We Planeteers take our love for the Earth, our enthusiasm for education, and our commitment to human well-being on this planet very seriously. As a public benefit corporation, our stated goal is “to accelerate humanity towards a more sustainable, safer and more prosperous world, by illuminating environmental and social change”. For our internal Earth Day fundraising event, we wanted to make sure we live our values when considering partners.
For the event, I worked with other Planeteers to create custom LEGO designs, celebrating our satellites, which would be sold internally to our employees. And more importantly, we also had to choose the ideal organization to be the beneficiary of the profits. When Planet’s employee experience manager, Julie Kuschke, suggested that since this fundraising initiative was my idea, maybe I should find our ideal beneficiary, I began the exciting search in earnest.
My first thought was that since this was an Earth Day fundraiser, the charity should be one that benefits, well…the Earth! My second thought was that I wanted to make sure that the organization receiving the money was a reputable organization – an organization known to be good stewards of the funds it received. Through web resources like Charity Navigator and GuideStar, I found many good Earth-focused nonprofits, and they all seemed like great fits.
But then I saw it…Captain Planet. Pointing a right finger at me. The Captain Planet Foundation (CFP).
The word “Planet” in the title? It caught my attention. So I visited their site and learned what they were doing. “Empowering young people to solve the planet’s problems.” I am the father of a nine-year-old child and a ten-year-old child, and it is one of the greatest passions of my life. Well, that was another feather in CPF’s hat.
The foundation also earned the highest possible rating from Charity Navigators and GuideStar. An obvious good sign. Then I noticed they were based in Atlanta. It really wouldn’t matter or they had their headquarters, but since I’ve called Atlanta my home for 25 years, something about it just felt so well aligned.
Finally, the original cartoon was called ‘Captain Planet and the Planeteers’ and the charity calls its young targets ‘planeteers’. He brought a huge smile to my face. Planet employees refer to themselves as “Planeteers”. It was just the icing on the cake.
It all seemed too perfect, so I announced to the other Planet members that the Captain Planet Foundation was the charity I thought should be our Earth Day fundraiser beneficiary. By a happy coincidence, I discovered that there were others at Planet who were looking to partner with Captain Planet!
We made the final decision to go with CFP. We know that both of our organizations are fully committed to providing the tools and resources needed to build a sustainable future. The Captain Planet Foundation empowers local schools, garden communities and youth to generate sustainable food systems and protect threatened ecosystems. Planet works with NGOs, research universities and governments to provide vital datasets to responsibly manage our Earth – from agricultural systems to rainforests. Together we are on a mission to defend our planet Earth.
I am truly grateful to have discovered the Captain Planet Foundation, and hope that we can work towards a bright future working with them.
And who knows?
There may be a few future planetists in the youth of the Captain Planet Foundation right now…
