The holiday season is a time when many people pause to give thanks and to give to charity. The University of Pennsylvania Center for High Impact Philanthropy has released an online guide filled with “handpicked opportunities” for donors to make a bigger difference with their charitable giving.

The 32-page “2016 High Impact  Giving Guide” is available at http://www.impact.upenn.edu/.

The guide offers evidence-based approaches and tips on how to give year-round. There are 11 distinct opportunities outlined in the guide showing donors how to help address a range of risks that human beings face from infancy to adulthood.

“While we spend all year analyzing high impact philanthropic opportunities, the ones in the guide were chosen because, as a group, they reflect a diversity of ways people can help, and each is something any donor can act on today,” said Katherina Rosqueta, CHIP founding executive director.

Since 2011, CHIP has produced the annual guide to share what’s effective. CHIP’s team also teaches, coaches and advises those committed to high impact philanthropy.

“We are the only university-based center solely focused on enabling philanthropy to achieve greater social impact,” Rosqueta said.  

Organizations highlighted in the guide provide services in the United States, other countries or both. For example, the U.S. based Nurse-Family Partnership equips low-income mothers to care for their children. In Mozambique, Food for the Hungry’s Child Survival Program helps mothers learn about child nutrition. In Pennsylvania, donors can help the homeless who have drug addictions find refuge and treatment via Pathways to Housing PA.

The guide lists ways to give designed for every budget. For as little as a $10 donation, 10 children can be vaccinated from measles and rubella in impoverished countries; $100 can give a U.S. teacher one-on-one instructional coaching to improve children’s literacy; $5,000 can help pre-schools set up a high-quality early-childcare curriculum.

This year’s guide also includes an update to the Center’s recommendations on philanthropic ways to help those affected by natural disaster, such as the recent hurricane in Haiti, and human-made disasters like the Syrian refugee crisis.

CHIP is a collaboration of Penn’s School of Social Policy & Practice and alumni of Penn’s Wharton School.