As I’ve said so many times before, the community that has grown...

As I’ve said so many times before, the community that has grown around this page is a special group of people. In addition to the people who follow this page, so many of you choose to routinely engage and participate in the community. You’ve created such a unique and supportive culture in the comment section. And you’ve donated nearly $5 million to our fundraisers in 2015. I think the HONY community is largely composed of people who try to choose compassion over cynicism, and that’s why we’ve been able to accomplish so much this year. In short—this is a group of people who ‘shows up.’ So thanks so much for showing up last year. Here are some of the things we were able to accomplish:

In January we raised $1.4 million to provide summer programs, college trips, and scholarships to students at Mott Hall Bridges Academy. The money is being administered with the assistance of The Fund for Public Schools. Earlier this year, the students took their first class trip to Harvard. This summer, they participated in a new summer enrichment program featuring such courses as horticulture, financial literacy, and social justice. Vidal, who inspired the effort, is beginning a new chapter as a high school freshman. And Ms. Lopez (The Lopez Effect) has continued to be recognized for her dedication to students, recently giving a TED Talk and becoming a finalist for The Global Teacher Prize.

In August we raised $2.3 million to help Syeda Ghulam Fatima in her quest to end bonded labor in Pakistan. Fatima has been extremely careful and deliberate in her acceptance of the funds, consulting with many other stakeholders and advocacy groups about how best to maximize the impact. She recently received the final installment, and plans to break ground on a new Freedom Center in 2016 to shelter and rehabilitate freed workers. Since our fundraiser, 105 slaves have been freed with the assistance of Fatima’s Bonded Labour Liberation Front, including one of the slaves featured on HONY. Earlier this year, the Clinton Global Initiative chose Fatima for its Global Citizen Award.

Most recently we raised $750,000 to assist thirteen Syrian refugee families selected for American resettlement. We are partnering with the nonprofit Together Rising (www.togetherrising.org), who will be helping us receive the funds and get 100% of the donations to the families– in a smart way that doesn’t conflict with other aid they may be receiving.

Finally, and closest to my heart, we are supporting Aya through her appeal process for American resettlement. Our petition ended at almost exactly one million signatures. (I’m choosing to view this as a favorable omen.) Now comes the less glamorous but critical process of filing the appeal itself. Aya’s lawyers at the International Refugee Assistance Project have been working over the holiday to get the appeal finished as soon as possible, and plan to be done next week. I’ll share all major developments on the blog, but as we move forward, I will be providing more detailed updates on the petition page here: http://chn.ge/1OxgK7F

Thanks to everyone for a wonderful year.

Excited for what’s to come.