Cause Celeb

Can star power create social change?

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Celeb: Lauryn Hill, hip-hop, reggae, and R&B artist

Cause: The Refugee Project (TRP), an outreach program for at-risk urban youths from New York and New Jersey

What she’s done: Hill founded TRP in 1996 and serves as chair of the board of directors. She also made an appearance at the August 1998 Camp Hill, a two-week recreational camp in the Catskill Mountains for kids between 10 and 13 years old.

What celeb gets: Spiritual fulfillment and publicity

What cause gets: Camp Hill, a mentorship program, a reading club, and an annual Halloween party, not to mention support from such superstar trustees as Sean “Puffy” Combs, Cornel West, and Spike Lee

Connection between celeb and cause: Hill grew up in a working-class section of South Orange, N.J., and knows from personal experience that dead-end inertia can be overcome.

Chance celeb will humiliate cause: Slim. Hill is known to be dedicated and socially aware. Plus, the kids love her.

What good came of this? More than 100 urban kids got the chance to escape to the Catskills. Says one of the camp’s sponsors: “[It gave] kids a great opportunity to get out into the country, and to learn skills through a structured curriculum of seminars in music, accounting, and marketing.”

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

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