Where are the twenty-something or GEN-Y Bloggers Who Are Writing About Social Change and Nonprofits?

Even though I'm more like twenty-something times 2.5, I attended the "Twenty-Something Meet Up" at the BlogHer Conference.    Why did I go?   I keep hearing from nonprofits that one of the reasons they want to incorporate a social networking or media strategy is to reach a younger audience.  So, having this opportunity listen was very valuable.

Zandria did a fabulous job of facilitating the session.  There were probably about 40 or 50 women in the room - not all were twenty somethings.

I wanted to listen to what was on their minds in general, although I was particularly keen on hearing any discussions or snippets about social change, nonprofits, and activism.  Julia Smith, who blogs at the idealist and was in the room asked "Where are the twenty something/millennial bloggers writing about social change, activism, and nonprofits?"

I thought to myself, now that's a list I'd like to see.

There are lots of twenty-something bloggers and gen-y bloggers.   If you work in nonprofits and track relevant research, you no doubt have come across the Social Citizen Blog from the Case Foundation and the paper, Social Citizen, from Allison Fine.  Both are essential reading.  And, on the sidebar, there are some links to young people's blogs. but I couldn't  find an extensive list of twenty-something bloggers who focus on nonprofits, social change, and social action. 

So, I decided to reach out and see if I could start to compile a list.  What follows below is no doubt incomplete and I sure I've gotten ages wrong too --  so please make additions and corrections in the comments. Here's a few good blogs written by GenYs that cover nonprofit technology, philanthropy, social change, and more.   

Blogs by Gen Y

Nonprofit Technology

Amy Sample Ward.  I discovered Amy's NpTech blog about a year ago, maybe longer.   She covers nonprofit technology, social actions, and social change.  She is a real community person and is often promoting other people's projects. 

Johanna Bates, a gen y and nonprofit techie, who works with a health care advocacy nonprofit, has recently take up blogging.  Her writing is reflective and brilliant.   She offers a perspective of what is like to be a GenY working for a nonprofit.  Thoroughly enjoyed her post about 140 character filters.

Pulse and Signal covers the intersection between healthcare and social media and is written by Andre Blackman who is totally awesome.  He is a terrific blogger, knows his beat, and very generous too.  When I put on my Facebook status that I was looking for blogs, he wrote on my wall recommending many of the blogs that follow.

Girls With Macs is written by Michaela Hackner one of the smartest nonprofit technologists and marketers around.  If I was working for a nonprofit that was doing a job search for a technologically savvy marketing person, I wouldn't even both posting a job description - I just hire her.

ConnectionCafe: Connection Cafe has a quite a few Gen Y bloggers - Taylor Shanklin, Misty McLaughlin, Brandy Reppy, Lacey Kruger and Jordan Viator

Tim Davis is working as a freelance consultant on youth participation.  His blog covers social technology, social action, philanthropy - with a UK perspective.

EngageJoe.com blogs about his experiences spearheading and contributing to social change mashups and working with nonprofits on online strategy.

Philanthropy

GenYGive is written by Miriam Kagan and talks about motivations and trends related to philanthropy and Gen Y.   I discovered Miriam a month ago and have been fan.  One of her recent posts, "Research Points Out That Gen Y's Give" is very informative.

New Voices of Philanthropy is written by Trista Harris and it covers issues of generational change in the philanthropic sector and more broadly trends in philanthropy.

Do Good Well is written by Nathaniel Whittemore who is the founding director of the Center for Global Engagement at Northwestern University.  The blog is about citizen-led social change efforts.

$5 Philanthropist by Tom Williams is the CEO of GiveMeaning and writes about philanthropy and social networks.

MyKro is a blog about micro finance, one of the bloggers is Drew Meyers.

Epic Change Blog is written by Stacey Monk.  Epic change raises money to provide micro-loans in developing countries.

