We’ve been working on a lot of changes and additions to the main GiveWell website and at this point have gone live with all of the following: New research and recommendations on U.S. education and early childhood care. We did some work on these causes in our first year, but we’ve now gone back with…
The GiveWell Blog
Year: 2010
After “extraordinary and unorthodox” comes the valley of death
An anonymous donor got some buzz a few weeks ago with its call on Innocentive for “extraordinary and unorthodox” philanthropic opportunities. It seeks a project that “holds the potential for a transformational impact,” “is unlikely to attract funding elsewhere due to its risky, unorthodox, and/or neglected profile,” and will be able to “attract additional capital…
Health system strengthening + sustainability + accountability
We’ve written a lot about our top-rated charity, VillageReach (in particular, see our official review and our 2009 blog post). Consistent with our focus on individual/casual donors, we generally emphasize effectiveness over ambition, and so we have mostly focused on VillageReach’s fit with our criteria: its strong case for effectveness, cost-effectiveness, and room for more…
Microfinance: The multi-billion-dollar aid sector that we’re just starting to learn about
GiveWell attended the Microfinance Innovation & Impact Conference via Board member Tim Ogden and part-time employee Stephanie Wykstra. (Our full-time staff could not attend as we are all in India). Our main takeaways: The people involved with this conference, and the nonprofits working with them, are producing a lot of promising, interesting, rigorous and informative…
The process of giving: A personal story (guest post from Ian Turner)
This is a guest post from Ian Turner about how he decided what charity to support for his most recent donation. Ian and GiveWell staff had several in-depth conversations as he worked through his decision, so we invited him to share his thought process here. Note that GiveWell has made minor editing suggestions for this…
Engineers Without Borders earns “Notable” distinction
Engineers Without Borders is a group we’ve never encountered before, focused on “enabling rural Africans the opportunity to access clean water, generate an income from humble farms, and access critical infrastructure and services.” (Here’s a list of its projects in Africa.) This group deserves recognition for doing the simplest thing guaranteed to improve GiveWell’s view…