GlobalGiving.org: Better lives for kids with special needs worldwide

Three thousand copies of The Handbook given away

Jonathan Singer — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 15:05:30 GMT

Our mission with Advocacy4All is to help families become stronger advocates for their children with special needs.

We are pleased to report that we have continued to accomplish our goals by expanding upon our library donation program and having given away over 3000 downloads of The Special Needs Parent Handbook in both English and Spanish for Kindle through a special promotion on Amazon.

Once the promotion ended, we continued to draw attention to the book which resulted in sales that raised nearly $1,000 to fund our initiatives.

Thank you for your support and we look forward to reporting more terrific results from future Amazon promotions (we can give away downloads for several days each quarter).

Regards,

Jonathan Singer
Drive4Rebecca

More books to libraries and helping more parents

Jonathan Singer — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 16:08:01 GMT

Volunteers have continued to deliver copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook through our library donation program.

Excerpts from the book have been published in NY Metro Parents Magazine:

http://www.nymetroparents.com/article/Family-Outings-and-Your-Child-with-Special-NeedsGet-Out-ThereTogether

http://www.nymetroparents.com/article/How-to-Find-a-Babysitter-for-Your-Child-with-Special-Needs

These excerpts will help provide important information to families unable to afford copies of the book while getting the word out to parents that would like to purchase one - all proceeds from sales of the book help support our library donation program and provide funds to organizations that help parents to become stronger advocates for their children with special needs.

Thank you for your continued support.

Jonathan Singer

Drive4Rebecca

Links:

Special Needs Parent Handbook in 300+ libraries

Jonathan Singer — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 21:53:32 GMT

We are excited to report that with the help of volunteers, The Special Needs Parent Handbook is now available in over 300 US libraries and will soon be in over 100 more including locations in Montreal, Canada. We have been donating books to libraries to expand availability of the book to families unable to afford one.

The USA Toy Library Association is helping with this initiative to provide access to the book to families of children with special needs that visit their member libraries.

Using some of the proceeds from Team Drive4Rebecca in the NYC Triathlon we have donated thousands of dollars to organizations that have information and advocacy hotlines to help families to be stronger advocates for their children.

Thank you for your continued support.

Jonathan Singer

Drive4Rebecca

Special Need Parent Handbook E-Book Goes Global

Jonathan Singer — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 20:23:23 GMT

We are very excited to announce that The Special Needs Parent Handbook - Special Edition - is now available for electronic lending as an e-book to any library around the world that uses OverDrive.

There are English and Spanish editions and libraries that are OverDrive partners simply have to elect to add them to their e-book lending collections.

Through our Special Needs Ambassador volunteer program, physical copies of the book have been delivered to over 100 libraries and will soon be in more than 200 across the US.

Thank you for helping to make all of this possible through your generous support.

Jon Singer

Drive4Rebecca

Kicking off Library Donations and X-Country Trip

Jonathan Singer — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 23:27:02 GMT

Advocacy4All Cross-Country Tour

The Special Needs Parent Handbook Library Donation Program

The Special Needs Parent Handbook - Special Edition - has shipped from the printer and volunteers will begin distributing copies to local libraries over the next month. This will enable families unable to afford a copy to gain access to the book to help them become stronger advocates for their children with special needs.

The 2011 Advocacy4All Cross-Country Tour

We will meet some of our volunteers on the road during our 2011 Advocacy4All Cross-Country Tour which will be kicked off at the Apple Store 5th Avenue on Friday April 15th at 5pm.

Contests are underway to help raise funds for charities that help children with special needs. Anyone can enter to win terrific prizes including an Apple gift card or an iPad by setting up a fundraising page and 1) donating at least $25 to their favorite cause for kids or 2) uploading a photo of themselves in an Apple Store. Learn more at:

Thank you,

Jon Singer

Drive4Rebecca

Links:

Schedule of events for cross-country tour

Great review by Library Journal (and x-country tour)

Jonathan Singer — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 15:15:55 GMT

We are very excited that my book, The Special Needs Parent Handbook, has received a wonderful review from Library Journal, one of the leading sources of book reviews for libraries around the US.

From LibraryJournal.com
By Julianne J. Smith Feb 17, 2011

Singer, Jonathan. The Special Needs Parent Handbook: Critical Strategies and Practical Advice To Help You Survive and Thrive. Clinton and Valley Pub. 2010. 96p. ISBN 9781452074467. pap. $14.99. CHILD REARING

This title is being distributed to libraries across the country in support of Advocacy 4 All, an initiative to help families advocate for their special-needs children. The author, father of a 14-year-old with a rare genetic disorder causing autistic tendencies, clearly comes to his topic with firsthand experience and perspective to see the impact of his advice. Covering such subjects as finding babysitters, planning a financial future, working with school districts, and keeping the family together, Singer does an excellent job of being realistic about obstacles while providing hope for families faced with the complexities of raising special-needs children. Accept this donation with grace; it is timely, well written, practical, and focused. This slim gem should be on the shelf of every library.

