1. Tell us about your mission.

Our mission is to change lives and communities through the power of adult literacy.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation has been collaborating with ProLiteracy for more than 20 years. Our relationship started in 1999 when this organization was known as Laubach Literacy International (LLI). Leadership from The West Foundation allowed ProLiteracy/LLI to launch our Women in Literacy initiative, which ultimately grew to reach to 125 grassroots partners in 65 countries. The West Foundation worked directly with the international division for many years and helped us not only financially but strategically in connecting with other NGO partner organizations such as Care International. The West Foundation has funded many international projects integrating literacy into various development areas such as health literacy, women’s economic empowerment, and human rights. Their hands-on approach and leadership have been invaluable in growing ProLiteracy’s international division.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

The West Foundation’s leadership and involvement over the past 20 years have helped ProLiteracy connect with other strategic partners both to leverage new streams of funding and to develop new programmatic initiatives such as our international intern/volunteer program as well as Women in Literacy.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

As an organization, ProLiteracy developed a Theory of Change and accompanying measures of impact to better understand how our work helps local programs. We have learned over the past few years that our reach is quite large, touching at least one million learners worldwide through our member programs and publishing customers. While we hope to maintain our reach, growing it to help even more literacy programs and learners is our true goal. To do that, we are solidifying partnerships that make teaching literacy easier, meeting new organizations external to literacy so new learners can be reached, and raising awareness of the issue so more learners and tutors step forward.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

We want others to know the importance of adult literacy and that it is truly one of the most solvable social issues that would make a major impact on the world. When adults go from low literate to literate, it has immense effects on their lives especially in the areas of personal and family economies—one report showed that learners who study for over 100 hours earn $10,000 more in a year than those who do not reach this milestone. Additionally, improved health is an area where we see change—low-literate adults have a hard time understanding health risks and precautionary measures. Imagine how real this issue is in the midst of a global pandemic. A more literate population can not only affect the public’s health but also public dollars as well.

6. How can people reading this help you?

If you are reading this and want to help, we can always use financial support, especially during this time when the pandemic has caused distance education to replace in-person instruction. ProLiteracy recently launched the Literacy Relief Fund, which will give digital education tools and books to local programs so they can continue working with adult learners. If financial support is not possible, we encourage you to consider being trained as a volunteer tutor or offering other help to a local program. In the U.S., you can check out the National Literacy Directory to find a local program or contact info@proliteracy.org for international contacts.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

As an organization working in adult literacy, we have a long list of needs. What would help us the most is for the general public to recognize that literacy is a basic human right. So often, people assume that all adults are literate, but 760 million adults around the world are not. To improve our society, we first need to recognize and examine the inequities that exist and why they exist. Then we need help to create and distribute tools—such as literacy education—so we can start to solve the problem. Literacy is a basic building block of education and communication, so the more people who understand that and support our work, the better off we will all be.

Photo courtesy: ProLiteracy

Disclaimer: this is not an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities. Offers are made only following verification of eligibility and solely pursuant to a fund’s private offering materials.

1. Tell us about your mission.

Global Partnerships (GP) is a nonprofit, impact-first investor dedicated to expanding opportunity for people living in poverty. Our funds make loans and early stage investments in social enterprises delivering products and services that empower people to earn a living and improve their lives. Our investments seek social impact on four dimensions:

• Broadening Opportunity: We have a holistic understanding of poverty, so we invest across all facets of poverty – livelihoods, education, energy, health, housing, and sanitation.
• Deepening Inclusion: We invest at the edge of the market, emphasizing approaches that include people marginalized by depth of poverty, gender, and/or geography, including women and the rural poor.
• Serving Millions: We believe that every person matters, and we aim to expand opportunity for as many people as possible. We therefore focus on sustainable approaches that can, over time, scale to serve millions of people living in poverty.
• Improving Lives: We only invest where evidence convinces us that people living in poverty value the opportunity being delivered and are empowered by it – economically or otherwise – to improve their lives.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

For over a decade, The West Foundation’s support for GP has allowed us to grow and expand our work. That growth has expanded our impact significantly in service of our mission to expand opportunity for households living in poverty. As of June 30, 2020:

• Our funds have deployed more than $441 million in cumulative impact-led capital to over 155 partners across 23 countries.
• Our current fund portfolio of $122 million serves people living in poverty across 15 initiatives, from urban sanitation to women-centered finance with education.
• Our efforts to provide economic opportunity, better health, cleaner energy, safer and more secure housing, and other human services have cumulatively impacted 19.3 million lives.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

Philanthropic support from The West Foundation and other mission-driven supporters has strengthened our operations while allowing us to stretch to increase our impact. In recent years we have launched new investment funds, developed new initiatives to address the varied facets of poverty, increased our lending volume to social enterprises, and expanded into sub-Saharan Africa, all while building a sustainable staff structure to support those efforts.

GP also has a dedicated research and impact team that is largely funded by philanthropic support like that of The West Foundation. From researching new potential partners dedicated to social impact, to developing impact screening tools, our research and impact team continually enhances our ability to improve lives for people living in poverty.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

For 25 years, GP funds have invested in sustainable solutions that help impoverished people increase their incomes and improve their lives. During that time, we have continually reviewed and improved our approach. Our analysis starts from the household: what products and services are truly making a difference for people and families living in poverty? What social enterprises are providing those products and services affordably and at scale? Can GP help them do more?

We use leading-edge impact management tools, and we have a learning mindset. That means that we are constantly evolving to make sure we are meeting needs and striving toward our mission.

As the world is responding to the economic and health crisis posed by COVID-19, GP is committed to walking alongside our 80+ social enterprise partners and the millions of people living in poverty whom they serve. We hope to help our partners as they navigate through to the other side of this pandemic and emerge sustainable, resilient, and impactful for the long-term.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

GP is an impact-first investor, which means investing in a way that seeks the highest possible social impact, while seeking to preserve capital with a modest financial return for investors.

Impact-first investing is distinctly different from return-first investing, which seeks the highest possible financial return, often without consideration of social or environmental consequences, and from the broader definition of impact investing which seeks to offer market rate or near-market rate financial returns that can be a tradeoff to truly maximizing impact.

We believe that impact-first investing has an essential role to play in advancing sustainable solutions to poverty for millions of people worldwide.

6. How can people reading this help you?

Learn more about GP’s response to COVID-19 and about the investment initiatives GP develops to address different facets of poverty. If you are interested in making a philanthropic impact with GP, please contact us.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

GP is seeking catalytic philanthropic supporters to make five-year commitments to Global Partnerships. An impact-first approach to investment requires significant resources to ensure positive impact truly comes first. GP is more than 90 percent of the way toward our goal of raising $15 million in philanthropy over five years to support impact-first work related to the portfolio of our funds. For Global Partnerships, philanthropy is more than a donation. We are enormously grateful to The West Foundation for providing catalytic philanthropic support for over ten years.

