Articles
Crowdfunder
York University was one
of the first in
Britain to have
a crowdfunding platform,
provided by
Hubbub. It has
run over 70
projects since
early 2014
form is the ability for people to see their
own projects happen. The College tries
hard to create the strong community, but
this is no substitute for our members being
able to improve Grey for themselves. There
is also a huge benefit in terms of student
leadership development, since projects will
be run almost entirely by their creators they will have responsibility over the vision,
marketing, delivery and reporting of their
projects, replicating in miniature what
would take place over the development
cycle within a business. A third benefit,
and there are many more, is a familiarity
with the tools of crowdfunding. Massive
growth means that this industry will soon
have a major impact on how we live our
lives - in his first presidential campaign,
Barack Obama used crowdfunding to raise
over $600 million from small donations
averaging $86. Grey students will be given
a headstart in a global marketplace which
could soon change how new products, politicians parties and charitable campaigns
are created.
It goes without saying that this will be a
useful fundraising tool for the College. We
hope that it will be more than that, allowing more dialogue between donors and
our members as well as allowing support
to be better focused with projects that
staff and students want and that alumni
are interested in supporting. In particular, anyone will be able to ask questions
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of a project and shape the way it turns
out. While financial backing is important,
supporting a campaign on social media or
providing your personal experience are the
difference between a project’s failure and
success.
Great Ideas will be overseen by the
Master, Tom Allen, while I am working as
project officer to ensure that projects are
supported by appropriate text, videos and
social media marketing. Over time we aim
to build up a network of successful project
creators who can then support those who
follow in their footsteps. The company with
whom we are working, Hubbub, have built
similar platforms for many Universities,
including York and Somerville College Oxford, and will be offering us support as we
begin this journey. Looking at these other
universities, we see many projects, ideas
and opportunities which would not have
been thought of nor successfully completed, were it not for crowdfunding.