Wishing you a Happy Holiday
All of us at KIDS FIRST! send you our best wishes for a happy holiday season. Whatever holiday you celebrate, this is a time to slow down, spend time with our family and friends and reflect on our past year. As the year rapidly winds down, please consider investing in our shared future. Even as the nation and world shut down during the 2020 pandemic, the KIDS FIRST! Film Critics persevered, and thrived. We shifted from attending live events to attending online events — screening films, interviewing talent, attending virtual red carpets – without dropping a beat. As challenging as it was, our young reporters rose to the occasion and amazed us all.
As life has returned to a new normal, our team are returning to live events but, online events have claimed a space that makes sense. It levels the playing field for our reporters so that a child living outside of LA or New York City, where live events mostly take place, can still participate.
If you have followed us you have seen our reporters grow and thrive – before, during and after the pandemic. We give them a voice, an audience to share their insights about the media that impacts their lives. Most of our reporters envision a future in the entertainment business as creators; they plan to bring you the type of media they want to see. We are helping them realize those dreams as they are consistently offered opportunities to watch a wide assortment of films from mainstream studios as well as lesser known filmmakers worldwide. We invite you to be part of that process.
As we celebrate our 31st anniversary, we are grateful to supporters like you who help keep this program alive and relevant. Our staff that works with these kids and coaches them with every assignment are the above the line contributors that are invisible to you, but critical to our reporters. Your support is needed to help provide professional assistance by our team.
I recently have had the privilege of meeting with several of our alumni, some of whom you might remember. For example Gerry O., from Los Angeles, is now a senior at NYU Tisch School of the Arts and working for an animation company. Alejandra G., from Miami, recently was hired as a reporter for NBC News in Manhattan. They both talked about how their experience with KIDS FIRST! helped guide them to where they are now. I also visited with from Samantha M. who recently graduated from Cal State San Diego and is thriving on the east coast. Kayla and Kendyl P., both recent college graduates, recently wrote me saying “KIDS FIRST! taught me so much about myself, my craft and the industry. I will cherish those memories forever.”
The mother of a current reporter, Hanadie K., recently wrote me saying, “Thank you again for the life-changing opportunities you create for these children. You are a true gem and your work is going to leave a legacy and imprint on the hearts of so many.”
We believe in these kids.
They are the Creatives Of Tomorrow.
As we approach the end of 2022, we invite you to help us make an impact on the future of children’s entertainment by helping support these young people that we work with today. Contributions from individual donors like you help us meet our annual fundraising goals and provide critical funding that supports all the back-end work at our office – our coaches and editors, our IT and promotion team, our podcast producer and weekly e-zine editor.
At this time, we invite you to join millions around the world in supporting the causes they care about. Now more than ever, we need your support to keep our film critics program alive and well. No gift is too small or large. Every dollar counts. You have the power to shape the entertainment industry and transform young people’s lives by supporting this program.
KIDS FIRST! is a project of the national 501(c)(3) Coalition for Quality Children’s Media. Your donation is tax deductible to the degree allowed by law.
Support The Creatives of Tomorrow
A contribution of any amount is meaningful. Here are some ideas of what different amounts sponsor:
$ 20 Sponsors a youth filmmaker wanting to submit a film to our festival
$ 120 Sponsors one tween or teen at film critics Boot Camp
$ 2000 Sponsors a mini film critics boot camp at a local film festival
$ 5000 Supports a youth film critic for one year
For more details, visit out GoFundMe page. Thanks in advance for your help.