Photo courtesy: Global Partnerships

In a new article on Medium, Boris Bulayev, Educate! CEO & Co-Founder & Loren Crary, Educate! Director of Revenue Strategy share how their social enterprise is rethinking and reorganizing to survive the peak of the pandemic and thrive in the new world it creates.

Read the article here.

1. Tell us about your mission.

MAP International provides high-quality medicines and health supplies to millions of the worlds

poorest, most vulnerable people so that they may experience life to the fullest.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

Most recently, The West Foundation played a critical role by partnering with MAP to provide funding to help train and equip midwives in rural Liberia. One of the world’s poorest countries, Liberia also has one of the highest maternal/infant mortality rates. The MAP and West Foundation partnership has helped save lives and led to a decrease in the number of maternal/child deaths.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

By partnering with MAP to provide education and educational resources in some of the world’s poorest countries, the West Foundation is helping empower communities and creating lasting change for future generations.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

Educating people is vital to the long-term health of any community — particularly in more remote, rural areas where medicines and trained caregivers are in short supply.

MAP International and its partners are providing both the critically needed education and the resources necessary to maintain and build healthier, more sustainable communities.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

We believe that all people should have access to life-changing, quality medicines and proper healthcare no matter where they were born or their financial circumstances. Worldwide, there are more than 2 billion people – most of whom are children – who do not have access to the most basic of medicines that we in the developed world take for granted. Through our work in 98 countries – many of them among the poorest in the world — MAP’s life-changing medicines and health supplies impact the lives of more than 13 million people annually.

6. How can people reading this help you?

Global health needs are tremendous, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic raging. MAP relies on the generous support of our donors to get lifesaving medicines and health supplies to where they are needed. When you hear about a natural disaster with survivors without access to clean water or hygiene supplies or people who are suffering from curable illnesses because they don’t have access to basic medicines, please consider making a gift to MAP International.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

As the worst global health crisis in living memory, the COVID-19 pandemic is having a major impact in MAP’s work. We have received many emergency requests for personal protective equipment from healthcare providers and local governments in the United States and other countries around the world.

These emergency requests are in addition to our scheduled shipments of medicines and health supplies to countries in dire need. With medical mission teams unable to travel to areas decimated by coronavirus, MAP is also sending more medicines and health supplies to our existing partners on the ground to fill that gap.

With no definitive end to the pandemic in sight, MAP continues to respond to these increased demands. But to do so, we need more funding to cover these emergency shipments and the additional medicines we are sending.

Gifts of any size are deeply appreciated and will help bring health and hope to a world in desperately in need of both. Please visit www.map.org to learn more.

Photo courtesy: MAP

1.Tell us about your mission.

mothers2mothers (m2m) is an Africa-based non-governmental organization (NGO) with a simple and effective mission – to ensure healthy, thriving families and an end to pediatric AIDS. Our success and impact are rooted in the Mentor Mother Model of peer mentorship, role modelling, and high-impact interventions. We train and employ local women living with HIV, often society’s most marginalized population, as Mentor Mothers,—frontline health workers who educate and support women and their families to access healthcare, initiate any care they need, and adhere to their treatments. Our evidence-based programs are designed to reach, educate, and engage the most vulnerable women, children, and families, strengthen public health systems, and catalyze the achievement of the UNAIDS 95-95-95 Fast Track Targets for HIV epidemic control as well as the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.

Since 2001, m2m Mentor Mothers have provided life-saving services to more than 11 million women and children under two years of age, and by virtually eliminating pediatric AIDS among our clients for the last six years, have contributed to the reduction of pediatric HIV in the countries in which we operate. From a single site in Cape Town, South Africa, we have expanded our footprint across sub-Saharan Africa, created jobs for more than 11,000 women living with HIV as Mentor Mothers, and empowered millions more women to actively drive positive health outcomes for themselves and their families. From an initial focus on preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV, m2m now delivers a range of services including early childhood development, adolescent health,  screenings for malaria and tuberculosis, and support for non-communicable diseases (NCDs), to ensure the whole community not only survives, but thrives.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation has been a dedicated m2m partner since 2013, recognizing the game-changing role of Mentor Mothers at the heart of addressing some of the most pressing challenges facing families in sub-Saharan Africa. Its President and Executive Director, Emily West, has been an important advocate on behalf m2m’s belief in the power of mothers to ensure healthy, thriving families, and end pediatric AIDS.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is the West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

The West Foundation supports m2m by providing us with the most valuable grants possible, the unrestricted funding which affords us the flexibility and trust needed to be creative in program design, while allowing us to cover both programmatic and operational expenses. As an organization that prioritizes the social and economic mobility of women, their families, and communities, The West Foundation gives m2m the mobility to allocate funds where the needs are more urgent and greatest, which in turn ensures the sustainability of our programs across Africa.

The importance of unrestricted funding has never been more apparent than now, as m2m pivots to address the double pandemics of HIV and COVID-19. Our recently launched “Virtual Mentor Mother” platform allows us to deliver a sophisticated virtual system for providing emergency COVID-19 interventions in addition to our in-person core m2m health services.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

Since its infancy, m2m has consistently made measurable strides in reaching its mission to eliminate pediatric HIV and create health and hope in the families and communities we serve. Within the last year we have launched programs in three new countries—Angola, Ghana, and Tanzania—bringing our total countries of operation to ten.

In 2019, we enrolled almost 1 million new clients, and reached 27% more adolescents and 20% more children compared to 2018.  Just 0.08% of pregnant or breastfeeding women who were HIV-negative when enrolled in m2m’s program contracted HIV in 2019, which is 45 times lower than a 2020 estimate of the rate across sub-Saharan Africa (3.6%).  95% of our clients reported consistent condom use, up from 68% in 2018. 97% of infants born to HIV-positive mothers received anti-retroviral drops, a key preventative measure, up from 90% in 2018. And 84% of children born to an HIV-positive mother received a final HIV test between 18 – 24 months of age, a vital step to ensuring the child has not become infected during breastfeeding, up from 73% in 2018.

Most notably, with a transmission rate of just 1.9%, m2m has achieved virtual elimination of mother-to-child transmission of HIV among enrolled clients for the sixth consecutive year!

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

The m2m Mentor Mother Model is a robust strategy that empowers, trains, and employs women from local communities, and has been proven to be adaptable and well suited to address myriad issues beyond our initial mandate to end pediatric HIV. By creating local role models and breaking the cycle of stigma and discrimination, the model is ideal for eradicating and curtailing other noncommunicable diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, and kidney diseases.

