May 18th, 2009
Dear Supporter of Humanism and Freethought,
Hi! My name is Lyz Liddell, and I'm the new campus organizer at the Secular Student Alliance. I'm one of the primary contacts for students and our affiliate groups, providing them with the guidance and resources they need to create and run secular student groups across the country. Every day I'm able to support students who are asking for help, but today I'm writing to ask for yours.
This spring, I've been meeting with Secular Student Alliance affiliates all over the U.S. I've been amazed and delighted by the creativity, enthusiasm, and dedication of the students and leaders I've met. They organize ambitious projects, come up with new ideas, and have the youthful energy to pull it all off.
But there was one thing I kept hearing, over and over again, during my travels. Groups from California and Texas to Michigan and Washington, D.C., told me that they could only do what they do with the support of the Secular Student Alliance. And we can't provide that support without the financial help of humanists like you.
The Secular Student Alliance is an independent organization whose mission is to organize, unite, educate, and serve students and student communities that promote the ideals of scientific and critical inquiry, democracy, secularism, and human-based ethics – and we rely completely on the generosity of the freethought community for funding.
Your donation helps our student groups accomplish great things. The Campus Atheists, Skeptics and Humanists at the University of Minnesota brought Richard Dawkins to speak to a nearly sold-out auditorium of well over 3,000 people in March. It was the largest student-run event at the University of Minnesota this year! The Atheists, Agnostics and Freethinkers at the University of Illinois ran their second week-long spring break service trip. This year they cooperated with Students for Freethought at the Ohio State University to help lead-removal efforts in low-income housing in New Orleans. The Pastafarians at the University of South Carolina hosted a debate between Dan Barker (Freedom from Religion Foundation) and Kyle Butt (Apologetics Press), an event that was so successful they had to turn people away due to fire codes! Our affiliates hosted dozens of Darwin Day events in honor of Charles Darwin's 200th birthday this spring.
One of my own priorities in working with our groups is helping students stay involved in the freethought movement after they graduate. As the Secular Student Alliance grows, more and more students remain active in the freethought movement by joining off-campus groups when they leave school. This means that by supporting the Secular Student Alliance, you are investing in the future of your local and national humanist organizations as well. We love hearing that these young people are injecting new excitement and ideas into non-student groups because it means we're doing the job our members, donors, and partner organizations count on us to do: starting young freethinkers down a road of lifelong participation in working towards the goals we all share.
The SSA has been growing explosively. We're adding new affiliates every week! As I write this letter, we've reached 150 affiliate groups – up from 129 just at the end of 2008 and 81 at the end of 2007. These groups are all active affiliates; I check in with our groups every semester and adjust our numbers to include only active, functioning student groups.
Along with this growth in affiliates has come an increased demand for our services. In the 2007-2008 school year, we arranged 21 speaking engagements through our speakers bureau. For 2008-2009, we've already set up 55 speaking events! We've helped fund more outstanding student projects this semester than during any semester in the past. And since the beginning of this school year, we've sent out 119 group starting packets, which included our newly revised Group Running Guide, to students and faculty working to start groups at their schools.
While invaluable to our students, these services are provided at no charge to our affiliates. All costs are assumed by the SSA. We're rapidly reaching the point of needing another full-time organizer if we are to maintain the level of support we currently provide to our affiliate groups. Now, we hope that we can count on you to take the SSA's mission to the next level. We are eager not just to serve groups, but also to build a cohesive, nationwide movement of college students who care about the future of secularism in the U.S.
I could go on about all the ways our affiliates enrich the lives of students and their communities, but the point is that far
more of these events happen because the SSA has been able to contribute grant money, technical support, speaker referrals, and more to the sponsoring student groups.
You might be thinking that an economic slump is no time to make a gift to a non-profit, even one whose aims you endorse. But it's in times like these that your gift is more important than ever to students! You can trust that your support of the Secular Student Alliance won't go to waste. We run a lean, efficient organization with streamlined operations – as we always have. Your donation goes right to work building humanism's future on campuses across the country.
I'm counting on your support as we work to mobilize the next generation of freethinkers!
Sincerely,
Lyz Liddell
lyz@secularstudents.org
P.S. Don't miss out on the matching offer from the Vital Spark Foundation. They will match any donation to the SSA until August 1st, 2009 up to a total of $20,000.
P.P.S. Non-students are welcome at our 2009 Annual Conference. It's in Columbus, OH August 7-9. Go to www.secularstudents.org/conference to register.
