Pop star Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta, better known as Lady Gaga, stepped out of a limo at Harvard University’s Sanders Theater to announce the launch of a new nonprofit, the Born This Way Foundation (BTWF), aimed at combating childhood bullying, especially among young people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or trans-gendered (LGBT).

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The car dealership has been selecting a handful of charities each month, then allowing Facebook fans to vote on their favorite charity. The charity with the most votes at the end of the month will receive a $1,000 donation. Fans can vote once per day.

“I can’t  believe we have been invited to participate because our project was kinda little compared to all the other charities that have been competing, but we are also the first New Tampa charity to compete,” Patricia Murphy, of the woman’s club, wrote to New Tampa Patch when she learned Books For Troops would be included. “I seriously can’t contain my excitement.”

Murphy said the Books For Troops project began Oct. 1 and has collected more books than it had anticipated. While the girls underestimated the support from the community, there is not enough money to ship all of the books to U.S. troops serving overseas.

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Selena Gomez has announced her second annual charity concert for UNICEF.

The ‘Hit The Lights’ singer and her band The Scene will perform at the House of Blues in West Hollywood, California on Friday, January 20.

Fan club tickets go on sale today (January 5) from 10am PT through her official website, with general public tickets then available from January 6 at 5pm PT through Ticketmaster.  Gomez teased the event on her Twitter account, writing: “Have some surprise guests lined up for the UNICEF charity show… can’t wait to share them with you.”

She added in a statement to her website: “Giving back has always been important to me. This concert allows me to connect with my fans in person which is one of the best parts of my job and to raise money for important causes at the same time. I can’t think of anything I would enjoy doing more.”

The 19-year-old singer and actress has been a UNICEF Ambassador since 2009, working to raise awareness of the issues facing vulnerable children across the world.

Keep up the good work Selena!

The Knowledge to Action foundation was first conceived in November 2010 when Greg and I were at The Ubuntu Education Fund’s spectacular gala dinner in New York. With The Dave Matthews band playing and hosted by Chris Rock’s wife, it was an incredible evening with close to 700 people in attendance. The star studded crowd pulled together in the spirit of giving and among them managed to raise over $2 million dollars for this worthy cause. We were both blown away by how much money the evening raised for the charity. That evening really showed us that when people work together big things can happen. This inspired us to ask ourselves, “What could we do to make a difference?”

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The X Factor girl group Rhythmix are to change their name, following a threat of legal action by a Brighton charity with the same name.

The charity uses music to help disadvantaged youngsters and claims Simon Cowell’s production company Syco had initially failed to enter into a discussion about the name clash.

It said that having a band with the same name would affect its future work.

The X Factor said the girls would announce a new name “in due course”.

Producers at X Factor said they knew the charity existed, although the band had originally settled on the name without being aware it was used elsewhere.

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The Buoniconti Fund’s aim find a cure for paralysis resulting from spinal cord injuries. The fund was founded by football legend Nick Buoniconti after his son Marc suffered a spinal cord injury during a college football game.

Each year, The Buoniconti Fund to Cure Paralysis holds the Great Sports Legends Dinner honoring sports figures and philanthropic heroes in order to bring awareness and support to the fund.

This year’s 26th Annual Great Sports Legends Dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York raised more than $10 million for paralysis research. One of the standout sports honorees was Kerrigan and Cause Celeb was lucky enough to speak with her about the event.

Read the full article and interview here.

Something I never really thought about before but since no one really writes cheques anymore and instead everyone used online payments and debit/credit cards, what will happen in the future for charities that have always depended on cheques?  Luckily there are program like ours that encourage people to use other methods of supporting charities.

The future of cheques remains in the balance with definite plans needed to restore the public’s faith in the payment option, it has been warned.

Despite plans to abolish cheques being shelved back in July, Age UK said it had received growing numbers of complaints from the public about retailers refusing to accept them.

The charity had staunchly opposed proposals that would have seen cheques become obsolete in 2018, with the Payments Council eventually agreeing that the payment method will remain for ‘as long as they are needed’.

However, despite the success of its lobbying, Age UK has admitted to having mounting concerns that cheques are still in jeopardy.

Because of its fears, Age UK has written to the UK’s major banks and building societies asking them to set out
the steps they are taking to ensure that cheques continue to be widely accepted and easily available.

Ready the full article here.

It certainly is nice to see the new car industry giving a little something back after being bailed out of trouble.  The General Motors Foundation announced a $2.5 million donation to the College for Creative Studies in Detroit on Monday.

CCS, with an enrollment of nearly 1,400, is one of the world’s leading art and design schools. It offers Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees in 11 disciplines and Master of Fine Arts degrees in two majors.

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Here is a great little graph from blackbaud.com’s Benchmarking report.

Around 1,000 people helped make the Ian Jenkins charity hockey game a success and helped launch the Big E Foundation at Compuware Sports Arena in Plymouth Township.

Ian (Big E) Jenkins, considered one of the best 15-year-old goaltenders in the U.S., died last Monday, after suffering a head injury on May 19 after falling out of the bed of a pickup truck and onto pavement in Milan. Jenkins was recently drafted in the second round by the London Knights in the 2011 Ontario Hockey League draft and was supposed to play there next season.

Read the full article here.