To ensure that we’re supporting women and families at all stages of life, we offer a wide range of services:

• Women (ages 15-49) – Essential health services include: sexual and reproductive health (i.e. HIV/STI prevention and treatment, family planning); screening for malaria and TB; ensuring healthy pregnancies, safe deliveries, and quality postnatal care; treatment initiation, retention and adherence support for HIV-positive pregnant and postnatal women to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV; strengthening economic wellbeing and food security.
• Children (ages 0-9) – m2m is committed to ensuring that every child thrives, not just survives, by integrating services to protect and improve the health of development of infants into our core Peer Mentor program by: providing early childhood development support and education; tailoring support for HIV-positive or -exposed children and families including testing, disclosure, treatment initiation, adherence and retention support; nutrition education and immunizations; and assistance with registering births and accessing social services.
• Adolescents (ages 10-24) – m2m supports adolescents and young women to make healthy choices and protect themselves from HIV by providing peer-led, age-appropriate interventions in schools and communities that link to services at health centers. Services include: sexual and reproductive health education and services; age-appropriate interventions to prevent new HIV infections and unplanned pregnancies; prevention of mother-to-child transmission services for HIV-positive pregnant and postnatal adolescent girls and young women.

6. How can people reading this help you?

We are always looking for a variety of partners – from individuals, corporations, and government agenicies, to other nonprofit organizations. In terms of monetary support, there are many ways you can support us in reaching our mission – organize virtual events to create awareness and collect donations, spread the word to friends and family, create Facebook fundraisers, and follow us on social media.

On October 25^th, we will host Cycle2Zero@home, our first virtual adventure. Usually taking place in an African country where m2m operates, this year, we are bringing the cycle to you. Together we will collectively pedal more than 3,000 miles, day and night, over 36 hours. We cycle in solidarity with our incredible Mentor Mothers, who need our support now more than ever during this global health emergency. For more ideas, please check out our website www.m2m.org.

And finally, because mothers2mothers Mentor Mothers have been deemed essential frontline workers, they are putting their lives on the line every day to combat the double pandemic of HIV and COVID-19.  Your financial support can help us continue to meet the changing health needs of the one million women and families that rely on us across nine African nations as we scale up our response and adapt our services.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

As m2m works to ensure healthy, thriving families and an end to pediatric AIDS, we rely on the dedication, passion, and support of tireless partners and funders around the world. Ending HIV is just the start, and we are bent on achieving impact on a global scale. We know that women and mothers are central to any and all long-lasting systems change. We need to reach all women and children everywhere. We are looking to expand the Mentor Mother Model to ensure that, whether they live in Louisiana or Lesotho, every family is able to access life-saving care.  We welcome you to join us as we change the face of healthcare, putting the Mentor Mother Model at the center of the solution to eliminate pediatric AIDS and provide health and hope for families everywhere.

Photo courtesy: mothers2mothers

1. Tell us about your mission.

Boys Hope Girls Hope’s mission is to nurture and guide motivated young people in need to become well-educated, career-ready “men and women for others.” We firmly believe that children have the power to overcome adversity, realize their potential, and help transform our world. Children create these successes when we remove obstacles, support, and believe in them, and provide environments and opportunities that build on their strengths.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

Operating in 16 cities in the United States and Latin America, Boys Hope Girls Hope uses programming adapted to the needs of each community, unique curriculum, and partnerships with local schools and universities. The West Foundation supports our mission through its ongoing commitment to Esperanza Juvenil, a Guatemalan affiliate of Boys Hope Girls Hope. Esperanza Juvenil was established in 1991 to support the nation’s disadvantaged population. Since then, it has served youth from impoverished communities around Guatemala, helping them develop their academic and leadership potential to break the cycle of poverty for them and their families. Responding to the need for access and quality education, Esperanza Juvenil has created its own school from 3rd grade to 12th grade, which offers a rigorous curriculum and personalized attention to prepare students for college and beyond.

Developing well-rounded, well-educated individuals in Guatemala is an important goal because nationally only 8% of the population enrolls, and only 2% graduate from college. In contrast, all students who enter our program enroll and complete college. 2020 graduate Ericka Barrios expressed her appreciation: “Esperanza Juvenil has been a great blessing- not just for me, but for my whole family. It allows young people to fulfill their dreams and create change in society.”

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

Boys Hope Girls Hope relies on West funding to help maintain operations and flexibly provide critical resources for Esperanza Juvenil youth and their families. At Esperanza Juvenil, we always work hard for all our scholars to continue their education with no setbacks. Under normal conditions, this means a team is working together and serving the psychological, academic, social, and spiritual guidance and support. Right now, the challenges are significant as scholars live outside of our program residences and study remotely. Even as technology cannot substitute dedicated in-person support by professionals, providing educational and personal guidance through Boys Hope Girls Hope is proving vital for Esperanza Juvenil scholars to keep making progress.

Executive Director Lucas Pinzon offers his gratitude after leading a time of significant expansion: “We are very grateful for all the support The West Foundation has given us over the years. Thanks to your support, we have grown to support 186 boys and girls from all over Guatemala. We already have 32 students at the university level and 10 who have already graduated.”

4. How are you realizing your potential?

Esperanza Juvenil has made a long-term commitment to scholar excellence and achieved a huge goal last year, opening its new high school campus thanks to the support of a local construction company and other businesses, families, foundations and individuals. With this great step, two new grades (11th and 12th grade) were added to its high school program, and we will celebrate the first graduating class of the Esperanza Juvenil High School in November 2020. Of course, this group is coping with many different pressures now — academically, economically and emotionally — as most of them are helping their parents generate income as the crisis has increased their financial burdens. We are doing all we can to make sure all scholars perform well academically this year, despite the circumstances, and keep motivated to pursue their degrees and dreams.

In the big picture, of course, Boys Hope Girls Hope realizing its potential is when our scholars are realize their potential. A great example of this is Esperanza Juvenil’s Luis Ángel Hernández Sandoval, who will soon graduate as a lawyer from Landivar University. He is an ambitious young man drawn to business law, plus Luis also wants to give back by serving on the board of an organization like Esperanza Juvenil: “Always think about the future. Vaya por mas. Go for more.”

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

Boys Hope Girls Hope’s commitment to its youth is comprehensive and endures for years. It means accompanying them on a developmental journey that extends through college while honoring their strong ties to their families, cultures, and home communities. And in return, they become the “young men and women for others” that are so needed to face today’s tough challenges.

6. How can people reading this help you?

People can help Boys Hope Girls Hope in a wide variety of ways:

• Volunteer leadership through the International headquarters and our 16 affiliates

• Face-to-face and digital community service as coaches, mentors, houseparents and more

• Assisting with logistical needs at residences like cooking, repairs, etc.

• Making referrals for promising youth in need

• Providing fundraising support and contributions

• Joining us as community partners and dedicated employees

The Boys Hope Girls Hope website is an excellent place to learn more about our affiliates and operations, to follow us on social media, and to connect with our many support opportunities!

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

While Boys Hope Girls Hope has an outstanding +40 year record of service, we still continuously strive to improve on behalf of our young people. Right now, our greatest needs are deepening programs and resources that ensure the whole-child development of our youth as young men and women for others. Looking ahead, these needs include developing additional pathways to service-learning and 21st-century skills, keeping our students as safe and healthy as possible, and strengthening our online educational tools.

