Because of your generosity, more than 200 children and 50 seniors will have a brighter holiday season. We are so grateful for all the “elves” who saw the need and spread the word. Our Giving Trees story is a story about what happens when social media is used for good.
Every year around the holidays, AAPLD puts up Giving Trees at the Harnish Main Library and Eastgate Branch Library. AAPLD works with the school district, senior center, and other nonprofit organizations to make the holidays brighter for people in need. Each tag on the tree represents a child or senior and an item or two on their wish lists. Some wish for a plush animal; some wish for books. Others simply ask for a winter coat or pair of shoes.
For whatever reason, this year the tags weren’t moving very quickly. Based on the generosity demonstrated during previous years, we had taken on three times the number of recipients from the school district. But now we were concerned about fulfilling our commitment.
We extended the deadline for returning the unwrapped gifts and began a series of appeals on our social media channels. Soon we noticed that comments and shares on Facebook especially were taking off. In a few days, residents and community members were coming in and taking tags; in some cases, handfuls of tags. Firefighters from the Algonquin-Lake in the Hills Fire Protection District picked up 50 tags (“we saw it on Facebook”). A member of Jeeps on the Run came by and took another 30 tags, going live on Facebook to talk about what he did and to encourage others to do the same. Several people took multiple tags off the tree (“my friend tagged me on Facebook because I love doing things like this”). It was amazing—and it was all due to people sharing our posts, creating posts and check-ins of their own, and sharing the need on other platforms like community chats in Huntley and Cary-Grove, as well as “What’s Happening in Algonquin, Lake in the Hills, And Crystal Lake Illinois.”
The flurry of check-ins, posts, and shares really began on Saturday, December 8, when several Facebook followers shared AAPLD’s post about the trees and tagged their friends. More 5200 people saw that post and shared it 52 times. On December 11, a patron posted This breaks my heart you guys. The Giving Tree at Algonquin Area Public Library is still completely full of children who are in need of gifts this Christmas. The deadline was extended to Dec 17th since it is still full. I ask, if you’re able to, please help them out…
Steve Rohman checked in on December 12 and posted a photo of the Harnish Main Library tree with these words: Imagine being a kid and waking up Christmas morning only to find nothing under the tree. Or being that parent that struggles to put food on the table and has to decide between paying the electric bill or buying Christmas presents. Please stop by the Algonquin Library (behind Target) today and grab a mitten from the giving tree. There are a bunch of mittens still available. The deadline is quickly approaching.
By the end of the day on December 12, a miracle had occurred: all of the tags from both trees had been taken. AAPLD’s Facebook page lit up with posts, including additional questions about what else people could do to help, whether by wrapping gifts or donating more wrapping paper, gift bag, or tissue. AAPLD announced that the goal had been met, and the comments continued to pour in:
“YES!!! Look what WE all did! We worked TOGETHER”
“Nice job to this community. Makes my heart happy”
“I have tears in my eyes reading all this. Great job, everyone.”
Social media usually makes the news for all the wrong reasons. But on December 12, our patrons and staff saw what happens when social media is used for a good cause. Thanks to some kind souls and concerned citizens on Facebook–as well as our wonderful staff who took the avalanche of support and bags of gifts in stride–the holidays will be brighter for many kids, families, and seniors in our community.