Ice bucket challenge videos raising money for the ALS Association charity have saturated Facebook news feeds in the last month. It’s easy to participate in the very viral video campaign: film yourself pouring a bucket of ice water over your head, then challenge a friend or frenemy to do the same within 24 hours. At first, the dousing would substitute for sending a check to the ALSA, but many participants now do both. This week former President George W. Bush, actor Ben Affleck, Vogue editor Anna Wintour, and General Electric chief executive Jeff Immelt became the most recent famous faces to get soaked.
从上个月开始，Facebook的新闻推送放目望去几乎全是各类为美国肌萎缩性脊髓侧索硬化症(ALS——国内又称“渐冻人”)协会募捐的“冰桶挑战”（Ice bucket challenge）视频。要参与这项疯狂传播的病毒视频活动非常简单：你只需往头上浇一桶冰水，录下视频，然后挑战一位朋友或“敌友”在24小时内做同样的事情。起初，参与者可选择向ALS协会寄一张支票，来代替往头上浇冰水，但现在许多参与者会选择合二为一。本周接受了“湿身”挑战的名人包括美国前总统小布什、演员本•阿弗莱克、《Vogue》杂志主编安娜•温图尔，以及通用电气（General Electric）首席执行官杰夫•伊梅尔特。
At some point the ice bucket campaign will dry up, and photos of your friends’ kids and cats will again dominate your news feed. But the challenges for the ALS Association will just be beginning.
“冰桶挑战”终会有结束的一天，晒孩子和猫咪的照片将在新闻推送中卷土重来。但对ALS协会来说，种种挑战才刚刚开始。
Since July 29, the ice bucket challenge has raised $41.8 million for ALSA, which helps fight amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord commonly referred to as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. That eight-figure sum far surpasses the $2.1 million ALSA raised in the same period last year, and more than doubles the total revenue the organization generated all of last fiscal year ending January 2014—$24 million, according to its most recent 990 tax form. ALSA told Fortune it recorded donations worth $10.1 million on Wednesday alone.
自7月29日以来，“冰桶挑战”已经为ALS协会募集了4,180万美元（约合2.57亿元人民币），这笔捐款将被用于治疗肌肉萎缩性侧索硬化症，该疾病会影响脑部和脊柱的神经细胞，又被称为卢•格里克病。高达八位数的捐款远远超过了ALS协会去年同期募集的210万美元，甚至比该组织在上一财年（至2014年1月结束）的总收入还多。据ALS协会最近提交的税务报表显示，其上一财年的收入为2,400万美元。这家协会告诉《财富》杂志（Fortune），仅上周三一天ALS便收到了1,010万美元的捐款，创下了其单日最高记录。

So the question now is this: what is ALSA going to do with all that money?
一个问题随之而来：ALS协会要怎么处理这些钱？
Though the term implies otherwise, as a non-profit, ALSA is under no legal obligation to spend its ice bucket windfall, says Thad Calabrese, a professor of public and non-profit management at New York University. While that may be true, industry standards and the donating public expect otherwise; they want the organization to dole out the funds.
纽约大学（New York University）公共机构与非盈利机构管理教授萨德•卡拉布里亚表示，虽然“非盈利”这个词包含有其他意思，但ALS协会在冰桶挑战善款支出上无需承担任何法律义务。尽管如此，行业准则和捐款的公众都期待ALS协会能善用这笔钱：分次少量发放。
With an eye toward transparency and donor education, watchdog groups like Charity Navigator, the Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance, and Charity Watch have long laid out guidelines for how non-profits should spend their donations and rate or accredit charities based on how well they keep to those rules.