Photo courtesy: Boys Hope Girls Hope

1. Tell us about your mission.

Founded in 1961, the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF) has since its inception worked to ensure wildlife and wild lands thrive in modern Africa. AWF takes a multifaceted approach, to protect wildlife and their natural habitats, empower communities through conservation enterprises and human development, and engage African leadership at all levels to support conservation. In 2020, AWF adopted a new 10-year strategic plan, driven by its vision of an Africa where human development includes thriving wildlife and extensive wild lands as a cultural and economic asset for Africa’s future generation.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

AWF initially began as a leadership academy to equip African nationals to manage conservation efforts on the continent. AWF continues to invest in building African capacity and leadership for conservation. These efforts reflect AWF’s fundamental understanding of wildlife education as a means of cultivating conservation leaders and developing a population that recognizes their role in developing and maintaining positive conservation outcomes. Consequently, AWF understands that in order to achieve its vision, it must empower African youth as conservation gains will only be sustainable if future generations subscribe to this mission.

The West Foundation is supporting AWF’s advocacy effort to engage African youth in conservation and environmental sustainability discussions and enhance their leadership skills. AWF has partnered with the Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN) to build the capacity of youth from Cameroon, Kenya, Uganda, and Zimbabwe to advocate for biodiversity issues and to engage with conservation policy discussions in their home countries. After participating in training workshops, young people will be provided the opportunity to participate in global convenings on biodiversity. This training and experience will empower African youth by building their leadership skills, exposing them to high-level national policy discussions, and providing them an opportunity to define their perspectives and to share input into the post-2020 biodiversity framework. Furthermore, The West Foundation’s support of AWF heightens a sense of ownership and agency among African youth as it relates to wildlife conservation.

The West Foundation has supported AWF since 2001. Previously, The West Foundation supported AWF’s conservation and social development work in the Limpopo Heartland (South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique) to train young African research scientists, strengthen the management capacity and infrastructure of protected area systems, and explore new sustainable conservation enterprises. In addition, the foundation contributed greatly to AWF’s Easements for Education program to provide scholarships for the children of families who agree to conserve wildlife, forests, and fisheries in the ecologically significant Sekute Chiefdom—located in the region where Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Namibia intersect. The West Foundation enabled AWF to distribute and train teachers on the use of ZeduPad tablets to improve classroom learning, establish a small vegetable garden at the Lupani Primary School, as well as install solar panels in two of the six classrooms to permit adult literacy classes in the evenings. The West Foundation also contributed to AWF’s project to distribute improved cooking stoves among Simien Mountain communities to reduce deforestation and environmental pollution in Ethiopia.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

With the support of The West Foundation, AWF is working to ensure youth presence and leadership in defining dialogues about biodiversity conservation to shape strategic goals and targets as well as the corresponding actions by key stakeholders which inevitably influence not on conservation, but the nature in which Africa develops. Though African youth constitute a large proportion of the population on the continent, they are often overlooked in the development of programs to improve societal wellbeing. By engaging African youth in policy dialogues, AWF will help to shape the trajectory of Africa’s future in a more sustainable manner that gives precedence to the importance of biodiversity in ensuring healthy economies and ecosystems. This program is instrumental in advancing AWF’s critical objective to generate greater awareness of biodiversity issues and develop future leaders that will prioritize conservation.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

AWF is taking a more holistic approach, as guided by its country strategies and priorities, to ensure that conservation is mainstreamed into larger discussions of economy building and sustainable development. AWF is also prioritizing its engagement with youth and women because they are key drivers of change across Africa. AWF recognizes that its work would be impossible without the contributions of these two constituencies who make up the majority of the population on the continent today.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

While AWF serves to promote conservation of biodiversity in Africa, the impact of doing so serves to the benefit of the global community. This is evidence in the fact that threats to African wildlife are not an “African” problem. For instance, illegal trade of wildlife and wildlife parts heightens regional and global security issues. Meanwhile, healthy ecosystems are vital to continued economic growth and to creating new business opportunities in Africa. Furthermore, increased global demand for wildlife and wildlife products intensifies the risk of iconic wildlife – often those that play a key role in ecosystems – becoming extinct. As development continues in Africa, AWF will continue to work to ensure that conservation agendas are linked to economic and social development.

6. How can people reading this help you?

• Donate to help AWF expand our conservation efforts
• Learn about AWF’s youth engagement work
• Learn about the treasured species AWF protects every day
• Get an inside look at conservation on the AWF blog
• Spread awareness about Africa’s poaching crisis by sharing AWF’s infographic

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

Africa’s magnificent wildlife species at risk of disappearing forever. In the last few decades alone, the world has lost more than 60 percent of forest elephants and more than 40 percent of lions. Poaching, driven by global demand, is at crisis levels. However, habitat loss poses the most extensive threat to African wildlife. The state of rainforests in Africa and around the world is an example. Scientists estimate that if current deforestation rates go unchecked, rainforests will be gone in 100 years — and most of their inhabitants with them. The picture is bleak, but not set in stone. In fact, change has already taken root. There is a growing consciousness that thoughtful economic and infrastructure development can and should incorporate conservation priorities. AWF helped bring about this change and works tirelessly every day to ensure a positive future for Africa’s wildlife and wild lands. AWF seeks to create strong alliances that bring together the public and private sectors, as well as individuals, to support efforts to overcome the challenges of wildlife protection and conservation.

Photo courtesy: African Wildlife Foundation (AWF)

1. Tell us about your mission.

Ubuntu Pathways’ mission is to break the cycle of poverty by providing South Africa’s most vulnerable children with what all children deserve––everything, every day. Operating out of a state-of-the-art campus in the heart of Port Elizabeth’s townships, we provide transformative health, education, and household stability services to 2,000 children and their families. The Ubuntu Model, our revolutionary theory of change, encompasses four guiding tenets:

• Cradle to career pathway out of poverty that includes dynamic educational programs, life-saving healthcare, and sustained household stability services

• Depth rather than breadth of impact by continuously improving program quality to meet clients’ evolving needs

• Localized, grassroots development to mitigate the specific challenges that Port Elizabeth’s townships face

• Sustainable investments in community leadership, capacity, and infrastructure

We target not just the symptoms, but the root causes of poverty. By offering individualized services to every client, we help them overcome hardships to lead healthy, financially stable lives. This comprehensive support system enables our clients to advance towards a lifetime of success.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation has supported Ubuntu’s cradle-to-career for years. Ubuntu’s mission requires an individualized, grassroots approach to development. Our community’s needs are constantly evolving, and we must be ready and equipped to meet them.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

The West Foundation has allowed us to achieve this mission not only through its steadfast support, but also by trusting us enough to provide unrestricted funding to our operations. Nothing better exemplifies the importance of this funding approach—and the sustainability and mobility it provides—than the COVID-19 pandemic. This outbreak has posed an existential threat to disadvantaged communities around the world. Within a matter of weeks, Ubuntu had to pivot away from “normal” operations to become a COVID-19 response center. We not only had to prepare for the impending medical crisis in the townships, but also the food security and domestic abuse crises brought on by the region’s economic collapse. In this moment of critical need, our team could rely on funding from The West Foundation as we sought to respond to an unforeseen and unprecedented challenge.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

For the past two decades, Ubuntu has sought to expose and break down deeply rooted barriers to prosperity and success in our community. In South Africa, the country’s entrenched social inequality oppresses the Black majority. Abject poverty is pervasive, and the gap between the rich and poor grows ever-wider. Port Elizabeth’s townships are reminders of apartheid’s systemic segregation—while health care and education systems are composed of well-funded, private facilities for the wealthy, the poor are relegated to overcrowded, under-resourced, public facilities.

