Rejoice, O Colbert fans, for there are new shows tonight! Break weeks, for all we welcome them on behalf of Stephen and his hardworking crew, are pretty tough for the rest of us. I hope you all had a good hiatus; I spent most of mine relaxing, reading and catching up with friends and family.
Between the Fourth of July weekend, some of our recent “finds” from Stephen’s trip to Baghdad, and tonight’s guest stint from iava.org founder Paul Rieckhoff, I’ve been reminded of the DonorsChoose.org challenge Stephen set on behalf of the schools teaching the troops’ children. I thought you all might be interested in hearing an update on the impressive results of that challenge to date.
Let me begin by taking this opportunity to say, WOW, Nation! As of about 4:00pm today, 1693 people have donated a total of $183,485 to help students in these military classrooms, fully funding well over 300 projects! At the moment, the Marines have a considerable lead in the fund-raising department — it’s probably fair to say they’re kicking butt, actually — with $66,830 donated in their name. The Army stands in a distant second, with $35,575 donated so far, followed by the Navy ($29,649) and Air Force ($27,794). The Coast Guard brings up the rear with $23,637, but that’s still an impressive number, considering that they were added to the challenge later than the other branches were.
The challenge is still open to any participants able to spare a few dollars, and there are still over fifty open funding requests (donations are easy, check out this YouTube clip for more info if you haven’t been able to take the plunge so far). Here’s one of Stephen’s Colbert Report calls to the Nation, just to remind you of what Stephen asked of us:
| The Colbert Report | Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| DonorsChoose.org Donations | ||||
| ||||
Congratulations (and THANKS!) again, Nation, you’re all amazing.
Okay, I know it’s weird to comment on one’s own post, but I just wondered whether anyone else was watching Paul Rieckhoff’s Twitter feed. He’s posted a few tweets about The Report throughout the day, including a few photos from the Green Room and a shot at the current swag bag. Nice!
Shout Out (Hey!):
0
I am – I’m loving the backstage scoop! The backstage pic was so cool.
Shout Out (Hey!):
0
loved the pics, thanks for sharing the twitter link, Ms I
Shout Out (Hey!):
0
If you have a Yahoo! account, you can use the avatar feature to deck your virtual self out in Colbert garb. There is a collection of eight items hat was put up to round up more DonorsChoose donations. Under each item is a link to the Colbert DonorsChoose page so you can donate. Meanwhile, there is a hat, a shirt, an On Notice board, a couple backdrops, and other things to throw on your avatar. Needless to say the virtual me is highly branded now.
Shout Out (Hey!):
0
LOL! I noticed that not long ago. My avatar is standing in front of the desk! Yahoo! people = It-Getters
Shout Out (Hey!):
0
I’m sporting the T-shirt and On Notice board, and I’m standing in front of the fireplace. I look much more like me now. All Yahoo needs now is a WS bracelet =D
Shout Out (Hey!):
0
I check the Donorschoose site every once in a while to see how it’s going. I remember after Stephen talked about the Coast Guard being in dead last, the numbers jumped up dramatically! :)
Shout Out (Hey!):
0