出于对透明度和捐赠教育的考虑，慈善导航（Charity Navigator）、商业促进局（Better Business Bureau）下署的明智捐赠联盟（Wise Giving Alliance）和慈善观察（Charity Watch）等监督组织早已出台了关于非盈利组织如何使用捐款的指导方针，并且会根据慈善机构遵守规定的情况对其进行评级或认证。
The breakdown of what percentage of donations a charity spends on administration, fundraising and “programming,” such as research and education, is a main component in how non-profits stack up. (Just how much weight should be placed on this spending measurement and the ratings in general is a flashpoint in the non-profit world, says Suzanne Perry, a senior editor at the Chronicle of Philanthropy. “It’s a love-hate relationship. If [charities] get rated highly, they broadcast it everywhere. If they get a lower grade, the methodology is ‘flawed,’” she says.) In calculating their different scoring systems, the watchdog organizations agree that the majority of a non-profits’ revenue should be spent on programming: Charity Navigator pegs that percentage at 75; Better Business Bureau at 65%; and Charity Watch at 60%.
将慈善机构花在行政管理、资金募集和“项目”（如研究和教育等）的捐款按百分比进行分解，是对非盈利机构进行评级的主要形式。[《慈善纪事报》（Chronicle of Philanthropy）高级编辑苏珊娜•佩里表示，对于开支计量与评级的重视程度，在非盈利机构间一直存在争议。“慈善机构对此褒贬不一。如果得到较高评级，他们会四处宣扬。但如果得到的评级较低，他们就会宣称评级方法‘存在缺陷’。”] 监督组织均认为，非盈利机构应该将大多数收入用于“项目”，在评分方法的不同计算上，：慈善导航认为这一百分比为75%；商业促进局认为是65%；慈善观察认为在60%。
ALSA has measured up fairly well in trying to meet those expectations. According to Charity Navigator’s latest report, for instance, ALSA earned the highest four-star rating, in part, for spending 72% of its fiscal year 2013 revenue on programs and services; 11% went to administration costs while fundraising expenses ate up 16%.
以这些标准来看，ALS协会得分很高。例如，慈善导航最近的报告称，ALS协会得到了最高的四星评级，部分原因是其将2013财年收入的72%用于项目和服务；11%作为行政管理成本，资金募集开支占16%。
While the ice bucket challenge has prompted an onslaught of donations, it’s chilled any prospect of ALSA duplicating those rosy watchdog figures in its current fiscal year. Charity Navigator’s annual spending metrics measure how charities distribute money they’ve generated that same year. “The reality is that fundraising for most charities is up and down, so we’re moving toward a multi-year review,” Charity Navigator CEO Ken Berger told Fortune. “Right now, though, it’s an annual snapshot.”
“冰桶挑战”促使捐款金额猛增，却让ALS协会很难复制其在当前财年取得的乐观的监管数据。慈善导航的年度开支指标会对慈善机构一年的资金进行评估。慈善导航CEO肯•伯格告诉《财富》杂志：“事实上，大多数慈善机构募集的捐款金额都会有波动，因此我们计划采用多年期评估。但目前依旧用的是年度评估的方法。”
That means—as Charity Navigator’s requirements stand now—in order to replicate its most recent 72% programming expenditure, ALSA would need to spend just over $30 million of its $41.8 million in ice bucket money on research and education by the end of its fiscal year in January.
这意味着，按照慈善导航目前的要求，为了达到最近一年实现的72%的项目开支标准，ALS协会需要在截至明年一月的财年结束之前，从4,180万美元的“冰桶挑战”善款中拿出3,000万美元用于研究和教育。
That’s a challenge ALSA doesn’t plan on meeting.
这是个令ALS协会措手不及的挑战。
“When you’re doubling a budget, it can’t be spent all in same year,” says Lance Slaughter, chief chapter relations and development officer at ALSA. “If a [hypothetical] $3 million organization gets a $10 million bequest one year, there’s no way the members of its board can thoughtfully spend three times as much [in one year's time],” he says. “We’re going to work with these watchdog groups. They understand that anomalies take place.” Without the constraints of the year-end deadline, Slaughter says, the ALSA board will be able to thoughtfully plan how to use the money to further fund the organization’s current priorities: researching the disease and possible cures, providing compassionate care for ALS patients, and advocating for public policies that benefit people living with the disease.