On a related topic, this April we are embarking on our Advocacy4All Cross-Country Tour in an effort to raise funds for charities that help children with special needs. We will be supported by a major PR effort by Rubenstein Public Relations and a huge online promotion with contests in conjunction with Crowdrise, the fundraising web site started by actor Edward Norton. We will be giving away iPods, Apple Store gift cards, and the grand prize is an iPad.   We are stopping at Apple Stores along the way (see the promotional video for the trip) with the goal of highlighting how Apple products can help families having children with special needs, while promoting our Advocacy4All initiative to help make sure that no child with special needs gets left behind. With the help of volunteers we are donating copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook, to libraries around the country and around the world.

Thank you for your continued support.

Jon Singer
Drive4Rebecca

Links:

Reviews for The Special Needs Parent Handbook

United Cerebral Palsy buys 1500 copies of Handbook

Jonathan Singer — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 19:44:51 GMT

Thank you again for your support and Happy New Year!

We are pleased to announce that United Cerebral Palsy of NYC has purchased 1500 copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook - Special Edition - to distribute to families unable to afford one.

Here is what Ed Matthews, their Executive Director, had to say about the book:

“Singer’s book offers parents thoughtful guidance with a healthy dose of honesty and optimism. This is a terrific resource for navigating the challenges associated with caring for a child with special needs.”

We now have twenty volunteers around the country and around the world who are ready to distribute copies of book to their local libraries as soon as our first review is published (see attached draft review from The American Library Association/Booklist). If you are interested in joining our other volunteers to distribute books to your local libraries, you can learn more here about the Special Needs Ambassador Program.

Stay tuned for more exciting announcements.

Jon Singer

Drive4Rebecca.org

AdvocacyForAll

Attachments:

Draft review of The Special Needs Parent Handbook (PDF)

$5000 donation kicks off Ambassador Program

Jonathan Singer — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 10:47:40 GMT

Special Needs Parent Handbook - Special Edition

We are excited to announce that the parents of a child with autism, who want to help all parents to become stronger advocates for their children with special needs, have donated $5000 to kick off The Special Needs Ambassador Program.

After hearing about the $5000, another very generous donor agreed to match their donation with an additional $5000.

With these donations, and through the generosity of AuthorHouse who has agreed to provide books to us at cost, we will be printing thousands of copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook - Special Edition to donate to libraries around the country and around the world to provide access to families unable to afford one.

The first volunteer/ambassadors are from California, China, Florida, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Washington State and India.

“Ambassadors” in India and China are working on translations, a Spanish version is in the works from a New Jersey agency, and a 9th grader in Florida has agreed to be an ambassador in his area and help with that translation.

The goal is 11 languages in 11 countries in 2011, and long term a free copy of the book in every library around the world.

Learn more at:

http://www.Drive4Rebecca.org/Ambassador.htm

Happy Holidays!

Jon Singer

Drive4Rebecca

Links:

Special Needs Ambassador Program

Special Needs Parent Handbook in Chinese & Spanish

Jonathan Singer — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 15:33:07 GMT

In continuing to fulfill our mission of giving away 1000+ free copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook - Special Edition, to families unable to afford one, we were put in touch with an organization in China that will translate the book into Chinese and distribute free ebooks and/or a locally printed version.

We are also working on translating the book into Spanish so we can help many more families in the US and internationally.

Our goal is to have the book translated into a minimum of 11 different languages in 2011. We welcome any assistance in helping to translate the book into other languages.

The Special Needs Parent Handbook will be available shortly in paperback on Amazon and through our web site, www.Drive4Rebecca.org.

All proceeds from book sales are in support of Advocacy for All.

Best regards and thanks for your continued support.

Jon Singer

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____________________________

Drive For Rebecca, Inc.
201 567 3699
2 Valley Place
Tenafly, NJ 07670
Drive4Rebecca.org
AdvocacyForAll.org
SpecialNeedsParentZone.org
____________________________

Free resources for parents on DriveForRebecca.org

Jonathan Singer — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 01:08:35 GMT

We've added two new free resources to DriveForRebecca.org for parents and caregivers that have been downloaded over 1000 times in the past few weeks.

Your Child Handbook

A free organizer to help parents of children with special needs put together a binder containing everything there is to know about their child, including medical history, school information, and all related correspondence and evaluations. It serves as a handy reference guide for parents, for new doctors or therapists, and for anyone who might care for a child while parents are away or if something happens to them.

Your Family Achievement Diary

A free download for parents to record and celebrate what their children accomplish each day, at home and in school, to help acknowledge their progress.

Attachments:

Great progress on potential partnership

Jonathan Singer — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 15:11:18 GMT

Here are our latest updates on our Advocacy For All initiative through The Drive For Rebecca.

1) We continue to give away free electronic copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook to families unable to afford them through Autism Cares.

2) We are in discussion with a number of organizations about establishing free advocacy hot lines and providing free copies of the books in their local areas.

