Awesome Foundation - Projects

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Mondays at Racine

2014-03-03T00:00:00Z

Mondays at Racine began in 2003 when we opened the doors of our spa & salon on the third Monday of every month to provide beauty and wellness services to anyone undergoing treatment for cancer, free of charge. At a time when no one was recognizingthe emotional side of being diagnosed with cancer, Racine set out to attempt to offset cancer treatment's ravaging side effects and provide solace, care and support to it’s community members stricken with this disease. Having addressed the needs of this population for more than ten years, we have a keen understanding that the key to a patient’s wellbeing entails more than just the clinical side of healing; it requires attention to the mental, physical, spiritual and social side as well. We aim to work in conjunction with a patient’s standard care regimen, and offer services and support that treat the whole person, and not just the disease. We now offer our services every Monday.

Washington, DC – Funk Parade

2014-03-02T00:00:00Z

Funk Parade is a one-of-a-kind street fair, parade and music festival for DC and the U Street neighborhood, on May 3, 2014, the 211th anniversary of the DC’s incorporation. It's a celebration of what makes U Street great, what makes Washington DC, great, and what makes being alive such a groove. The day's schedule is as follows: The Funk Parade street fair (noon-5): The U Street neighborhood teems with music and performance, artists and vendors, food and art, workshops and spontaneous acts of soul. The mighty Funk Parade (5-7): The main event! Imagine a gyrating horde of dancers, a marching band behind them, and a drum corps. Hear beat-boxers and junkyard drummers, see pot-bangers and clappers and kids on their parents’ shoulders. Horn players wander in and out of the crowd, neighbors come out of their homes to join the procession. A thunderous syncopated army of groove, winding its way through the neighborhood, calling the city to the funk. The Funk Parade music festival (7- ): Grooves from all corners of the human soul play in venues on and around U Street. The sounds of the city’s best acts call from every doorway. One day, one spirit, one celebration of funk: the subatomic particle of love. The Funk Parade — free your mind and your city will follow!

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – The Indigo Theatre Project

2014-03-01T00:00:00Z

My colleague Nick Gereffi and I founded The Indigo Theatre Project in the fall of 2012 when we realized that there were many remarkable pieces of theatre we'd never had the opportunity to see live. We decided to present readings of these pieces, but resolved to do more than simply reproduce them. Combining artistry and advocacy, The Indigo Theatre Project's mission is to produce readings of high-profile plays to benefit specific, related non-profit organizations. We seek to pair our plays with an organization aligned with the play's author or that resonates with the plays' themes. In 2013, we were fortunate enough to present three sold-out readings with star-studded casts: Lynn Nottage's INTIMATE APPAREL in January 2013, directed by Jade King Carroll as a benefit for Donor Direct Action; Wendy Wasserstein's UNCOMMON WOMEN AND OTHERS in May 2013, directed by Leigh Silverman as a benefit for TDF Open Doors; and Craig Lucas's RECKLESS in October 2013, directed by Kate Whoriskey (starring Golden Globe winner Tina Fey) as a benefit for Safe Horizon. In total, we were able to raise almost $20,000 in our first year. Audiences have responded positively to our mission and we recognize that we've developed a powerful artistic model. This year we endeavor to produce two benefit readings: Robert Harling's THE FIRST WIVES CLUB screenplay in the summer of 2014 (to aid a women's center, as they do in the script) and Lisa Kron's IN THE WAKE in fall 2014 (to aid an LGBT organization as the play explores the themes of sexuality). However, we still have to cover the costs of space rentals, marketing tools, food for actors, and various other expenses that arise throughout the process. For these reasons, I've decided to apply to Awesome Without Borders. We believe that with a grant from Awesome Without Borders, we would be able to extend our impact--bringing in more audiences and funds to the nonprofits we support--thus empowering the mission of The Indigo Theatre Project.