协会首席分会关系与发展官兰斯•斯劳特表示：“如果你的预算增加了一倍，你不可能在一年内全部花完。如果一家年收入300万美元的组织某一年得到1,000万美元的善款，这家组织不可能在这一年花完三倍的钱。我们将与慈善监督机构合作。他们能够理解这种特殊情况。”斯劳特表示，如果没有年底最终期限的限制，ALS协会的董事会可以仔细规划如何利用这笔捐款，为协会目前的重要工作提供资金：疾病与可能的治疗方法研究，为ALS患者提供周到的护理，以及倡导有利于ALS患者的公共政策。
In early August, before fully realizing just how much money the ice bucket campaign would generate, ALSA awarded 21 new grants worth $3.5 million to scientists in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Switzerland, Israel and Australia. The grants are all focused on “developing effective therapies for ALS,” Lucie Bruijn, ALSA’s chief scientist, said in a statement.
在八月初的时候，ALS协会尚未意识到“冰桶挑战”能带来多少捐款。当时，它拨给美国、英国、法国、加拿大、瑞士、以色列和澳大利亚的科学家们21笔资金，总计350万美元。ALS协会首席科学家露西•布鲁英在一份声明中表示，拨款全部用于“探索ALS的有效疗法。”
The influx of donations that ALSA has received since making that announcement “gives us confidence that we’ll have funding for these grants in their second and third years,” Slaughter says. The same holds true for the 11 new ALS clinics the organization had planned to open this year prior to the ice bucket campaign going viral. The organization already operates 34 clinics that provide multidisciplinary therapies to ALS patients; opening the new ones “was a leap of faith,” Slaughter says. The wave of donations recently is “an opportunity to provide greater funding [to the clinics],” he says.
斯劳特说，在发表声明之后ALS协会收到的大笔捐款，“让我们确信，我们在第二年和第三年仍然有足够资金来资助研究。”这种情况也适用于该协会计划新开的ALS诊所。协会在“冰桶挑战”疯狂传播之前曾计划在今年新开11家ALS诊所。目前，ALS协会已经开设了34家诊所，专为ALS患者提供多学科治疗；斯劳特表示，开设新诊所“是一次信心的飞跃”。他说道，最近的大笔捐款“让我们有机会[为诊所]提供更多资金。”
There’s one element of the ice bucket campaign that will make the challenge of deciding how to spend the money a bit easier: the $41.8 million that ALSA has raised has come from individual donations that are unrestricted. That means that unlike some more traditional donations that are sometimes designated to a specific aspect of a charity’s mission, this money has arrived at ALSA with no strings attached.
“冰桶挑战”活动中的特定因素让如何使用善款的问题变得更简单：迄今募集的4,180万美元捐款均来自不受限制的个人捐赠。这意味着，该笔资金没有任何附加条件，这与传统的捐款有所不同。传统捐款有时会被指定用于慈善机构的特定使命。
“From a non-profit’s perspective, all donations are great but some are better than others,” Calabrese says. And it’s good that ALSA has that flexibility because it has lots of options to consider.
卡拉布里亚表示：“从非盈利机构的角度来说，所有捐款都是好的，但某些更好。”拥有灵活性对ALS协会来说是好消息，它可以考虑许多选择。
Aside from spending the money on promising, worthwhile research, both Calabrese from NYU and Patrick Rooney, associate dean for academic affairs and research at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, floated the idea of ALSA starting an endowment-like fund with the ice bucket money since it would turn what’s likely to be a one-time donation phenomenon into a reliable source of future revenue, and it could be tapped if some major medical advancement needs significant funding in the future.
除了将捐款用于一些有价值的前途无量的研究以外，纽约大学教授卡拉布里亚，和印第安纳大学（Indiana University）礼来家族慈善学院（Lilly Family School of Philanthropy）学术事务与研究副院长帕特里克•鲁尼均提出，ALS协会可以用“冰桶挑战”募集的捐款成立一支类似于捐赠基金，这样一来，协会不仅可以将一次性的捐款现象转变为可靠的未来收入来源，而且一旦未来有重大的医疗技术进步需要大量资金时，还可以动用该笔基金。
ALSA’s Slaughter says the organization has never had an endowment, and while “nothing’s off the table,” saving the ice bucket money for a rainy day doesn’t necessarily fit with the organization’s mission, mainly because “this is a disease that requires urgency,” Slaughter says. When the average life span of an ALS patient is between two and five years and ALSA has seen no improvement in mortality rates, there’s no time to waste.