3) We have established The Special Needs Parent Zone for families to share information on advocacy and many other topics relating to caring for their children with special needs

4) The Special Needs Parent Handbook is on the way to the printer for publishing. All proceeds from sales of the book benefit Advocacy For All. The book and individual chapters are available for the Kindle on Amazon.com.

Enjoy the rest of your summer, thank you for your support, and we look forward to some exciting announcements in the fall.

Jonathan Singer DriveForRebecca.org

Great review by Academy of Special Needs Planners

Jon Singer — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 21:56:52 GMT

As part of our mission, we continue to distribute free copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook to families that are unable to afford them and are reaching out to several national charities about helping us to expand our reach.

In the meantime, The Academy of Special Needs Planners, a national organization representing attorneys that help families with children with special needs with estate planning, wrote a very favorable review of the book and mentioned Advocacy For All. We have asked them to help us distribute free books through their members.

Here are some excerpts from their review:

"The Special Needs Parent Handbook is a well-written, down-to-earth guidebook that reads like a conversation with a good friend. In it, Singer offers tips for interacting with a child with special needs that he has learned through his first-hand experience of raising both a child with special needs as well and one without."

"In a particularly helpful section, Singer discusses how to integrate a child with special needs into the general community, and he offers suggestions for teaching children and parents without special needs about a child's condition without sounding shrill or patronizing. In fact, throughout the book, Singer's conversational tone rarely reaches a fever pitch -- you can tell that he is completely committed to his work without resorting to lecturing. When you reach the end of The Special Needs Parent Handbook, you will feel like you gained 15 years of practical knowledge in a matter of hours.

At the moment, The Special Needs Parent Handbook is available as a download from Singer's Web site with a $10 donation to Advocacy for All. Readers can also purchase an ebook version for the Kindle or iPhone. To read excerpts from the book, or to purchase a copy, click here."

Links:

Book review and mention of Advocacy For All

30 copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook given away a month to families unable to afford one

Jonathan Singer — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 17:07:21 GMT

Free Handbook to families unable to afford one

Thank you again for your generous support of Advocacy for All, a project of The Drive For Rebecca.

As part of our mission to help parents become stronger advocates for their children with special needs, we have begun giving away free copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook to families unable to afford one.

Autism Cares is the first organization to help us with the distribution of free books - they help families affected by natural disasters and other catastrophic life events and are sending approximately 30 copies of a special edition ebook version of the Special Needs Parent Handbook each month.

We have continued donating funds to help support not-for-profit organizations with parent help lines and expect to hear shortly from a few advocacy organizations about providing additional free services.

Thank you for your continued support.

Regards,

Jon Singer

................................................................  Drive For Rebecca, Inc.  201 567 3699 2 Valley Pl.  Tenafly, NJ 07670  DriveForRebecca.org  .................................................................

Links:

Drive For Rebecca web site

We did it - with your help we raised over $5000!

Jon Singer — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 00:31:56 GMT

Thank you for your generous support.

With your help, we raised over $5000 from 65 people.

We have already added links to state advocacy organizations on our Resource page on www.DriveForRebecca.org/resources.htm and are in discussions with a national advocacy organization about providing free advocacy services to families across the country.

Having raised 5000 will enable us to provide 1000 free copies of The Special Needs Parent Handbook to people who cannot afford one and will fund the cost of 1000 calls to advocacy hotlines.

Thank you again for your support of our Advocacy For All initiative.

Jon Singer ................................................................ Drive For Rebecca, Inc. 201 567 3699 2 Valley Pl. Tenafly, NJ 07670 DriveForRebecca.org Building better lives for individuals with autism (TM) The Special Needs Parent Handbook (Now available through Amazon for The Kindle) ................................................................

Over $2000 raised - $2000 to go by 12/21

Jon Singer — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 16:05:12 GMT

We are very excited that we are halfway there (a check for $125 was mailed and has not been entered into the system).

Because of the funds raised to date, we will be mailing another $1000 to organizations that provide advocacy services and will provide a minimum of 400 free copies of the Special Needs Parent Handbook to families that cannot afford one.

Thank you for your support and for helping to get out the word.

Jon

P.S. Please go to the following pages to read a story in The Northern Valley Suburbanite about our efforts:

http://www.northjersey.com/community/events/79478822.html

http://www.driveforrebecca.org/suburbanite2009.jpg

Over $1200 raised in first week - just $2800 to go!

Jon Singer — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:36:27 GMT

Thanks for your support.

Despite the long holiday weekend you helped raise over $1200 in the first week - and we still have three weeks to go.

That means 240 free copies of the handbook to families that can't afford one and it pays for 48 hours of advocacy services via hotlines from Autism New Jersey and Autism Speaks - checks have been sent to them today!

We need a total of 50 donors and any amount of $10 or more counts.

Thanks for getting the word out to your friends and other contacts to help us gain a permanent spot on the Global Giving web site.

Jon