Austin, TX – Old Books for New Teachers

2014-02-28T00:00:00Z

Many young teachers want to offer students rich experiences with literature but lack the resources. The Old Books for New Teachers project will put good books into students’ hands by providing first-year teachers with the means to build a classroom library. By building classroom libraries and sharing good books with their students, teachers would give students engaging literacy opportunities. Currently, many area schools have a sustained silent reading program, but students are uncertain of what books to select, and many skim through books hastily checked out of school libraries. With high-interest and varied texts available in the classroom, students will have easy access to books as well as an instructor who could help them make informed reading choices. These classroom libraries could benefit hundreds—even thousands—of students over time.

Nairobi (Inativo) – Desks for Neci Education Centre in Mathare

2014-02-28T00:00:00Z

Neci Education Centre is a school located in the Mathare slum, and provides a basic education to 340 children in the community and surrounding areas. Without Neci these children would not receive an education. The centre focuses on reaching the neediest children in Mathare slum and neighbourhood: children with special needs, learning disabilities and those from drug addicted families. The orphans and vulnerable children who come to the centre receive basic education from pre-school to year 8, along with alternative care, feeding and love. However, Neci faces a number of significant challenges. It does not have a permanent donor or source of income. It currently operates from a rented premises, and has little capacity to purchase learning materials or facilities. Samson is a yoga teacher with the African Yoga Project who undertakes yoga outreach in ten disadvantaged schools in the Nairobi area, including the Neci Education Centre. He has also been working with Neci to improve facilities at the school. Despite there being over 300 students, the school has only 100 desks – many of which are in disrepair. With Awesome Foundation’s help, Samson and the team at Neci will build new desks, providing workspace for many more students. What is awesome about the NECI project is that the parents who are mostly low-income earners provide the labour that goes into building the desks for the school in exchange for offsetting the tuition fees that they owe the school. This is a win-win for everyone: the school gets to make improvements in their learning facilities at low cost; the parents get some relief on the debt they owe the school and are happier to see improved learning facilities for their children. More importantly, you have the kind of “school-parent” engagement that goes beyond supervising homework or attending PTA meetings, and which is an absolute requisite for any school to succeed. We see this as a model that can be replicated in many other schools from disadvantaged neighbourhoods and hope that the small contribution from the Awesome Foundation Nairobi is a step towards making this a reality.

Orlando, FL – Creative City Project

2014-02-27T00:00:00Z

The Creative City Project is built on the belief that art has the ability to change the way people experience and connect with their city. By placing live performance, visual and interactive art in public places, the Creative City Project has helped shape the creative ethos and face of Orlando. In its first two years, the Creative City Project has partnered with Cirque du Soleil, Orlando Ballet, Mad Cow Theatre and SAK Comedy Lab. It has engaged hundreds of artists and thousands of residents of and visitors to Orlando. As we continue to grow, we anticipate seeing a greater level of engagement by arts organizations as well as residents of and visitors to Orlando. In 2014, we will - once again - have a single night of events featuring dozens of arts organizations and hundreds of artists. In 2013, several thousand came out to be part of the night's festivities. We anticipated an even larger turn out in 2014.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – B'Seder

2014-02-27T00:00:00Z

B'Seder is a visual system for healing conflicting histories. The system is designed to collect and store fragmented anecdotes of cultural conflict and then transform them into into whole, flowing narratives through a collaborative process. B'Seder uses the paradigm of a "memory palace" and collaborative photographic and painterly tools to produce a visual map of stories. This visual object is used as a kind of script for interactions between communities. This initial version of B'Seder is interested primarily in the contested histories of Polish and Jewish communities. Future versions of the project may be applied to other communities with contested histories.

Maldon (Inativo) – Freedom from plastic bag tyranny!

2014-02-26T00:00:00Z

This project will move Maldon towards becoming plastic bag free. It seeks to fund production of reusable bags together with an education project to encourage the community to choose reusable. The ultimate aim is a ban on plastic bags locally. The branded bags will also be beneficial to Maldon's tourism industry as purchasers of the reusable bags return to their home towns with them.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – EpiBone: living bones grown from stem cells

