Do you like arbitrary targets? The overall blogger drive is sitting at $49,620 as of this writing.

Can we make it an even $50,000?

The final hours are upon us..... you know what to do!

Technically we have until tomorrow but I know my audience dries up on the weekend. So let's overview.

Your new donations will be matched by the DonorsChoose Board of Directors, as detailed by Janet. So no time like the present to drop your pennies in the bucket. This particular match will be applied by means of a gift code assigned to you after the conclusion of the drive so pay attention in the coming weeks to emails from DonorsChoose and spend out the matching funds.

Now, if you are a success oriented person, there's a project in a high poverty school in Hickory, NC, for a plant and insect habitat that has a mere $26 to go. One person has a chance to have a little dopamine rush of satisfaction today.

Doc Becca and Odyssey tag teamed the Baltimore project to put copies of Skloot's Henrietta Lacks book into the hands of school kids. Great job folks! If you saw their Tweets and posts too late, no problemo! Jump into some other project selected by either Doc Becca or Odyssey.

If, like me, you'd been wondering where the hellz PZ and the Pharynguloid horde were this year, no worries. The Freethought Blogs leaderboard now has his drive properly linked. Phew, you readers of science blogs, free thinkers and the like have passed last year's drive. I thank you all.

Ok, back to the real purpose here...the self-aggrandizement of the DM blog readership! Still a lot of projects on my list that could use some help if you feel able to donate. Every $5 or $10 counts people (and I will note that Doc Becca's readers have put on a very strong push to catch the DM Blog readers in the all-important number-of-contributors stat. ahem.). Success breeds success in this philanthropy- push a project closer to the finish line and the next person is a tad bit more motivated to donate. Contributions speed up the closer a project gets to completion. So even if you can only take a bite out of the amount remaining, do so. It all counts.

Thanks to all my Readers who have already contributed to Donors Choose this year under my challenge, those of other Scientopians or those of blogs affiliated elsewhere. At present, $24,796 has been contributed by 364 readers of science-related and freethinking blogs. This is fantastic.

We can, however, do more. My blog has only a medium sized audience and I know there are thousands of readers over the course of a couple of weeks.

If you have not contributed yet because you were waiting for a paycheck or have been working on a grant or manuscript, I have another one that caught my eye for your consideration.

A teacher in a high poverty school in San Diego CA explains:

We have two classes of third graders and 1 class each of fourth and fifth graders that include GATE, Special Education and regular ed students. I will be sharing many of these materials with all of our third, fourth and fifth graders. Our school has a 76% free and reduced student population. Many of our students spend 8-10 hours at school each day due to childcare issues.

We are a small public school in a large urban school district in California. With all of the cutbacks in our state, all of our budgets for extension activities have been cut to almost nothing. Without assistance from grants, etc. our students will not be able to experience educational and fun activities like these.

She had me at "GATE", which stands for "Gifted and Talented Education". It may be elitist of me, but so be it. The available demographic IQ stats that are available suggest that post-graduate students are on average at least a standard deviation above the mean. We all know that "smarts" are highly valued in our business. We have the sneaking suspicion that very smart people are disproportionally drawn to science careers.

My researches (ok, a few minutes with Google, sue me) suggests that while Gifted students are identified in public education around the US, they are not always well served. Why should they be? They can meet the minimum standards and public education is not so much interested in making sure everyone reaches their potential, just that they meet minimum competency. Middle and upper middle class parents with a smart kid have some options, typically. I may have mentioned that my own children are given numerous extra-curricular educational opportunities because my spouse and I can afford it. Many of your children have, do or will enjoy a similar benefit. Can we not spare $10 or $25 to help some kids who do not have parents who can afford science camps?

My Project: Our 3rd, 4th and 5th graders need live animals to observe (i.e., ladybugs and praying mantis), as well as preserved specimens to dissect (i.e., crayfish, earthworms, starfish.) With this project, we will be able to ensure that our students are able to take part in activities that are meaningful, as well as educational and FUN! This will help me to expose our 3rd, 4th and 5th graders to experiences that they will not be exposed to outside of our classrooms.

