Hi there,
Welcome to the monthly EA Chicago newsletter 👋
The most wonderful time of the year is upon us: Giving Season! As the holiday season begins to ramp up, it's natural for our minds to turn towards giving back, especially when many of us are celebrating what we’re grateful for or spending time with loved ones.
As the charity appeals start to roll in, it’s worth being mindful of which charities can do the most good with your donations because: Donating to the best charities can mean doing 100x more good for each dollar donated.
Consider checking out some of EA’s high impact donation options and meta-charities (such as GiveWell, GivingWhatWeCan, and the GivingMultiplier) when deciding where you would like to give this year!
And, as always, be sure to stay in touch during the month via our Eventbrite page and Slack workspace.
EACHI December Event Schedule
December Learning Event: Lauren Imholte from GiveWell will share some recent updates on GiveWell and their evolution funding water programs on Thursday, December 7th from 6-8pm (event details can be found HERE)
December Social Event: EACHI goes to Christkindlmarket on Saturday, December 16th from 1-3pm (event details can be found HERE)
News & Updates
Community
· GWWC has recently posted about their funding shortfall and the case for why donors might want to consider supporting donations to our operations.
· GWWC has just opened this year’s Donor lottery - this could be an exciting opportunity for donors who are willing to research effective funding opportunities to maximize the amount of funding they can allocate. Read more about this unique opportunity.
· Jeff Kaufman, who worked a high paying job so he could donate more to charity for many years has done an Ask Me Anything about his experiences.
· There is a donation election being held on the EA Forum which will allow account holders to vote to distribute a pot of money between 3 high impact projects. Voting opens December 1.
· A series of posts on how different high impact projects would use additional funding
· There is a brand new Dutch podcast series about Peter Singer's book The Life You Can Save called 'Levens redden'. In the podcast, Youth physician Rosanne van der Lugt and Bram Schaper (CEO of Doneer Effectief) discuss key outtakes of the book.
Evaluators, grantmakers and incubators
· GiveWell has released their 2023 recommendations to donors
· The EA Animal Welfare Fund (Once Again) Has Significant Room For More Funding
· On Giving Tuesday (November 28), Rethink Priorities will hold a virtual workshop on how you can use their new prioritization tool to help you navigate uncertainty as you weigh different cause areas. The Worldview Investigations Team created this tool as a part of its project on Causes and uncertainty: Rethinking value in expectation, which explored some of the common assumptions that inform donors’ choices. Please RSVP here to receive the Zoom link to the webinar, or click here to learn more. The event will kick off at 9 am PT/12 pm ET/5 pm BT/6 pm CET and last for an hour, including a Q&A. To learn more about Rethink Priorities’ work this year, as well as their plans and funding needs for next year, please see the organization's annual report.
· After several months of evaluating animal advocacy organizations, Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE) has announced their 2023 Recommended Charities! To learn more about this year’s charity recommendations and processes, check out this thread from their recent live Reddit Ask Me Anything event. GWWC's research team also recently evaluated ACE's work in its evaluations of evaluators.
Cause areas
Animal welfare
· The Humane League (THL) have once again been recommended by Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE) as one of the most effective animal protection organizations in the world.
· The Open Wing Alliance published their report on Sustainability and the Better Chicken Commitment (BCC). It challenges previous claims that the BCC is not sustainable and reveals that there are also environmental benefits of moving towards higher welfare breeds of chicken.
· THL UK's end of year fundraising appeal runs from 22nd-28th November. They also recently ran an AMA on the EA Forum, answering questions about the appeal, their work and their current funding gap.
Global health and development
· Malaria Consortium showcased results and insights from their latest research on SMC across more than twenty presentations and a symposium at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene’s Annual Meeting in Chicago last month. Whilst there, they also kicked off celebrations for their 20 year anniversary, demonstrating 20 years of saving lives and transforming communities.
Long-term future
· There was an AI Safety Summit hosted by the UK Government early in November.
· The need for innovation in clinical trial design to speed up vaccine development in From Warp Speed to 100 Days by Witold Więcek in Asterisk Magazine.
In Case You Missed It
Giving What We Can has a new pledge option!
There is a new option to make wealth a part of your pledge with Giving What We Can. To read more about why they’ve opened up this option and how it works - read their blog post.
(Please contact EACHI’s organizer, Samantha Kassirer, if you have something you’d like featured here next month!)
We look forward to seeing you in person or online!