2014-02-26T00:00:00Z

In the past, humanity viewed the body as a “machine” with “interchangeable parts” provided by cadaver tissues and prosthetic devices. We envision a future in which the body is viewed as a “renewable resource” by mobilizing stem cells to grow living replacement parts in the laboratory. EpiBone is a NYC-based biotech company seeking to improve human lives by growing living bones are customized to the patient and defect being treated. Every year, millions suffering from craniofacial defects due to cancer, trauma, or birth defects are left without options, and without the ability to reintegrate into the society. We take the patient’s CT scans and fat-derived stem cells to engineer mature, living bones with precise anatomical fit to the defect, and no risk of immune-rejection, Our technology is based on fifteen years of NIH-funded research in bone tissue engineering. EpiBone is a technology platform serving surgeons and patients who may benefit from anatomically precise, patient-specific grafts. EpiBone's main competitors are patient bone harvesting, cadaver based products, and prosthetics. EpiBone is better for three main reasons: (1) EpiBone's precise anatomical shape means a better fit than patient or cadaver bones (2) EpiBone continues to remodel, unlike tissues taken from cadavers or prosthetics and (3) because EpiBone is grown from patient cells, there’s no second surgery. We envision EpiBone as a “grow your own bone” approach to repair the head, face, shoulder, arms, legs, knees and beyond, and pave the way for other fully biological implants grown using the same principles to repair our missing or diseased organs. We are thrilled at the prospect of pioneering a new paradigm for skeletal reconstruction that unlocks the power of the patient’s own stem cells to regenerate the body. But we're brand new, and don't even have our own lab yet -- we're ready for our own space! With this grant, we hope to get our own, first "new home."

Melbourne (Inativo) – Seen & Heard Film Festival - Melbourne

2014-02-26T00:00:00Z

Seen & Heard is a festival for films that are made by women, i.e. the primary roles like writer, director, producer, cinematographer are filled by a woman. This is definitely not a festival just for women to attend, though - it is about balancing the representation of female-made art in this world and we encourage all people to attend! So, S&H has been running in Sydney for the past five years and I have the exciting plan to bring it to Melbourne around April during a several week run (with maybe two nights a week). Most entries are artist-submitted, however we do source some of the films ourselves. I will be using some of the S&H Sydney's films but I also hope to do a special horror night in collaboration with some cool peeps from Tasmania who run a horror film festival there as well as source some films from quality international film festivals. Not really sure what else you want to know about this cool little film festival, but I would very happy to answer any questions you have about it! A lot of the things I am still nutting out myself, so I answering any questions you have may actually aid myself!

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Naked Narratives

2014-02-25T00:00:00Z

London, ON (Inativo) – Rambot vs World 2014

2014-02-25T00:00:00Z

The St Joseph’s Catholic High School Robotics Team aka ”Renaissance Robotics” aka Team 4525 consists of students, teachers and community mentors working together to achieve a common (and awesome) goal; building a real live robot to compete in the 2014 FIRST Robotics Competition. Our regional competition takes place in Waterloo, Ontario in March where we plan to be awesome enough to continue on to the international competition in St. Louis, Missouri. Last year, we were the recipients of the Rookie Inspiration Award, for our spirit, enthusiasm and overall level of awesome! Our robotics team offers opportunities to many students who would otherwise not be involved in extra-curricular activities, and we think that is pretty awesome in itself! The team requires the dedication and talents of a diverse group of young people and their mentors in a variety of roles in order to be successful. This gives students who have a passion for art, computer programming, marketing, finance, construction or design a chance to utilize and apply their talents in an effort to achieve one co-operative goal. We hope to represent our community at these competitions with not just an epic robot but also the kind of team spirit, co-operation and gracious professionalism that FIRST encourages young people to strive for. These qualities are what make London and area youth and the mentors with which we work nothing but pure awesome!