Over the past few months, COVID-19 has shown a spotlight on these fissures of social inequality across the world. Those who have the most limited access to health care and education—such as the people of Port Elizabeth’s townships—are the ones who are disproportionately affected by the pandemic. While Ubuntu has pivoted our service provision to best mitigate the effects of the pandemic in the townships, this pivot is, in essence, a more targeted and intensified version of our previous 20 years of service to our community. While our response project will provide immediate, life-saving services to those in greatest need, it will just as urgently contribute to our core mission, breaking down social inequalities and affirming every human’s right to live a healthy, fulfilling life. In this way, we are realizing the full vision and potential of Ubuntu.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

At Ubuntu, we do not measure success by the number of children we reach, but by how deeply we impact each child’s life. As a result, our clients are re-writing their own futures and the wider narrative of what disadvantaged communities can accomplish.

6. How can people reading this help you?

Donate! During this unprecedented crisis, every dollar matters. The generosity of our donors literally translates into medication, food on the table, and other life-saving interventions for children and families in need. You can also get creative––create a birthday fundraiser, run a race, start a school Ubuntu club, or become a monthly THRIVE member. From cryptocurrency to planned giving, there are so many ways to contribute to our work in a meaningful way. Plus, you can always create awareness of our work and mission in your own networks.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

As Ubuntu continuously seeks to grow and develop as an organization, we have a deep and urgent need for funders who understand and support our theory of change. Ubuntu seeks to fundamentally change the lives of each child and family we serve. Just as any parent or caregiver knows, supporting a child’s growth and development is a long, hard, and often non-linear process. Every individual has their own unique needs, as well as their own moments of triumph and setbacks. Ubuntu aims to be holistic and unwavering in our support – but in order to achieve this ambitious goal, we need funders who follow the example of The West Foundation and trust those on the ground to possess the experience and judgement needed to best utilize unrestricted funds. Ubuntu does not decide to spend any dollar lightly—resources are scarce in our community and thus extraordinarily valued. To have the trust and mutual understanding of additional funders who understand this dynamic would be game-changing not only for Ubuntu, but the entire industry.

Photo courtesy: Ubuntu Pathways

1. Tell us about your mission.

The mission of Strategies for International Development (SID) is to design, prove, and promote better methods for eradicating rural poverty.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation has partnered with us over the years to fulfill our mission in Guatemala’s poorest regions. First, with coffee farmers in the western highlands and now with coffee farmers in the northern highlands. When The West Foundation chose to focus on women and girls, that encouraged us to think about them as well. In a smaller area of the northern highlands we added a women’s component to the coffee program and in the last two years we have expanded our reach to cover a whole region of thousands of coffee-growing families and thousands of women.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

In 2018, with the support of The West Foundation, SID started a new regional approach in the northern highlands. With this new approach, we were able to help over 18,000 small farmers.

Coffee is the major cash crop of the region. The core activities of the program include:

1. Farmers define the practices they need to adapt to graduate from poverty

2. Local officials promote the practices among the general population

3. Conduct demonstration fairs in the practices

4. Provide twice-monthly technical assistance to early-adopter communities that become an example to others

5. Gives special assistance to women

4. How are you realizing your potential?

We designed a new idea that fulfills our mission in ways which we have not before: to help farmers conserve their natural resources at the same time as they increase their income. We have also helped them adopt business practices and we helped women increase their personal growth, but now we are doing it at a large scale. This innovation brings assistance to thousands of farmers who never had any help before. This is very important because, a lot of small farmers around the world do not have access to technical assistance.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

75% of the world’s poor are small farmers. We can do a lot for farmers to help increase their income. Agricultural projects are also great vehicles for addressing the conservation of natural resources and women’s equality.

6. How can people reading this help you?

Learn about SID and participate in our annual individual donor campaign, Friends of SID.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

To enhance our visibility and find channels to spread our ideas

Photo courtesy: Strategies for International Development (SID)

1. Tell us about your mission.

Shared Interest mobilizes the resources for Southern Africa’s economically disenfranchised communities to sustain themselves and build equitable nations. We provide entrepreneurs, smallholder farmers, women, and other unbankable borrowers with the financial and social capital they need to invest in their businesses, farms, families, and communities. We do this by providing loan guarantees to local African banks, moving them to extend credit to “high risk” borrowers who otherwise would not have qualified for credit. By moving local banks to lend to their own communities, we help build sustainable, vibrant economies that are not dependent on international capital for development. Since our founding in 1994, we have benefitted 2.3 million Southern Africans.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation has partnered with Shared Interest for many years, by providing grant support for both general operations, with a focus on institutional strengthening, and specific projects, such as our work with women seed entrepreneurs in Malawi. The West Foundation’s support is particularly crucial to our work because it is flexible, helping ensure that we have the organizational resources that are required to produce strong and impactful programs.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

Most recently, The West Foundation has helped Shared Interest adapt to the new working conditions imposed by the pandemic. We used 2019 grant funds to upgrade our technological capabilities – moving to cloud-based file storage, improving staff hardware, and investing in new donor management and prospecting software. In some cases, these changes were made a matter of weeks before our offices in New York were closed due to Covid-19. Because of these enhanced IT resources, Shared Interest was able to transition smoothly to remote work, keeping in close contact with our local partners and beneficiaries as well as our donors and investors.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

Shared Interest was founded to push for economic justice in post-apartheid South Africa, and our success there has helped demonstrate that African countries’ own financial institutions are not only capable of serving the majority market but are critical to driving inclusive economic growth. We are now expanding our model across the Southern African region, where financial exclusion is similarly widespread, especially in agriculture and among women borrowers. Working in new geographies (e.g., Malawi, Zambia, and eventually, Tanzania) and in high impact focus areas (e.g., climate change adaptation) is helping us leverage our investors’ capital to impact another 100,000 individuals by 2024, creating jobs and small enterprises, increasing incomes, and building community infrastructure.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

Shared Interest has investors as well as donors, and for more than 25 years, we have been responsible stewards of their capital. We have made 100% of interest payments in full and on time, and we have had zero losses of investors’ principal. To make an investment in Shared Interest, contact martha@sharedinterest.org

6. How can people reading this help you?

Shared Interest is holding its first Virtual Gala this year on September 9th, 2020, and we would love to have you as our guest! For more information, please go to https://www.sharedinterest.org/26thanniversarygala

The event is free! This year, we celebrate the power of women in Southern Africa; accordingly, the event will honor Sophia Williams de Bruyn, anti-apartheid activist and leader of the 1956 women’s march, and Felicia Mabuza-Suttle, South African talk show host, activist, and entrepreneur. The event will also feature an after-party, with beats by DJ AQ.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

We are always in need of partners – of all types – who understand the long-term nature of this work. Changing financial systems that were built, in large part, by and for settler colonialism is a painstakingly slow process. The results are not always easily measured, and progress is not linear or steady. Our most prized relationships are with like-minded organizations who understand these challenges yet remain steadfast in working toward our common goals.