Nonprofits - Management Issues

From the Pipeline Rosetta Thurman is an emerging nonprofit leader of color sharing career advice, nonprofit management and other wisdom on her blog.  I've been following her work for about two years now and excited to learn that we're going to speaking at the same conference come November - so we'll meet in person too!  She is one of several bloggers part of the Brazen Careerist Nonprofit Network.

Subject To Change is written by a recent Yale alum, Vanessa Mason, who is just starting out a career in public health.  Read her post "Gen Y and Global Health - Not A Match Made in Heaven".  I discovered her on Twitter recently because she is connected to Andre Blackman.

Non-Profit Chas shares his experiences as he helps take a small non-profit organization to the next level.

Entry Level Living is written by Miss Jones who blogs about what she is learning as a recent college graduate with her first full time job in the nonprofit sector and as a young woman of color living in a new city trying to find herself.  Very refreshing. 

Social Citizen is written by Tera Wozniak from the League of Women voters and covers nonprofits, civil society, and more.

Nonprofit Leadership Blog 101 written by Heather is one of the best that talks about leadership and nonprofits.

Nonprofit Leadership, Innovation and Change: Christopher Scott is a nonprofit leader who founded A Day of Hope, a student based organization that delivers baskets of food and turkeys to families for Thanksgiving.

Nonprofit Programs and Social Actions

Nina Simon a proud member of Gen Y, writes the very awesome Museum 2.0 blog, but you don't have to be a museum person to get a lot of value from it.

Ivan Boothe one of my all-time favorite GenY social media for social change people. 

The Stupid Cancer Blog  is written by Matthew Zachary who founded the social enterprise I'm Too Young for This."  I had the pleasure of interviewing him about his he formed his organization.

Enviroblog blogs about latest science and news on toxins in your food, water, and air, and what government agencies should be doing to protect public health.  Amanda Hanley is the editor. 

Orrdinary Life - First hand account of doing global international development work in a remote area in Southeast Asia.

Holy Meatballs is Global Kids project blog - I've pointed to the posts by teens. Global Kids uses interactive and experiential methods to educate youth about critical international and public policy issues and provides them with opportunities for civic and global engagement.

SpeakUnited and  Inspire4life come from the United Way of Merrimack Valley focused on social issues affecting the region and written by Gen Y.

Mobilizing Youth: Ben Rigby of MobileVoter incidentally also wrote the book Mobilizing Generation 2.0: A Practical Guide to Using Technology to Recruit, Organize and Engage Youth, a book with lots of answers for those of you who are just looking to break into this.

Change.Org is covering news about social change on its site.   I didn't cull through all the content to pick out the Gen Y perspective, but I did notice that Vanessa was blogging over there.  A blog network will be launched in about another month.

Marketing

Media Awaken
Maria R. Thurrell is the blogger.  She's awesome.

Michael Silberman from EchoDitto

Alex Rampy writes a blog called Social Butterfly that covers social marketing.

Qui Diaz has a blog called Evange.LIST that covers social media for social causes.  She also blogs at The Buzz Bin (her day job)

Association Marketing is written by Linda Dreyer who is very active with ASAE and recently cofounded a networking group for young association professionals.  Also, Maddie Grant who started blogging about a year ago to write about associations and web 2.0. - Even though as Maddie notes in the comments that they are more Gen X, we'll give them an honorary place on the list.

My research also found some excellent how-to blog posts about reaching out to Gen-Ys as potential donors and more general articles.

Some Relevant Blog Posts about Gen Y and Philanthropy (via Step by Step Fundraising)

• Giving is for all ages from Inside Philanthropy
• Youth Philanthropy: Growing the Next Generation of Givers from New Voices of Philanthropy
• Understanding the “Millenials” from The Agitator
• Young vs Older Donors: Who is More Generous? by Joanne Fritz, About.com
• An Interview With Matthew Zachary, Founder I’m Too Young for This by Beth Kanter
• Don’t Wait to Engage Millennial Donors by Derwin Dubose
• Make Way for Millennials by Kim Carpenter Drake
• Giving Generation from Bicentennial Baby