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – HOLOSCENES

2014-02-24T00:00:00Z

HOLOSCENES is a suite of multi-format artworks that manifest states of drowning — both in water and the larger systems of our own devising — in order to directly connect the short-term, everyday behaviors of individuals to the long-term patterns driving global climate change. HOLOSCENES re-imagines historical antecedents of public spectacle, and simultaneously translates related streams of scientific investigation into a visual, visceral, and public address in urban communal space that challenges our personal and collective capacities for long-term thinking and empathy. The heart of HOLOSCENES is a large-scale performance installation and intervention in urban public space — such as a metropolitan plaza, city park, courtyard of a science institution, or hub of an arts festival — featuring three custom-made aquariums (10’ cubes of transparent acrylic raised 4’ above the ground) set proximate to one another and viewable from 360 degrees. Each is inhabited by a performer conducting an everyday behavior — highly choreographed secular or sacred habits with attendant objects, costumes, and utterances — gathered and shared with us by collaborators in 52 locations in 38 countries. As water fills and empties from each tank at varying intervals and rates by way of a sophisticated hydraulic system, the choreography of the performers, the appearance of costumes, the functioning of objects, all change. Pushed to the top of the aquariums for air, the performers dive below, where they adapt their behavior to the new underwater environment. As water drains, the performers continue, soaked by these mini-floods, aware that the water will soon rise again. The ebb and flow of water and the resulting modified behaviors will conjure mythic, historical, and coming environmental tragedies as the performers, carrying out their actions, offer complex human portraits of myopia, persistence, and adaptation.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Providing Online Access

2014-02-23T00:00:00Z

Many of our publications have won awards and have been best-sellers in their field. We'd like to transform these publications into e-media so that they can be distributed online at cost or for free. This would enable us to bypass the shipping or mailing costs that have limited the distribution of these works to countries outside of North America or to other non-profit organizations within North America.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – BOT S Pots

2014-02-21T00:00:00Z

Although Connecticut is one of the richest states in the nation, paradoxically, its capitol city, Hartford is one of the poorest in the nation. There are over 4000 people experiencing homelessness in Connecticut, 700 of whom are Hartford-based. In response to the immense need within Hartford, Charter Oak provides three programs that work to address homelessness and other issues faced by Hartford residents. One of these is BOTS Pots: BOTS Pots-- named for Beat of the Street, Charter Oak’s “street” newspaper written by individuals experiencing homelessness and their allies-- places large potted organic vegetable plants throughout the City of Hartford. Individuals who are experiencing homelessness are hired and trained to tend the pots and the vegetables are provided for free to anyone in need, addressing hunger in Hartford. In addition, local artists volunteer to transform the pots into public art. As far as we know, the program is the only one of its kind in the country, although the model has been sought out by other cities asking how they can bring it into their communities. BOTS Pots brings food, jobs and art to Hartford and provides much-needed work experience and a resume line item for individuals experiencing homelessness.

Sydney – Rooftop Garden for refugee's and asylum seekers

2014-02-20T00:00:00Z

Well, above our soup kitchen is a refugee and asylum seeker support service. (jrs.org.au). Above them is a rooftop that is screaming out to be transformed into a rooftop garden. There is an accommodation centre next door that houses about 14 asylum seekers. It takes about 5 years for their application to be processed. In this time they cannot work or study and often fall into depression. Our project is a garden of opportunities, a place of meaningful and familiar activities. A place to allow the asylum seekers to grow food and feed back into our soup kitchen.

Oahu, HI – Ku’i Hui

2014-02-20T00:00:00Z

Mahoney Hale is Hawaii’s only Federal Residential Re-Entry Center (RRC) for offenders preparing to release to our community. Up to 90% of Mahoney Hale’s female residents have been sexually abused. Such past traumas strongly correlate with a woman’s pathway to criminality, her crime, and even her experience of prison as a re-traumatizing event. Now, imagine a convicted felon has served her sentence and is moving onto your street. Would you rather she had only experienced punishment during her incarceration, or that she’d been offered opportunities for change? Mahoney Hale is exemplary in its trauma-informed care perspective1, which addresses the continuing impact of past traumas, including incarceration itself. Through healing these old wounds, female residents obtain healthy coping skills and self-images. This creates a strong foundation from which to make different life choices to reduce recidivism. Why boxing? As counterintuitive as this may seem, boxing can be an antiviolence experience, especially in the non-contact format of my awesome project. Let a participant in a similar program for survivors of violence2, explain: “It’s a creative release valve for me because I tend to harbor my emotions inside so that they become toxic. And with the heavy bag I imagine that the bag is all those people who made my life a living hell…..While you are letting it [anger] out you’re not hurting anybody, in fact you’re helping yourself. I mean a lot of times we’re told ‘turn the other cheek’….but what happens if you’ve had years of doing that? How do you deal with or release all that pent up anger and hatred inside of you safely?” Anger is a dominant and appropriate emotional response to violence and trauma. The opportunity to safely embody and release the anger can be transformative, a motivation for real change. 1Roe-Sepowitz, D., et al. (2009). Social Work with Groups, 32: 4, 330-341. 2Van Ingen, C. (2011). Sociology of Sport Journal, 28: 171-188.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Let the kids surf in the Philippines

