by Ray Campbell
"Braille Forum" readers have undoubtedly heard about the Monthly Monetary Support (MMS) program of ACB. Many of you are probably out there thinking, "That isn't for me, that's for people who can afford to make really big donations each month."
That's where you're wrong. Think about your normal day. Perhaps you work or go to school and you buy a lunch each day. Let's say that you spend on average $5 for each lunch that you buy. Why not pack two lunches a month, and take the $10 you would have spent on them and contribute it to the MMS program? If you do this and designate your total contribution to go to ACB, then ACB has an additional $120 that it did not have before to help fund our vital programs, including this very magazine, "The Braille Forum." ACB has around 25,000 members. If each of us donated $10 a month to ACB, our organization would have $3 million more to fund its work.
There's more. As you know, when you sign up for MMS, you can designate up to 50 percent of your contributions to go to an ACB state or special-interest affiliate of your choice. If all 25,000 ACB members did that, ACB would still come $1.5 million ahead.
And all this could happen if we each pack two lunches a month for ACB's MMS program. Sound good? Then grab an MMS form and sign up today. You can sign up for MMS on-line at the ACB web site, www.acb.org, or contact the ACB Minneapolis office, 1-800-866-3242, and someone will help you fill out an MMS form. Donations can be made by direct bank draft or credit card. Be sure if you are doing a bank draft that you have both your bank account number and the 9-digit routing number for your bank. The bank's routing number can be found on your checks, or you can contact the bank and ask for this information. And we'll be back this summer, signing up new MMS participants at the 2008 ACB national convention in Louisville.
So, let's start packing those lunches and send the money you save to the ACB MMS program. If you have any questions about MMS, contact Dr. Ron Milliman at (270) 782-9325, or by e-mail, [email protected].