A woman or girl will reinvest 90% of her income into her family. A man will reinvest 30-40%.

With Thanksgiving just a hop and a skip away, it’s the perfect time to put down your Mont Blanc, your Magic Mouse, or your Wii controller and take a moment to think: what can I give back? Whether a college freshman on a budget, a fledgling creative crawling up the ranks, or a comfortably established exec, there’s always something you can do to make our struggling planet just a wee bit better. However, the plethora of charities vying for our attention can sometimes paralyze our ability to give. Who needs my contribution most? How do I know my efforts are going to the right place? What does this organization mean to me on a personal level?

Which leads me to The Girl Effect. Funded in part by the Nike Foundation, Population Council, UN Foundation, NoVo Foundation, BRAC, and several other partnerships, The Girl Effect focuses on giving third world girls a chance at a better future. The NPO’s main focus is getting girls in school and providing young women with the funding and skills to live self-sustainably – whether by starting a business in their village or gaining employment elsewhere.

A woman or girl will reinvest 90% of her income into her family. A man will reinvest 30-40%.

So, where do you start? If you want to make an individual donation, just head over to The Girl Effect’s donation page on GlobalGiving.com. It takes as little as $60 for a young woman to turn her life around. You can give a general donation or choose from the list of programs that The Girl Effect works with. If you’re in a position to do more, download the Invest Today PDF to read more about larger-scale contributions. Curious to know more? Download the Your Move PDF for an in-depth look at the NPO, its partners, and things we can all do: from grassroots to global! Go guerilla and spread the word in your community: download the stickers, become a fan on Facebook, or embed the banner on your site by just cutting and pasting the script below:

<object width=”300″ height=”250″><param name=”movie” value=”http://www.girleffect.org/banners/tge_300×250.swf”></param><param name=”wmode” value=”transparent”></param><embed src=”http://www.girleffect.org/banners/tge_300×250.swf” type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” wmode=”transparent” width=”300″ height=”250″></embed></object>

For more about the benefits of investing in girls from developing countries, read Girls Count: A Global Investment & Action Agenda at the Center for Global Development website

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