2014-02-20T00:00:00Z

We create after-school, surfing programs in the Philippines that keep the children in school by offering the incentive of surfing lessons, and access to surfboards as a reward for good school attendance. There are 6 programs in the Philippines we have in operation: 2 on Siargao Island and 4 on the island of Mindanao, namely in the Southern remote regions of the Philippines. Over 50 boards have been shipped to the Philippines since beginning in 2008 and we continue to expand, with an upcoming trip in Feb 2014 to the typhoon hit area of Guiuan, Samar. Working with the local surf community and teachers at the program locations, we monitor our participating youth and help them achieve educational success by partnering with other organizations offering scholarships to college. We have helped over 80 kids complete their schooling since 2008, with 15 of them receiving honors. Maintenance of the equipment is an annual cost which includes repairs and stipends for managing the surfboard borrowing program. We have been working with other organizations towards branching out to other countries using our community model of success. Voluntourism with our group is encouraged when we visit our program locations via organized trips. In our San Francisco headquarters we teach surfboard repair and surfing to our volunteers and hold annual art sales to raise money for our yearly operational costs. We accept donations of surfboards, skimboards & bodyboards year round. Contact us for a pick-up in Northern and Southern California.

Miami, FL – Universal Diagnostic Platform

2014-02-20T00:00:00Z

Problems: - Each medical test only gives you just one piece of information... and you are charged for each test - Millions go undiagnosed from treatable diseases - Tests take years and million of $ to develop - Millions throughout the world lack means of assessing water or soil quality, infections in live stock or contaminants in food Solution: Develop an easy to use diagnostic platform able to simultaneously analyze any sample quickly and at a low cost. One platform for all applications. How do I test samples? Apply sample (e.g. water, blood, urine, saliva, etc.) onto a capture device called NUTeC (nanoscale unbiased texture capture). This device has a series of molecular binding pockets that bind to small molecules, proteins and cells found in the sample and creates a unique signature that's specific to a given condition. For example, the signature for breast cancer looks different than the signature for a STD or celiac disease. You then take a picture of the NUTeC device using your smart phone, Google Glass device or you can use an office scanner. This picture is then uploaded to our cloud-based analysis portal that uses machine learning techniques and our innovative algorithm to provide you with the results along with a confidence indicator. One can simultaneously screen for various conditions using this approach. How do I make my own test? Simple, you only need samples that you know are positive and negative for whatever you want to test (e.g. contaminated vs clean water). These samples "teach" the cloud-based system what's positive and negative in your test. Interesting... but does it really work? YES! Prototypes are able to correctly detect various samples and even diagnose bladder cancer in 30 min and breast cancer in 1 hr. Are there applications outside healthcare? Yes, MANY, the exact process can be used for any application throughout the world. Our open platform allows users the freedom to develop tests as needed.

Miami, FL – Save Our Stories (SOS)

2014-02-20T00:00:00Z

Once Upon A Time… There lived a youth in Miami. He had two brothers and one sister and lived in a small apartment with his mother and grandmother. He took two buses in the morning and afternoon to get to his school but he did not mind. In his classes, he would always pay attention and do his work. His favorite days where those when his class would be allowed to use the library, the days his whole grade had testing, except he wasn’t allowed to take out the books. No one was. The sad reality is that although free resources such as school libraries, Miami-Dade County libraries, and non-profit organizations at times provide books to children, many youth here may never have the opportunity to take out a book. Literacy is vital to youth development and can drastically change a child’s situation much like a community can shape a child. Save Our Stories proposes to bring the power of books and their stories to the communities of Miami-Dade. The idea is composed of two elements: a mobile library and story time. The mobile library would visit different public spaces (parks, urban gardens, etc.) to bring the power of books to places close to the community and accessible without the restraints of public transportation, hours of operation, or a membership card. The story time would accompany the bookmobile and would feature a children story read aloud by a volunteer (in English, Spanish, and Creole) throughout the time the bookmobile would be at the space. The objective is to promote literacy but also foster community involvement so as to garner support from local organizations, empower community members to occupy public spaces, and prove a catalytic force for pop-up community fairs to occur.

