Dear Friends,
This is a friendly reminder of our 2021 #GivingTuesday fundraiser. We are raising money for Turkish American Cultural Association of Michigan (TACAM) and your contribution will make an impact, whether you donate $5 or $500. During the first week of our fundraiser, we raised 43% of our $5000 goal, thanks to generous donations. We are in our last week of our donation drive; it is time for you to donate now!
You can donate to TACAM 2021 #GivingTuesday fundraiser by visiting our fundraiser page in Facebook. Alternatively, you may also use our donation page for credit card or Paypal payments, or mail a check made payable to TACAM to 28847 Beck Road, Wixom MI 48333.
As COVID-19 raged all businesses, TACAM, a non-profit organization, has not been an exception. Since the beginning of the pandemic in early 2020, TACAM has suspended many of its face-to-face activities including but not limited to income generating events such as breakfast/brunches, meze nights. Unfortunately, most of our annual expenses remained constant as TACAM still had to pay our property taxes (approximately $10,000), insurance, and general maintenance including those related to our Ataturk Park. Furthermore, TACAM continued to support students with scholarships both in Turkey and in Michigan. In 2021 alone, we provided a scholarship to one college student in Michigan and 2 students in Turkey through our collaboration with Cagdas Yasami Destekleme Dernegi.
We appreciate all donors and members for their diligent support throughout these difficult times of COVID-19. Your donations and membership fees have continued covering most of our expenses in 2021. However, TACAM is still short of approximately $5,000 to cover all of its expenses. Although TACAM is not in a financial crisis thanks to our careful cash management, we strongly urge you to donate to our fundraiser so that TACAM can continue sponsoring important programs such as Turkish Classes which started in December 2021, celebration of national days, educational, informative webinars, supporting our TACAM Highschool Chapter and maintaining our Cultural Center and Atatürk Park years to come.
There are two other ways that you can support TACAM at no cost to you:
1) Kroger Community Rewards Program:
Simply visit http://www.kroger.com. Create or log into your Kroger account, then search for Turkish American Cultural Association of Michigan either by name or by the code HN687 and then click Enroll. New users will need to create an account which requires some basic information, a valid email address, and your rewards card number. Here is the short video explaining how to create an account and enroll:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D06KIySGYt4
2) Amazon Smile Program:
If this is the first time, when you go to smile.amazon.com. Search TACAM in the area "pick your own charitable organization" and then select it.
Turkish American Cultural Association of Michigan, founded in 1972, follows the philosophy of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founder of the Turkish Republic, who stated: “Culture is the foundation of the Turkish Republic.” His view of culture encompassed the nation’s creative legacy as well as the best values of world civilization. It stressed personal and universal humanism. “Culture,” he said, "is a basic element in being a person worthy of humanity,” and described Turkey’s ideological thrust as “a creation of patriotism blended with a lofty humanist ideal.” Thus, TACAM wants to instill this philosophy into all Turkish Americans living in Michigan.
