Effective compassion

College basketball's 2010 Final Four is now part of sports history, but WORLD's drive to the final four continues. Many WORLD readers nominated compassionate ministries for this year's Hope Award for Effective Compassion contest. Charity expert Jill Lacey and I researched and assessed the entries and then sent a reporter and a photographer out on the road to see firsthand what groups are doing.

The first fruits of this exploration are on the pages that follow. We chose three finalists-Christ Clinic in Spokane, Youth Horizons in Wichita, and New Horizons in Colorado-and in San Diego late last month announced the champion: New Horizons. To view video profiles of each of the West Region finalists, to follow this year's Hope Award competition region by region, and to read profiles of finalists and winners from 2006 through 2009, visit WORLDmag.com/compassion.

In succeeding months we'll have articles on the Midwest, South, and Northeast finalists, and each time we'll select a regional winner. WORLDmag.com/compassion also has links to register for upcoming WORLD Reader Dinners in Chicago, Atlanta, and Boston, where the finalists and winners from the upcoming regional competitions will be honored and recognized.

By summer we'll have our own Final Four, and readers will be able to go to the website during July and August to vote for the regional winner they think should be national champion: We'll announce that vote in September at a dinner in New York City. With the American Bible Society co-sponsoring the competition, regional winners will receive $5,000 and the national winner an additional $5,000, but what's most important is that hundreds of thousands of people will learn how these ministries glorify God. Click here to listen to WORLD editor in chief Marvin Olasky discuss with Alisa Harris the West regional finalists.