The National Runaway Safeline Anthesterion 2014 Pandora's Kharis cause + an update on the Gamelion 2014 winner Desmos

By a huge margin, the American Non-profit organization the National Runaway Safeline has been elected as Anthesterion 2014 cause for Pandora's Kharis. NRS provides education and solution-focused interventions, offers non-sectarian, non-judgmental support, respects confidentiality, collaborates with volunteers, and responds to at-risk youth and their families 24 hours a day. Its sole competition was Adopt-A-Greek-School, an initiative which seeks to financially support struggling schools in Hellas using funds raised in the United States from individuals and other organizations. The National Runaway Safeline won with 78 percent of the votes.

Some history on the cause: Metro-Help was established in 1971 to fill a need for comprehensive crisis intervention for young people in Chicago. It was conceived as a centralized organization with free 24-hour services, expertise in all youth-related issues and as an information clearinghouse of youth services.

In 1974, the agency received an eight-month federal demonstration grant to establish a national hotline. During this time, 11,000 calls were received demonstrating the need for this type of service. Beginning as the National Runaway Switchboard, and now as National Runaway Safeline, NRS’ capabilities and services have grown considerably. The 1-800-RUNAWAY hotline now handles more than 100,000 calls each year. NRS’ 1-800-RUNAWAY crisis hotline is available 24-hours a day throughout the United States and its territories, including Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Guam.

The Pandora's Kharis PayPal account is once more open to receive donations, and can be accessed in the right hand sidebar. The deadline to donate is March 3, 2014. All PayPal costs will be covered by Elaion so your full donation will be transferred to the National Runaway Safeline. Thank you in advance for your donation, for spreading the word, and/or aiding the cause in any other way.

If you want to join the conversation, join Pandora's Kharis on Facebook.

Last month, Greek Non-profit Foundation Desmos was elected as Gamelion 2014 cause for Pandora's Kharis. Unfortunately, it turned out that transfering funds to this cause is a banking nightmare unless you are in Hellas itself. We have been wrestling with banking systems to get the $146,- that was raised transferred and we are hoping to get confirmation of the transfer any day now.

Thank you for your patience and your more than generous donations!