Charity

Since 1853, the California Academy of Sciences has been dedicated to exploring, explaining, and protecting the natural world. Under one roof, the Academy houses the Steinhart Aquarium, Morrison Planetarium, and Kimball Natural History Museum.

Room to Read partners with local communities throughout the developing world to establish schools, libraries, and other educational infrastructure. We seek to intervene early in the lives of children in the belief that education is a lifelong gift that empowers people to ultimately improve socioeconomic conditions for their families, communities, countries, and future generations. Through the opportunities that only an education can provide, we strive to break the cycle of poverty, one child at a time.

The Human Rights Campaign is America’s largest civil rights organization working to achieve gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender equality. By inspiring and engaging all Americans, HRC strives to end discrimination against GLBT citizens and realize a nation that achieves fundamental fairness and equality for all.

WINGS, in conjunction with partner organizations, provides information, financial resources, and access to reproductive health services to low-income, rural and/or indigenous Guatemalans. WINGS enables Guatemalans to plan their families and access vital reproductive health services, thereby improving their reproductive health and their quality of life.

PBS, headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, is a non–profit media enterprise owned and operated by the nation’s 348 public television stations. A trusted community resource, PBS uses the power of noncommercial television, the Internet and other media to enrich the lives of all Americans through quality programs and education services that inform, inspire and delight. Available to 99 percent of American homes with televisions and to an increasing number of digital multimedia households, PBS serves nearly 90 million people each week.

The Surfrider Foundation is a grassroots, non-profit, environmental organization that works to protect our oceans, waves, and beaches. Founded in 1984, Surfrider Foundation’s most important coastal environmental work is carried out by Surfrider Foundation’s 60 chapters located along the East, West, Gulf, Puerto Rican, and Hawaiian coasts.

The Sierra Club’s members and supporters are more than 1.3 million of your friends and neighbors. Through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying and litigation, the Sierra Club works to protect the health of our environment and the preserve our remaining wild places. The Club is America’s oldest, largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization.

Kiva is the first person-to-person micro-lending Web site, creating a way for individuals to connect with and make personal loans to small businesses in developing countries. Launched in October 2005, Kiva’s goal is to reduce poverty in developing countries by giving entrepreneurs the ability to build their businesses through flexible loans.

Friends of the Urban Forest is a nonprofit committed to the belief that trees are a critical element of a livable urban environment. Since 1981, FUF has offered financial, technical, and practical assistance to individuals and neighborhood groups who want to plant and care for trees.

The mission of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is to transform San Francisco’s streets and neighborhoods into more livable and safe places by promoting the bicycle for everyday transportation.

In response to the public health crisis of breast cancer, the Breast Cancer Fund identifies – and advocates for elimination of – the environmental and other preventable causes of the disease. Founded in 1992, the Breast Cancer Fund works from the knowledge that breast cancer is not simply a personal tragedy, but a public health priority that demands action from all.

PlayPumps International is a nonprofit organization that enables individuals, governments, foundations, and companies to donate PlayPump® water systems to rural African communities and schools. Donors to PlayPumps International help improve the lives of children and their families by providing easy access to clean drinking water, enhancing public health, and offering play equipment to millions across Africa.

The San Francisco Food Bank collects donated food from growers, manufacturers and grocers, then distributes it to people in need through food pantries, soup kitchens, child care centers, homeless shelters, senior centers and other human service agencies with meal programs. All in all, the San Francisco Food Bank will distribute 28 million pounds of food this year to hungry people in San Francisco.

One Laptop per Child is a non-profit organization created by Nicholas Negroponte and others from the MIT Media Lab to design, manufacture and distribute laptop computers that are sufficiently inexpensive to provide every child in the world access to knowledge and modern forms of education. These XO laptops are rugged, open source, and so energy efficient that they can be powered by a child manually. Mesh networking gives many machines Internet access from one connection. The pricing goal is $100.

Thirty years ago, La Casa de las Madres opened San Francisco’s first domestic violence shelter for women and their children. The once-quiet shelter has grown into the city’s leading voice for abused women, their children and teens—educating, promoting awareness and changing the community’s and the media’s perceptions about domestic violence and its victims.

Human Rights Watch is the largest human rights organization based in the United States. Human Rights Watch researchers conduct fact-finding investigations into human rights abuses in all regions of the world. Human Rights Watch then publishes those findings in dozens of books and reports every year, generating extensive coverage in local and international media.

Tides Foundation partners with donors to increase and organize resources for positive social change. For over 30 years, Tides Foundation has been leading the way in progressive philanthropy – not just by grantmaking to innovative nonprofits, but by offering a unique host of services to donors committed to fairness, equality, and the sustainability of this world.

Founded in 1990, American Land Conservancy is a national non-profit land conservation organization that conserves landscapes for the benefit of people and wildlife. ALC works in partnership with communities, landowners, non-profit organizations, corporations and public resource agencies to create innovative and effective conservation solutions.