Photo courtesy: Shared Interest

1. Tell us about your mission.

TechnoServe is a leader in harnessing the power of the private sector to help people lift themselves out of poverty. A nonprofit organization operating in 29 countries, we work with hardworking men and women in the developing world to build competitive farms, businesses, and industries. By linking people to information, capital, and markets, we have helped millions to create lasting prosperity for their families and communities.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation is currently supporting our efforts to reduce poverty by helping women smallholder cocoa farmers in San Martin, Peru to sustainably improve their livelihoods and ensure the full integration of women farmers into the cocoa market. In the past, the West Foundation has supported many other impactful projects, such as strengthening our Monitoring and Evaluation systems for our projects with small-scale entrepreneurs, as well as supporting smallholder farmers in Tanzania’s tea industry to improve their livelihoods.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

The support of the West Foundation over the past several decades has enabled TechnoServe to become a catalyst for transformation in market systems, industries, and most importantly, people’s lives in the communities where we’ve implemented projects. Together, we’ve helped families around the world send their children to school, access healthcare, buy nutritious food, and build safer homes.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

TechnoServe was founded in 1968 on the premise that the power of private enterprise can transform lives, and that hardworking individuals in the developing world can lift themselves out of poverty. In 2019 alone, TechnoServe helped directly transform the lives of 317,493 people (38% women) by targeting improvements in farms, businesses, and industries. Our efforts generated over $200 million in increased revenues and wages for our beneficiaries and we helped hardworking individuals’ access $27 million in financing to help grow their businesses and farms. Last year, TechnoServe was also rated the world’s #1 nonprofit at reducing poverty by an independent evaluator, ImpactMatters. They assessed over a thousand nonprofits across different categories and determined that for every program dollar spent, TechnoServe delivers the greatest income gains for enterprising women and men in the developing world.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

TechnoServe not only transforms individual lives—but also markets, sectors, and communities. We are committed to creating and measuring this lasting impact. We aim to report only the impact that is attributable to our work. We do this by establishing baseline data and using counterfactuals, control groups, or other methods to exclude the effects of variables outside of our control. We then analyze this data to identify successful project models and learn how to improve future approaches.

6. How can people reading this help you?

They can help by joining our efforts to change lives around the world. Every day, our supporters help us continue in our mission to assist hardworking men and women in the developing world to build sustainable farms, businesses and industries. Even during these challenging times, we are committed to helping our clients continue their fight to overcome the toughest obstacles, care for their families, and fulfill their true potential. None of this work would be possible without support from generous individuals.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

The support we receive from foundations and individuals is critically needed, especially at this critical time. Funding for important projects like our work with cocoa farmers in Peru often depends upon TechnoServe’s ability to leverage and strategically utilize unrestricted and private support. Furthermore, unrestricted funding or strategically directed support is critical to our ability to innovate or pilot new types of interventions. These funds allow us to design programs before larger funding is awarded, to leverage funding after receiving an award and to continue implementing programs while honoring timelines related to specific large donors’ commitments.

Photo courtesy: TechnoServe 

1. Tell us about your mission.

My mission is multifold. First, we support two schools that are located in a remote and densely populated rural area in  northern Afghanistan and work to educate a large block of women who – during the Taliban administration – were deprived of education. In providing educational opportunities, such as vocational training we can reach widows who have no education or ability to earn a living wage other than by begging door-to-door, pleading for food to feed their family. Many in this region have large families and without a breadwinner this can be challenging.

One of the goals we’ve put forth is to increase the education level for women who participate through participating in the basic literacy courses offered.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation has been a substantial donor of funds for our initiative and this has helped provide not only educational supplies but teacher income for  the adult female literacy program. Women who have completed the basic course have gone on to land fullfiling jobs to sustain their families.

3. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

Many women have achieved great things such as pursuing higher education and quality jobs. It is empowering to witness a widow – whose life was subject to begging transform themselves into a business owner.

4. How can people reading this help you?

You can make a financial contribution so that we can continue to fund the schools. We have well over 500 students enrolled and 50% are female. Also, we would like to ensure that Hakim Wardak who is on the ground and championing the cause has the funds to pay teachers he hires and supervises for the basic adult female literacy training.

6. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

Ideally, we’d like to find someone who has a high level of interest to continue to support Hakim and his work in transforming an entire generation of uneducated women and educating them; enabling the women to improve their lives.

Photo courtesy: Qudrat School

1. Tell us about your mission.

Problem statement: Issues of poverty persist and it’s hard for those affected to resolve them alone.

Mission statement: Outreach International is a global nonprofit that supports local leaders and community-led groups who develop lasting solutions to poverty-related issues.

Vision statement: We envision a world where communities are working together to overcome the challenges of chronic poverty.

Tagline: Together.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

One of the things that all of us at Outreach International deeply appreciate about The West Foundation is its desire to magnify results by helping organizations improve their systems. Their value comes not by an offer to cover reasonable overhead or fund a specific field project, but rather, by asking “how could you be more effective?”

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

Helping an organization improve its technology, processes, and systems to become more effective or efficient is a defining characteristic of constantly improving in one’s sustainability and mobility. Outreach International provides one piece of evidence – with appropriate investments, we’ve lowered our overhead, improved our feedback loops, and built resilience in our headquarters and international communities. The West Foundation has been a partner in this process.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

We’re still on that journey, but our potential is realized in the company of others working toward similar worthwhile goals.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

We’re one of the highest-rated international charities in the world – and we try to earn that honor every day.

6. How can people reading this help you?

Investigate our work via external evaluators, financials, Annual Reports, and social media.  If empowering people to discover their own pathways out of extreme poverty – and then help their neighbors do the same – speaks to you, then partner with us in this great work.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

To no longer have the need to exist.

Photo courtesy: Outreach International

1. Tell us about your mission.

At Lifewater, we are Christians committed to ending the global water and sanitation crisis one village at a time. We believe that every child deserves a safe drink of water, access to life-saving sanitation and hygiene, and the love of Jesus.