ALS协会的斯劳特表示，协会之前没有任何捐赠基金，然而，虽然“我们不排除任何可能”，但将“冰桶挑战”的捐款存起来以备不时之需并不符合组织的使命，主要是因为“这种疾病刻不容缓”。ALS患者的平均预期寿命为两至五年，而且ALS协会并未看到患者死亡率有任何改善，因此现在没有时间可供浪费。
There’s an added challenge to spending the ice bucket money that stems from the fact that the ALS Association did not start the campaign, and as a result, never stated a specific mission behind it. That makes it difficult to pinpoint what individuals want to come from their donations. And disappointing donors isn’t a chance you want to take.
如何使用“冰桶挑战”的捐款还有另外一个挑战，因为这项活动并非由ALS协会发起，结果，活动也没有明确的使命。因此，协会很难确定个人捐赠者希望自己的捐款用于怎样的目的。而让捐赠者失望是要不得的。
Just ask the Red Cross.
不妨汲取一下红十字会（Red Cross）的教训。
In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the relief organizations raised a record $564 million. Donors believed that their money would go to help victims of the attacks and their families, but the organization decided to set aside more than half of the funds for operations and future reserves. The Red Cross had a long-standing practice of taking such an approach, but it nonetheless sparked outrage among donors and prompted an apology from the Red Cross as well as the redirection of funds.
911恐怖袭击之后，该救济组织募得的资金达到创纪录的5.64亿美元。捐款者认为，这笔资金应该用于帮助袭击受害者及其家人，但红十字会却决定将超过一半的捐款用于机构运营和作为未来资金储备。长期以来，红十字会一直都采取这种做法，但这一次却引发了捐款者的众怒，最终红十字会被迫道歉并重新确定了捐款用途。
“When donors tell us that their money should be used for a specific purpose, it’s important for us to honor that intent,” Laura Howe, vice president of public relations for the Red Cross told Fortune. “It’s a lesson that we’ve learned over the years.”
红十字会公共关系副总裁劳拉•霍伊对《财富》表示：“当捐款者告诉我们，他们的捐款应该用于特定目的时，我们必须尊重他们的意愿，这非常重要。这也是我们得到的一条重要教训。”
Slaughter says that in addition to generating donations, the ice bucket campaign has raised awareness of ALS, a disease that less than half of the country could identify when the association conducted a survey a few years ago. “They’ve learned that it’s degenerative and deadly. I don’t know that people are concerned about how we spend the money; they’re determined now that this is an unacceptable disease. If they took time to go to the website and donate…they feel that ours is a cause worth investing in,” Slaughter says.
斯劳特表示，除了带来捐款以外，冰桶挑战也提高了人们对ALS的认识，几年前ALS协会进行的一项调查中，美国知道这种疾病的人还不到半数。斯劳特说：“他们开始了解到这种疾病是一种退化性疾病，并且会致命。我不知道人们是否会关心ALS如何使用这笔捐款；现在他们已明确认识到这是一种难以忍受的疾病。如果他们花时间浏览了网站并捐款——那是因为他们认为这项事业值得投资。”
ALSA certainly has a lot of spending decisions to make, but for the organization and the people it’s trying to save, there could not be a better challenge to face.
ALS协会必需做出大量的支出决策，但对于该组织和它努力拯救的那些人来说，这种挑战真是幸事。
“The question that’s showing up out in the universe now is, ‘How much is too much?'” Slaughter says. “Until we have effective long-term treatment, we’ll never have enough.”
斯劳特表示：“现在的问题是：‘到底多少钱才算太多？’除非我们找到有效的长期治疗方法， 否则我们的捐款永远处于不足状态。”