It is ever so slightly unusual that this project will impact three grade levels instead of a single classroom. That's kind of neat. As the teacher states, this is not solely for GATE kids but rather for the general classrooms that happen to include the Gifted children along with the general population and even some Special Ed kids. A nice broad impact for the low, low price of $492 to complete the project.

Won't you take a moment to donate?

Wow! Thanks to all of you readers who stepped up to give little kids in Maine a carpet to sit on, instead of a dirty, wet linoleum floor.

Now here's a chance to help some big kids. High school students in a high poverty school in Gaffney SC need materials for dissections.

My Anatomy and Physiology students attend a high poverty school that has limited resources and monies available. They are juniors or seniors who have identified their career path to be in the health science field. Some have set goals to be lab technicians while others strive for their doctorates. All of them want to learn and are interested in the structure and function of the human body. We have an enormous amount of fun learning and utilizing the limited resources we have.

Sure, and I remember the lab demos from my science classes the best. Exploding stuff and thermogenic reactions. Inclined planes, air tables and dropping shit. From biology, the dissections. Are you any different?

Let's try to give these kids an experience they will remember when they are at my ripe old age...

My students need dissection specimens, like 40 sheep eyes, 40 sheep hearts, 40 sheep half brains, and dissection supplies to conduct essential labs in anatomy class.

Remember, every little bit counts. Can you spare $5? Even if you gave your bit already, pass along the link. Ask your Facebook friends to donate. Twitt your Tweeps.

It's for the next generation. Don't you want them to know a little something when they come to re-insert your catheter at Happy Golden Acres? I know you do.

Give. Your urethra will thank you later.

One of the Donor's Choose projects that I am featuring in my challenge is for

A Place to Sit:

Have you ever had to sit on a dirty floor? This is what my students must do each day in my classroom, we don't have a rug or carpet in my class so my students have to sit on the floor to learn. The floor has dirt from our playground and in the winter it has small puddles of water from boots.

The primary school is in Sanford ME and is a high poverty school. Looks like a nice location.

View Larger Map

Brother or Sister.... Can you spare a dime?

As you are aware, Dear Reader, one of my favorite times of year as a blogger is October. Because we get the chance to put on the full court press for DonorsChoose, an organization that helps teachers fund small projects in their classrooms. Projects that range from the inspirational, to the disturbingly mundane- a rug for the children to sit on?

You will note that I have selected numerous projects which feature dissection kits. This is no coincidence. Those biology labs tend to be some of the most memorable ones from our schooling, are they not? It also so happens that one of my kids had the opportunity to dissect a bazillion things in a summer camp. A camp that my spouse and I are able to afford, obviously, but I have little doubt many of the parents in the High Poverty schools I've selected cannot do the same. How can we not do a little bit to help out these children?

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Now, on to the seerious beesnees. We do this drive as part of the ScienceBloggers for Students Challenge, in which we here at Scientopia compete against those other lame collectives like the FreeThoughters, Pirates, SciAmSellouts, LabLamers and whomever still remains at ScienceBlogs brought to you by National Geographic. Other glossy mag collectives like WIRED, Discover and CENmag have skin in the game too.

DearReader, we want to beat them. On the measure that matters most which is not the cash, not the projects funded. Oh, no. The most important bragging right is the number of donors! That's right. What really matters here is that we get as many people as possible participating. Only have $5? Make a donation. Every little bit counts. Make a statement that you stand up for science (and health, and humanities, and...) education. You can skip a couple of lattes to make up for it....

For those of you new to this blog's participation in Donor's Choose, a word to the wise. Starving graduate students in the audience have been, proportionally speaking, very generous in past years. So if you are a postdoc or a prof.....yeah. Let's get 'er done.

Final note, even if you cannot afford to donate this year, we would appreciate your participation by bringing Donor's Choose to the attention of some folks that may never have heard of it. Post a link on the Twitts or the Facebooks or even, meh, GoogPlus.

Do it for the children.