, and charity: water are featured throughout the book.”

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The Changemaker Ripple Effect

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How one person can transform the lives of thousands when driven by passion, purpose and boldness.

by Sarah Boxx

From Amazon:

“Do you believe that real, significant change in our world is possible?

Do you ache to ‘turn off’ the negativity we are constantly being bombarded with and reconnect with a dream that will transform the lives of others?

Then The Changemaker Ripple Effect is for you…

“This inspirational, positive book was a delight to read, and provides the reader stories of other’s success, and tools to begin to create positive change in their own lives and the lives of those around them, creating a ripple effect from their actions.”

—Kathleen Sandoval, First Lady of Nevada

This book shares the stories of some remarkable people who’ve overcome challenges and uncertainty to change lives. Inside you’ll meet:

Ian, a businessman and entrepreneur, who for the past 25 years devoted his life to volunteering and improving the conditions and resources for children and youth.

A young man named Julian, who overcame early life challenges that led him to California, where he built a movement for musicians.

Michelle, who is a triathlete, advocate for exploited children and international human resource consultant.

Gerard and Stacey, a French documentary filmmaker and a U.S. social justice champion, who joined forces for hope.

A woman name Cherie, who grew a small nonprofit organization into a regional force for change and a platform for addressing poverty.

Ten of the key characteristics they share can be possessed or developed by anyone—giving each of us the potential to become everyday heroes in our own areas of the world.”

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The Art of Giving by Charles Bronfman and Jeffrey Solomon

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An honest assessment for how to determine your individual relationship with charitable giving in today’s world From world-renowned philanthropists Charles Bronfman and Jeffrey Solomon of the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies comes a comprehensive guide on how to be a canny, street-smart, effective philanthropist, regardless of your income level. It is also a perfect companion for nonprofit program and development executives who would like to introduce donors to their work and their organizations. Despite their critical importance to philanthropy, donors have few resources for solid information about making their gifts-deciding what type of gift to give, how to structure it, the tax implications, what level of follow-up and transparency they should ask for and expect, and countless other complexities. This book fills that vacuum and helps you gain a special understanding of philanthropy as a business undertaking as well as a deeply personal, reflective process. Drawing on decades of experience, the authors offer a fresh, enlivening approach to the nonprofit enterprise that, too often, is undervalued and thought of as the province of the burnt-out and the overwhelmed. Along with its many candid insights and memorable anecdotes, The Art of Giving also offers instruction on how to create a business plan for giving that works for you.

Do Good Well by Nina Vasan and Jennifer Przybylo

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Practical, wise, and witty, Do Good Well is a groundbreaking book that offers a comprehensive and readily adaptable guide to social innovation that not only captures the entrepreneurial and creative spirit of our time, but also harnesses the insights, wisdom, and down-to-earth experience of today’s most accomplished young leaders.

Written in a fresh voice and a dash of humor, Do Good Well avoids the typical generalized takeaways and overly simplistic “how-to” advice which lacks a grounding in a larger context. It delivers instead a winning combination of theory, anecdote, and application that walks you through the process of identifying a problem, developing an action plan, and then executing the plan in a way that will get results.

Giving 2.0 by Laura Arrillaga Andreessen

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Giving 2.0 is the ultimate resource for anyone navigating the seemingly infinite ways one can give. The future of philanthropy is far more than just writing a check, and Giving 2.0 shows how individuals of every age and income level can harness the power of technology, collaboration, innovation, advocacy, and social entrepreneurship to take their giving to the next level and beyond.

Major gifts may dominate headlines, but the majority of giving still comes from individual households ordinary people with extraordinary generosity. Even in 2009, at a time of deep recession, individual giving averaged almost $2,000 per household and drove 82% of the $300 billion donated that same year. Based on her vast experience as a philanthropist, academic, volunteer, and social innovator, Arrillaga-Andreessen shares the most effective techniques she herself pilots and studies and a vast portfolio of lessons learned during her lifetime of giving. Featuring dozens of stories on innovative and powerful methods of how individuals give time, money, and expertise whether volunteering and fundraising, leveraging technology and social media, starting a giving circle, fund, foundation, or advocacy group, or aspiring to create greater social impact Giving 2.0 shows readers how they can renew, improve, and expand their giving and reach their fullest potential.

A practical, entertaining, and inspiring call to action, Giving 2.0 is an indispensable tool for anyone passionate about creating change in our world.

The Promise of a Pencil

The Promise of a Pencil by Alan Braun

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The riveting New York Times bestseller about a young man who built more than 250 schools around the world—and the steps anyone can take to lead a successful and significant life.

Adam Braun began working summers at hedge funds when he was just sixteen years old, sprinting down the path to a successful Wall Street career. But while traveling he met a young boy begging on the streets of India, who after being asked what he wanted most in the world, simply answered, “A pencil.” This small request led to a staggering series of events that took Braun backpacking through dozens of countries before eventually leaving a prestigious job to found Pencils of Promise, the organization he started with just $25 that has since built more than 250 schools around the world.

The Promise of a Pencil chronicles Braun’s journey to find his calling, as each chapter explains one clear step that every person can take to turn their biggest ambitions into reality. If you feel restless and ready for transition, if you are seeking direction and purpose, this critically acclaimed bestseller is for you. Driven by inspiring stories and shareable insights, this is the book that will give you the tools to make your own life a story worth telling.