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With budgets getting tighter and funding from the state unpredictable, many educational organizations are turning to crowd-sourcing to keep after-school programs going.

Two organizations taking this approach are CORE Educational Services and arc After School Programs, which are using a partnership to provide after-school programs at seven L.A. Green Dot Public Schools in Los Angeles. Green Dot runs a network of 21 unionized charter schools in Los Angeles. 

In a crowd-sourcing campaign on Indiegogo, CORE is asking for $50,000 to keep the programs alive until it can apply for new funding from the state in two years. According to CORE, the programs lost their state funding on May 21.

The campaign has received over $29,000 in donations as of Tuesday afternoon, but donation period expires on Nov. 2.

“When we refer to ‘after-school programs,’ we’re not talking about babysitting services, arts-and-crafts, or open gyms for pick-up sports and dodge ball,” the campaign’s page says. “These high school after-school programs provide enriching classes in art, music production, culinary arts, career-and-college-readiness, and more. Importantly, these classes are taught by skilled instructors from ‘the neighborhood’ who serve as mentors for at-risk students.”

Click on the the attached video to learn more about the campaign.

“If these programs are cut, No. 1, there won’t be a dedicated safe space for these kids to go to every day,” Leon Clayborne, a regional manager for arc, said in the video.