There’s a lot to love about the holiday season, but not much gets us more amped than Giving Tuesday, a global initiative launched in 2012 to promote generosity + encourage folks to do good. Arguably the biggest giving day of the year across the globe, it takes place the Tuesday after Thanksgiving and is an opportunity for people to make donations to their favorite charities, non-profits, and philanthropic organizations.

Last month, we invited you, our dear readers, to help bring awareness to the local orgs that help keep our communities connected + running, and we told y’all we’d choose one lucky organization at random to receive a $1,000 donation from 6AM City and a special shout-out in the newsletter.

We received so many thoughtful nominations, and today we’re delighted to highlight the winning organization, the Underwood Foundation. To ensure everyone knows who they are, what they do, and why their work is so important to the folks in Raleigh, we’re sharing a brief Q + A sesh with them. Read on and enjoy some good old-fashioned educational warm fuzzies (’tis the season, after all).

What is the purpose of your organization?

The Underwood Foundation supports the Underwood GT Magnet Elementary School near downtown Raleigh. The mission of the Underwood Foundation is to maintain the excellence of our school program by supporting initiatives which recruit and retain quality teachers, enable and bolster rich instructional programming, and sustain the educational environment of our magnet elementary school. The Foundation helps cover the funding gap between what the state and county provides our school and what the school needs in order to provide our students the educational, emotional and behavioral resources they need in order to fulfill their full potential.

How do you go about making that happen?

We depend on the generosity and support of our community to support our school. In particular, we hold fundraising events throughout the year, such as our Giving Tuesday campaign (which is already underway for this year) and our annual virtual spring gala. Our commitment to include the local community allows businesses to sponsor the event which allows any other donations (from parents, alumni, and local community members/businesses) to directly fund the Foundation.

How has the pandemic affected your work?

Our primary source of support comes from our local community — including small businesses, which we know have been very much impacted by the pandemic. In addition, the pandemic has impacted the finances of our parents. However, our teachers and staff are still hard at work and our school has needed even more resources during these times, which are not fully funded by the state (e.g., COVID-care assistants, custodial support, and social-emotional assistance). Our goal this year is to raise $80,000 for the school's needs and we know it's going to be a difficult lift, given that we are all impacted as a community. Our school children are coming back to school with great areas of academic and social needs due to the pandemic. Our purpose is more vital now than ever.

What have you done this year that you’re most proud of?

This year we brought together an engaged and passionate board. Our board is the engine behind everything the Foundation does, so having committed members with the drive and passion to fulfill our mission to support our teachers, our students, and our community is imperative. Their energy, creativity and motivation is what makes the hard work we do enjoyable and has allowed us to spread our mission to more people within the community. We are also proud of continuing to be a united school community, with a strong partnership with the PTA and school leadership that supports all students.

Can you briefly share a story of how your work has helped the community you serve?

The foundation’s role in supporting the school is unique. The work is interwoven by the support the staff (which are directly funded by the foundation) provide to individual students. An example of this work includes (but is not limited to), providing small group reading intervention instruction to more than 20 students per year. This targeted instruction directly aligns with the School Improvement Plan and supports NC’s Read to Achieve initiative.

What is the greatest challenge to your organization and its work?

Educating our community about what we do. We are different from a PTA in that our funding supports people resources, rather than physical resources. It's sometimes hard to contextualize how our funding impacts the school and community because we aren't purchasing physical items. Rather, our funds go to ensure that a staff position isn't eliminated, or that we have the right teacher-to-student ratio, or that we have additional staff resources to help children emotionally transition back to a classroom environment. That's sometimes hard to message, which can create an additional challenge when we are appealing for funding.

What is one thing you wish people knew or understood about the work you do? Maintaining a strong public education system is critical to a growing and vibrant community — it positively impacts our economy and our quality of life. And a cornerstone of strong public education is the ability to have passionate and quality teachers and staff. The Underwood GT Magnet Elementary Foundation is a small part of this system, and by providing support and resources to our teachers, staff, and students, we hope that we are doing our part to support our community's public education system.