Kingston – Healing through Music

2014-02-20T00:00:00Z

Can music heal? As mental health crisis workers, Richard Tyo and Chris Trimmer support individuals in the Kingston community who are struggling with mental illness. Since there are many people at various stages of recovery, it has often been discussed that a need exists for programs that help facilitate mental health support for hard-to-reach populations, and in a context that operates outside of the traditional mental health system. Being avid musicians, Chris and Rich wondered why music couldn’t be used both as a form of therapy, and as a tool for discussing mental health. After all, who doesn’t have some type of meaningful connection to music? Music brings us together. It’s also the perfect metaphor for life and our struggles. Since April 2013, Rich and Chris have been running a weekly music group session at a local mental health support drop-in centre. Clients attending the group have reported that positive coping arises from music-based group cohesion. Activities include shaker circles, singing, using song to discuss and reframe positive/negative events, & writing lyrics to discuss coping with, for example, seasonal affective disorder and social isolation. In addition to observable benefits for clients, having Crisis workers associated with musical programming, while still discussing mental health, appears to reduce stigma towards mental health workers in the community. Rich and Chris are asking the Awesome Foundation for support in bringing the Healing through Music group to the larger Kingston community. There have been numerous requests from various community agencies for bringing the music group to their clients. We would like to expand the weekly group session to also include a weekly roving session - going to various community agencies, such as other mental health facilities, hospital wards, long-term care facilities, in Kingston and the surrounding area.

Detroit, MI (Inativo) – Detroit REPRESENT!

2014-02-19T00:00:00Z

Detroit REPRESENT! is a project conceived by a handful of other LGBTQ youth of color from across the city. Although there are several social service agencies for young people in Detroit, we wanted a space not just to receive support resources, but to put our heads together and creatively solve the large-scale problems that formed our need for those resources. Detroit REPRESENT! is our attempt to create this space. We decided that the best place to start, when addressing the issues of racism, homophobia, transphobia, and negative bias against Detroit youth, was with our own stories. Creating our collective, we partnered with the Allied Media Projects, CHASS Center's La Vida program, Detroit Latin@z, and a few other groups, to learn how we could use the telling of our stories to create a major culture shift in Detroit. Our goal is to connect as many LGBTQ youth of color from Detroit as possible with each other, equipping them with the means to create graphics, videos, blogs, photographs, short stories, and even more art and media messages, which tell our personal stories of struggle, resilience, rejection, and inner strength. Sharing these stories with youth, adults, teachers, social workers, and Detroiters at large, we hope to fill the void of affirming media portrayals of youth like us, help others in our community to overcome isolation and feelings of powerlessness, and produce media that can be used as practical tools to fuel social justice. Some of the topics we hope to address with our media include: - LGBTQ youth legal rights (so youth can advocate for themselves with schools, police, or other bureaucracies) - resources for homeless youth, runaway youth, and youth in foster care - tips for LGBTQ youth in need of employment - ways that LGBTQ organizations can better include and serve youth of color Our workshops culminate in a gathering of LGBTQ youth of color, where we will create large-scale media messages to share with our community.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Tribal Justice Project