2. How is the West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation’s gifts allow Lifewater greater opportunity and mobility to carry out sustainable safe water and community solutions in extremely poor communities across the globe. In Ethiopia, Cambodia, Uganda, and Tanzania, The West Foundation supports Lifewater’s mission to bring safe water to every child, improved health for all, and the love of Jesus in everything we do.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

With West Foundation’s generous giving, we’re able to employ local staff to travel house by house in our target communities. Knowing the language and culture, they build relationships to empower communities to make cost-effective, life-saving health improvements like constructing a hand washing device and a latrine of their own. Our skilled team of WASH engineers, hydrogeologists, drilling team, and the wisdom of the local community work together to construct a safe water solution unique to the needs of the village or school. With The West Foundation’s support, Lifewater’s able to carry out a grassroots program to end the global water and sanitation crisis, beginning with extremely poor communities in hard-to-reach corners of the world.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

In 2019, Lifewater constructed 207 sustainable, safe water solutions built to last for generations in the globe’s poorest regions, a record-breaking number. As more families than ever gain the health that comes with access to safe water, more children go to school and parents go to work, increasing both income and education. The West Foundation’s mission to eliminate poverty and Lifewater’s mission to end the global water crisis are realized.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

At Lifewater, it’s not about the quantity of results, but the quality. It’s about creating a change that will last. Designing high-quality, locally-sourced safe water solutions customized to the population and hydrogeology of each village is priority at Lifewater because people are priority. When we can serve the globe’s poorest communities with commitment and care, we can be the hands and feet of Jesus.

6. How can people reading this help you?

Every 60 seconds, the world loses another child to unsafe drinking water and a lack of basic sanitation. This is entirely preventable. A gift to Lifewater is a gift to a child or family in need.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

We are always seeking ways to connect our generous partners to our mission in a meaningful way. Our Vision of a Healthy Village program is a grassroots, sustainable answer to the global water crisis, and it’s been tested, proven, and improved with every year. Our deepest needs as an organization are developing ways to draw others into this proven process to finally put an end to the crisis together.

Photo courtesy: Lifewater

1. Tell us about your mission.

KickStart International’s mission is to provide technology that enables millions of people in Africa to break the cycle of poverty quickly, cost-effectively and sustainably through smallholder irrigation. KickStart’s innovative, high-quality, and affordable technologies allow subsistence farmers to break their dependence on seasonal rain-fed farming, unlocking year-round harvests and a pathway to financial freedom, climate resilience, and social empowerment for farming families across Africa.

With KickStart’s MoneyMaker irrigation pumps, farmers can access available ground water, grow crops year-round to eat and sell for a better profit when food is scarce and market prices are higher. Farmers using KickStart’s pumps increase their annual income through irrigation alone by almost 500% on average—from $150 to $850. With the new money they earn, farmers can afford additional quality inputs for the next planting season and sustainably grow their farming business. Many go on to make additional investments in livestock and poultry, diversifying their income and securing their livelihoods. KickStart’s empowerment-based model enables farmers to earn significantly more income, properly feed and educate their children, afford healthcare, and plan for their futures.

2. How is the West Foundation supporting your mission?

The West Foundation is supporting KickStart’s advocacy efforts to catalyze the promotion and uptake of irrigation interventions across Africa through our work with diverse stakeholders to develop, test, and scale new high-impact irrigation solutions, and advocate for systems-level changes. Through our partnership with The West Foundation, KickStart leveraged our reputation as a leading provider of affordable irrigation technologies along with evidence of our direct livelihood impacts on farmers to spotlight this critical issue within the development sector and influential policy circles. This fosters an enabling environment for expanding small-scale irrigation across the continent by influencing global dialogue, policies, and investment strategies related to agricultural development.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

KickStart continued its Irrigate Africa! advocacy campaign with support of The West Foundation by employing our social impacts and urging influential international, continental and sub-national actors to increase irrigation access for the smallholder farmer. To highlight, the Malawi government endorsed MoneyMaker pumps as a highly reliable technology and KickStart was invited to help draft the Malawi Irrigation Investment Strategy. As proven by our country study of Malawi, with smart-subsidies, policy focus, and investments in support of a wide array of systems change, we can drastically increase large-scale uptake of low-volume irrigation technology across sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), enabling millions more to break the cycle of poverty.

With The West Foundation’s philanthropic support, KickStart participated in the AGRA Forum, where we successfully networked with ministers of agriculture from across SSA and representatives of the African Union. In addition, KickStart’s leadership team attended and demonstrated the use of MoneyMaker pumps during a main program session on irrigation at the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa Forum (AGRF), generating enthusiasm among influential policy makers to incorporate low-volume irrigation into their agriculture programs. Consequently, the World Bank continued its promotion of small-scale, farmer-led irrigation, by hosting a side event at Stockholm World Water Week and ordered thousands of MoneyMaker pumps for supported projects in Malawi, Angola, and Mozambique.

4. How are you realizing your potential? 

KickStart has scaled the adoption of MoneyMaker pumps and the resulting impacts by deepening and expanding our network of key partners across 16 countries in SSA, and increasing their appreciation for the benefits of irrigation. This partnership-based model has yielded exciting successes, lending new flexibility and increased reach to farmers in highly remote areas and to those experiencing newfound pressures due to social upheaval, political strife, and climatic changes.

KickStart has continued its efforts to build livelihood capacities at the grassroots level through the development and delivery of innovative technology and design. KickStart’s livelihoods interventions combine two critical commitments: income and food security. These two resources are essential for community resilience, providing the capacities to weather life’s unexpected challenges, from storm surges to civil conflict, and from drought to epidemics.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

To date, KickStart’s smart irrigation pumps have enabled over 1.3 million people to take a major step out of poverty across Africa, and are being used to grow immune-supporting fruits and vegetables to meet the nutritional needs of 13 million people every year. Through year-round irrigation, KickStart’s tools have also led to the creation of 260,000 profitable and sustainable farming businesses, generating $220 million in new profits and wages annually.

With the support of organizations like The West Foundation, KickStart aims to provide 2 million people with the technology to take a major step out of poverty in half the time that we served 1 million people.

6. How can people reading this help you?

KickStart has helped eliminate poverty for farming families across the continent, but more work is needed to reach millions of others. The challenge is great, but every small gesture of support can make a difference.

Here’s how you can help:

• Spread the word!
• Donate
• Partner with KickStart

Get the full details here: http://kickstart.org/get-involved

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

The Covid-19 pandemic has created a new context for KickStart and our vast network of farmers. In Africa, the virus is already exacerbating existing inequalities and cutting off critical livelihood supporting activities where food insecurity is already endemic. Providing tools that increase food production independently of climate and global supply chains will be critical to avoiding protracted famine. Despite the challenges, KickStart remains committed to protecting and growing local food production capacities and income generating opportunities for smallholder farmers across SSA through access to affordable, high-quality irrigation tools.