Some Relevant Blog Posts about Gen Y and Impact on Workplace

• How will digital natives impact the workplace? by Connie Bensen
• Everyone's Talking About Gen Y by Sam Davidson
• When I was your age, I had to walk ten miles in the snow to use the Internet by Beth Kanter
• I only use email to communicate with old people, by Jeremiah Owyang

Initiatives for Youth and Philanthropy (via Forum of Regional Grantmakers)

• Coalition of Community Foundations for Youth (CCFY)  a network of community foundations in the United States dedicated to improved conditions for children, youth and families.
• Do Something  a nationwide network of young people who take action to change the world around them.
• The Giraffe Project  the purpose is "move people to stick their necks out for the common good."
• Learning to Give goal is to educate children about the independent sector and philanthropy.
• Resource Generation Offers programs for young people with wealth to explore how their financial resources relate to social justice and provide tools for them to take action.
• SV Kids To engage the next generation in giving the SVP way
• Youth on Board prepares youth to be leaders in their communities.

Other Blogs written about or cover Gen Y in general

Danah Boyd
Ypulse



What Gen Y/Twenty-Something bloggers who write about nonprofits, social change, philanthropy, or social action did I miss?  What other relevant blog posts or web sites would you add to the resource list?

Update:  Thanks for the additions.  Keep 'em coming.  I'm adding to the list.

Comments

[Michael Connery]

I'll throw my own blog into the mix here and say that in the realm of electoral politics (on the Democratic side), Future Majority is pretty much the only game in town.

Also, we're a group blog written of by and for Millennials and we just opened the site up to user diaries like on Daily Kos or other community sites.

[Peter Gulka]

While not just a blog, the Blackbaud User Society provides a community to clients of Blackbaud who'd like an alternative to the services provided by Blackbaud.

As the community manager I am on the tail end of Gen Y (1978) and work with a great group of people, many of whom are also GenY. We work together within the community to spread awareness of waht peopel can do with their Blackbaud software in order to get the most out of it.

As someone who has just turned 30 I think my youth brings with it an impatience with the establishment of Blackbaud - at least how it was run when I started the Scoiety. I knew that there was a great opportunity for people to do more with their tools and they just needed a better way to communicate with each other. By helping each other we are hleping our orgs run more effiecently, and effectively and that helps change the world.

Pete

[Katherine Orr]

Thank you so much for including my blog on your list! I feel so honored to be part of the group and it's good motivation to keep up the blogging!

[Stacey Monk]

Thanks for including Epic Change on your list! I wish I were 20-something ;)

- Stacey

[Jon Ray]

Enjoyed going through this list, as there were quite a few bloggers that I had never read before. I am 24 and currently writing at http://www.whoisjonray.com on Marketing, PR, Social Media and Creating Compelling Video Content...

...but I'm working closely with designer, Ashley Heathcock of My Charms for Charity (http://www.mycharmsforcharity.com) and we are putting together a blog that highlights the charities she's working with, the progress of her project, how her school loans are slowly being paid off and why it was important to her to have a business model that gave back to the community that has helped her so much. It is certainly an interesting read and I wear a different charm every day, because they are stylish and I know they represent young people giving back.

Anyhow, enjoyed the post! ;)

[Channing Rodman]

Beth, this is such a great list! Thanks a lot for compiling it. One of the best things about it is the response it's generated - looking at how many people my age are working on non-profit/internet intersections is really inspiring.

My brother (Gen X) and I (Gen Y) run a Canada-based blog that looks at social change, non-profits and the internet. We range from non-profit online infrastructure how-to's to looking at online social activism (like Jane McGonigal's work on ARG gaming for change!) You can check us out at www.netfornonprofits.org.

Looks like you really brought together a community here!

[Corinne]

Thanks so much for mentioning Kim Carpenter Drake's post on Gen Y! She is a consultant for the Center for Nonprofit Management. Since I am a twenty something, and I mantain the blog, I try to post info on working with people from different generations. This list is really great!