| How GIG came about ... the story of Toan, GIG's Founder... |
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![Toan's Family]() |
My name is Toan Lam and I'm the "Chief Inspirator" of Go Inspire Go (GIG). I believe that if you tell a story authentically and leverage social media, the community will be inspired to take action.
When I was a kid (yes that is me with the #12 tee making the goofy face), we moved from one bad neighborhood to another in Sacramento. Stories and books were my passport out of my reality of gangs, drugs and violence. Many years later, I became a television news reporter to give back to my community by telling stories of hope. I quickly became disillusioned when I realized that the "news" my bosses wanted focused mostly on tragedy and despair.
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| After nearly 8 years in the TV industry, I took a leap of faith and left my career to create GIG. Four years later, 60+ volunteers are pitching in, 300,000+ people around the world have watched our content and thousands have used their power (network, resources and money) to help those we has featured through GIG. |
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| Now we need YOU! |
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We’re just getting started. There are countless unsung heroes across the country, and we want to tell their stories - 50 of the most extraordinary individuals across our 50 states. As we’ve done with past GIG stories, our hope is that this will inspire others to dig deeper within and think about what we can do to make a difference.
So you can help by...
- Donating as much or as little as you can for this campaign, every donation will take us a long way
- Sharing this campaign and our content with your friends, family, colleagues
- Telling us about ordinary people doing extraordinary good in your community
- Smiling...because your smile is an inspiration! :)
- Donate - did we say that already?
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| How we’ll put your donation to spark inspiration |
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100% of donations will go towards production costs of stories to raise the visibility of local heroes and amplify their message.
The GIG team will crowdsource ideas and travel and produce as many videos as possible. In addition, we will enlist GIG Ambassadors nationwide to produce videos and photo essays as well. Our goal is to raise at least $25,000 with the stretch goal of raising $50,000. The plans are for:
- 10 original GIG videos and blogs
- 10 ambassadors videos and blogs (stipends)
- 30 ambassadors photo essays and blogs (stipends)
If we don’t make our stretch goal, we will produce as many stories as the raised funds will allow us to.
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| What will happen to this content as it's produced? |
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All produced content will be posted on the GIG website for the world to see and share. In addition, we will take our GIG content to TV networks and multimedia outlets and make sure that the magic of these heroes is shared even more widely. So many people tell us that TV content brings them down. We CAN change that TOGETHER!
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| Heroes who inspire us everyday |
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Meet some of the amazing people we’ve met and the impact we’ve sparked along the way:
NEW JERSEY: Go Inspire Go Helps Reverend Send 32 Kids to School in Haiti
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Reverend Lemaire Alerte in New Jersey wanted to build a high school and educate 170+ students in his hometown of Grande Saline, Haiti. By shining a light on his story, we sent 32 kids to school for a year at his newly built school, Mahanaim High School in Haiti.
VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ2Lo5RObso
CALIFORNIA: 6-year-old Boy with Brain Cancer Brings Halloween to Sick Kids
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Nico Castro, a 6-year-old brain cancer patient, felt bad that kids in his cancer ward didn’t get to celebrate his favorite holiday Halloween with costumes. So he created his own costume drive. After GIG caught wind of this, we helped him collect 200+ costumes for his sick friends in the hospital.
VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVGvCps7w-k
NEW YORK: “Angel in Queens”
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New York school bus driver Jorge Munoz spends more than half of his $700 per week salary on food to feed more than 150 hungry people at a subway stop every night. Until his stove broke. After GIG highlighted Jorge’s story, it went viral with the global community responding with donations and offers to replace his broken stove from bloggers to Good Morning America. Thanks to the new stove, he and his family now spends half the time cooking meals.
VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2Vep1WPoPI
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| Finally, a little admin info ... |
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We hope you are inspired and will donate to this campaign and also share it with your family, friends and colleagues. We are ever so grateful!
Note that Go Inspire Go is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) and contributions made qualify for tax deductions according to the US Federal tax laws. Generally, contributions are tax-deductible minus the fair market value of any perks you receive. To deduct the full value of your contribution, you may choose not to receive the perk. For questions about tax deductibility, you should contact your tax advisor. Go Inspire Go will provide the value of any donations/goods/services received in an acknowledgement e-mail to you at the end of the campaign.
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