Given this outlook, KickStart is working strategically to fast-track our response mobilization through the design and distribution of the lowest-cost human-powered pump available, the Starter Pump—offering unprecedented and scalable affordability. By providing unprecedented financial access through our new Starter Pump and with extended reach through diverse mission-aligned partners, KickStart is better equipped to ensure year-round harvest, greater profits, and food security to more farming families than ever before. To learn more and support our response fund please visit: http://kickstart.org/

Photo courtesy: KickStart

1. Tell us about your mission.

Educate!’s mission is to develop young leaders and entrepreneurs in Africa.

Nearly 50% of all Africans are younger than 18, and that number is growing. These demographics, along with a scarcity of jobs, have led to dramatic rates of youth unemployment. Education systems in Africa already face challenges — current curricula and teaching methods are designed for a 1900s economy, consisting of rote memorization and exam-driven learning which do not prepare students to succeed in today’s economy. The current status quo perpetuates lack of opportunity and cycles of poverty — allowing the enormous potential of youth to remain untapped.

Educate! believes that by transforming educational pathways in East Africa, we can equip youth with the skills to disrupt the systemic problem of youth unemployment and realize their full potential. We believe post-primary education is the most untapped resource across the continent for cultivating talent and for development more broadly, and we aim to work both within the existing educational infrastructure and outside of the system to impact youth life outcomes at scale.

Our mission therefore aims to prepare youth in Africa with the skills to succeed in today’s economy. We tackle youth unemployment by partnering with schools and governments to reform what schools teach and how they teach it, so that students in Africa have the skills to attain further education, overcome gender inequities, start businesses, get jobs, and drive development in their communities. Our goal is to make this practical, skills-based model part of national education systems across Africa.

2. How is The West Foundation supporting your mission?

Since our inception in 2009, Educate! has worked to build a replicable and cost-effective solution to prepare youth with the skills to attain further education, overcome gender inequities, start businesses, get jobs, and drive development in their communities. We started in 24 schools and reached 830 youth, and today, Educate! has dramatically scaled our program by nearly 40x and has directly impacted more than 100,000 secondary youth across 1,000 schools. This has been achieved over the years due to the support of partners like The West Foundation that have contributed to making us the largest youth skills provider in East Africa! Additionally, urging us on through our commitment to deepening our impact in Uganda, Rwanda, and Kenya, while expanding our reach to out-of-school youth for the first time and developing a strategy to support education reforms in other countries in the future.

3. Considering your impactful work to eliminate poverty, how is The West Foundation’s philanthropic support providing you with sustainability and mobility?

Educate! aims to design solutions that measurably impact millions of youth across Africa each year. Long term, we aim to fully incorporate our skills-based education model into national education systems across Africa. With the support of the West Foundation, we are able to experiment with different ways to sustainably and cost-effectively deliver and scale our evidence-based solutions as we grow towards that goal and position ourselves for greater and more sustainable impact each year.

The West Foundation’s philanthropic support goes further to aid project implementation, including training and empowering teachers and youth Mentors – who are at the core of delivering our model to Scholars. Through the Educate! Experience – our flagship program, Scholars are taught an entrepreneurship, leadership, and workforce readiness course, which includes practical experience starting a business or community project in each secondary school.

4. How are you realizing your potential?

Our impact philosophy relies on periodic, rigorous external evaluations to measure medium- and long-term outcomes, coupled with ongoing monitoring to continuously manage program quality and track immediate impact for students.

Rigorous evaluations of our solution, including a randomized controlled trial (RCT), found that participants earn nearly 2x the income of their peers towards the end of secondary school. A follow-up RCT in Uganda assessed medium-term outcomes for students four years after they graduated from the Educate! program. The evaluation looked at the same student cohort as the prior RCT and found strong impacts on: 1) soft skills—improved grit, creativity, and self-efficacy; 2) gender-related outcomes—less domestic violence, fewer sexual partners, fewer children, and more egalitarian views; and 3) educational attainment—increased secondary school completion, increased tertiary enrollment for women, and greater likelihood of selecting higher-earning-potential majors (business and STEM areas of study). Importantly, after Educate!, girls were essentially as likely to graduate from secondary school as boys.

5. What’s one important thing you want others to know about your organization?

Educate! prepares youth in Africa with the skills to succeed in today’s economy through an innovative model with proven impact. Our model is built on best scaling practices and constant self-evaluation and was specifically designed to scale having spent the last 10 years building the most replicable and cost-effective solution possible that can reach massive scale. We are now the largest youth skills provider in East Africa. We reach a large number of youth at a low cost by delivering our model using existing infrastructure, engaging exceptional Educate! graduates as mentors, and implementing innovative technologies to manage and monitor our programs across great distances. While doing this, we work hand-in-hand with governments towards system-level adoption of our solution to sustainably integrate our model into national education systems.

6. How can people reading this help you?

With over ten years of experience operating our flagship program in schools, we’ve tested, refined, and continually strengthened our model to ensure the maximum impact on youth – impact that is both cost-effective and sustainable. We’ve developed our capacity to provide technical advisory services and support to national education systems, actively working with the governments of three countries to facilitate practical, skills-based secondary education that prepares youth to succeed in today’s economy.

Incredible partners like the West Foundation and other friends and champions allow us to continue to work towards a world where all youth receive the skills they need to succeed in life after school. We so appreciate anyone who is able to invest in youth. Your support will propel us forward into our next decade of work. It’s especially critical now, when a lot is changing and amidst the uncertainty created by COVID-19, we see opportunities for adaptation and innovation.

7. What are your deepest needs as an organization?

Over next two years, Educate! is continuing to work towards our vision of measurably impacting millions of youth across Africa each year by (1) scaling our direct delivery model to drive towards our goal of achieving full scale in Uganda as we iterate for long-term sustainability, (2) continuing to build education system capacity to implement Rwanda’s Competency-Based Curriculum while testing innovative school sustainability and incentive strategies that can sustain the reform, and (3) deepening our government partnerships in Kenya to support the ongoing national curriculum reform, while experimenting with a new model that brings Educate!’s impact to out-of-school youth.

Photo courtesy: Educate!

We are proud, at the West Foundation, of our commitment to supporting our partners in projects big and small. On February 26, the West Foundation joined CoCoDA for Febrero Fiesta in support of their water, public health and education projects in El Salvador and Nicaragua. The West Foundation team enjoyed a delicious meal, watched lively dance, and learned more about CoCoDA’s upcoming projects and initiatives.

Through its dedication to cooperating in projects for democratic, community-based social and economic development in Central America, CoCoDA seeks to build strong relationships and communities between people in the U.S., El Salvador, and Nicaragua. Receiving the second installment of a three-year, $21,000 flexible funding grant will assist CoCoDA in experimenting with new fundraising efforts and planning future programs. Learn more at CoCoDA.