Elon University senior Tyler Meacham was honored this spring in a national contest that sought creative ways to educate Americans on making effective gifts to international relief organizations.
Meacham, a cinema and television arts major from Richmond, Virginia, placed second in the broadcast category of the 2015 PSAid: Public Service Announcements for International Disasters competition hosted by the United States Agency for International Development.
Her video, “Canned,” was filmed in stop-motion and explains that while it costs fewer than $12 to donate a dozen cans of soup to disaster relief, it can cost nearly $300 for relief organizations to ship those cans.
That is enough money to supply nearly 30,000 people with a day’s worth of clean drinking water. Meacham ends the video urging the audience to instead donate cash to relief efforts.
PSAid promotes “Smart Compassion”- the idea that monetary donations can do more for relief organizations than material donations. It was founded by USAID’s Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance, which works to educate Americans about helping those affected by disasters overseas.
“For the past decade, the PSAid competition has increased awareness among Americans that monetary donations to relief organizations provide the greatest help to survivors,” said Juanita M. Rilling, director of USAID CIDI. “The winners of this year’s competition have done a masterful job of illustrating that ‘cash is best.’”
The winning PSAs will be aired through broadcast and cable outlets across the nation. To view the 2015 entries, visit the PSAid website: http://www.psaid.org/.