Oprah and her viewers have played an integral role in the growth and success of DonorsChoose.org. When we launched DonorsChoose.org, we spent the first few years operating out of my classroom with my students as our staff members. In 2003, Oprah Winfrey did a phenomenal story about our site. She told the world about the organization and our philanthropic model, and that story prompted the first inquiries from other parts of the country about DonorsChoose.org expanding.
Until 2004, our site was only open to public schools in New York City. Then we began to expand to other states and other cities. Then in 2007, we were able to open our website to every public school in America. Now, in her final season, during the Ultimate Favorite Things Episode, Oprah-with some big help from Bing-has helped us to serve thousands more classrooms, and will continue for months and years to come.
We were thrilled that one of our biggest supporters, Bing, enabled the show's guests and hundreds of thousands more people to have the DonorsChoose.org experience by underwriting the costs of gift cards for up to $1 million in funding! We've never worked with another partner who is as committed as Bing is to inspiring their users to get involved in supporting classrooms. Right now there are thousands of Bing users who are picking classroom projects to support with funding from Bing, and we have already seen a tremendous impact from Bing users who have been eager and excited to take part in their campaign.
Here's a comment I received from one donor: "I gave to this project because I want my students to receive these wonderful resources to improve their reading and because of Bing's generosity in supporting public education! Fluency is the Pathway to Reading Comprehension!"
Charles Best
CEO, Donorschoose.org
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