757 Uplifters is working with the city of Virginia Beach and has adopted Birchwood Malibu Park! It will be under our care for two years, minimum. In the two years, we are to conduct at least six park cleanings per year (so 12 cleanings, total). 757 Uplifters will host events that are combination events that aim to connect park cleaning with the Charity Miles app. Briefly, Charity Miles is an app that allows users to raise money for charities through miles walked, ran, or biked! A list of some of the charities can be seen at:
https://charitymiles.tumblr.com/thecharities
For more information, please visit:
Charity Miles is both on the app store (for iPhone) and Google Play store (for Android phones). I would like event participants to utilize the app while cleaning the park, since all walking (before, during, and after) will count towards raising money to charities! So, the event (which will be scheduled periodically) touches on health and wellness/fitness, charity/fundraising, and environmentalism! I love that! You download the app for your phone, set up a simple account, then start sessions in the app (indoor walk, outdoor walk, etc.) and it tracks your steps and miles like other fitness apps! The thing is this though…there are rules and stuff for joining the events, so if you are a member of the 757 (or are in the state of Virginia), you can join the event after reading and agreeing to the rules! To get an accurate count of people participating (for volunteer hours documentation, etc.), you need to join the 757 Uplifters group, at:
https://www.meetup.com/757uplifters/events/307513659/
Fresh Air, Smiling Faces, Walking For Health & Wellness, All Good Stuff!
I’ve been looking for new ways to make an impact and the aim is to not only raise money for potentially dozens of charities through Charity Miles during the park cleanups, but to also potentially create something habit forming that people might enjoy outside of the scheduled events! For example, we’ve made well over 1,000 cards for hospitalized kids, and when members of the community found out that they could help the children outside of the 757 Uplifters events, teachers began making cards with their students…I know people who made cards with members of their churches, so on and so forth. Kindness and care CAN spread!
Cleaning the park is a wonderful thing to do on several levels, especially when using a charity/fundraising app alongside cleaning efforts. We can build positive social and community relationships, encourage and promote care for the environment, move our bodies and get in just a bit of nature, and we can also network! There are animals out there who also will appreciate a little less trash that could be harmful to them!