2014-02-19T00:00:00Z

The Tribal Justice Project will create a documentary featuring Abby Abinanti and Claudette White, tribal court chief judges who serve the two largest Native American tribes in California. Through their judicial lives, the film will explore the critical issues in Indian Country, including the removal of children from their tribes; and the legacy of history’s ravages that has led to high rates of alcoholism drug abuse and domestic violence. In following the judges at work, we will see them creating a tribal judicial system that will restore justice and help rebuild their nations. Our intent is to create a film that is both enlightening and inspiring. Walter R. Echo-Hawk, an important advocate of Native American rights, advises that “the widespread lack of reliable information about Native issues is the most pressing problem confronting Native Americans in the United States today.” The tribal justice documentary can make significant strides in addressing that pressing problem. As Executive Producer, I am working with Anne Makepeace, who for more than three decades has directed and produced consistently outstanding films; Jennifer Walter, Supervising Attorney on Indian matters in California’s Administrative Office of the Courts; Native American field producers; and scholars and activists steeped in knowledge about Indian culture, Indian law, Indian history, tribal courts and tribal concepts of justice.

Gloucester, MA – Backyard Growers School Salad Days!

2014-02-18T00:00:00Z

Backyard Growers will lead our second annual Salad Days initiative in all five of Gloucester's elementary schools based on our successful 2013 pilot program. In early April, BYG staff will coordinate with school principals, teachers, and parent-led school garden teams to have all elementary school students (over 1,300 children) visit their school gardens to plant lettuce varieties. In late May all the students will visit the gardens once again to harvest the lettuce, which will go directly into the school cafeterias to be enjoyed by all of the students. Now I bet you're thinking, "But do the children really eat the salad?" And the answer is yes. The Center for Disease Control Guide to Strategies to Increase the Consumption of Fruits and Vegetables states that home and school gardens play an important role in the consumption of fresh vegetables, and that increased exposure to fresh vegetables through gardening increases the likelihood that people will consume what they grow. By giving children the full experience of eating fresh food--from seed to fork--children gain a greater appreciation of where food comes from and are inspired to make healthier food choices. In our pilot year we had children tell us that they had never eaten salad before, and many expressed pride at having grown the lettuce themselves. Growing food as a school community also helps build school spirit--everyone has participated and thanks to everyone's efforts a meal is shared together.

Boulder, CO (Inativo) – Pollination Planet

2014-02-18T00:00:00Z

Pollination Planet is a nonprofit organization with the mission to educate and inspire communities to protect our food supply by providing habitat for pollinators. This will be accomplished through hands-on education with students in the Boulder Valley School District, outreach, and habitat planting. Our education program starts in the classroom, introducing students to the life of a pollinator through interactive lessons. Next, we make the connection between pollination and our food supply by a visit to a local farm. Students learn the important role pollinators play and how they are connected to our food. Plus, they get to explore a really cool working farm. Finally, students have the opportunity to plant and maintain habitat at their school or in the local community.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Sharing knowledge: a meeting of indigenous midwive

2014-02-17T00:00:00Z

We want to organize a regional meeting of Mayan midwives of the state of Chiapas to be held 27-28 of February, 2014. The participants come from 11 indigenous communities of the state of Chiapas. This project will carry out a 2 day meeting of representatives (1 man and 2 women from each community) in San Cristobal de Las Casas and produce a video that will be used in the communities as a pedagogical tool. . Chiapas is one of the states with the largest indigenous population and is also one of the poorest states in the country despite the fact that it is rich in natural resources. Despite the importance of it having a large indigenous population (27%), indigenous knowledge is not respected – and in particular, midwives knowledge are not legitimized by Western medicine although Due to financial difficulties the midwives have not been able to meet since 2010. The midwives have asked us to organize this meeting because they feel that their knowledge is being lost and the impact of this loss is felt by the indigenous communities. This loss is due to the fact that the younger generation does not show an interest in learning traditional medicine and midwives have increasingly less patients. The direct beneficiaries of the meeting would be 33 individuales who represent 11 communities. During the meeting, they will exchange information regarding health problems in the communities, solutions to these problems and they will exchange their knowledge regarding medicinal plants and birthing techniques. The indirect beneficiaries of this meeting would be the people of the indigenous communities. When the midwives return to their communities they will take back with them enhanced knowledge and greater confidence in their work. In this way, the health of their patients will be improved. They will also share their knowledge with other midwives (and apprentices) in their communities.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – SPARK GIRLS-MENTORSHIP PROGRAM

2014-02-17T00:00:00Z

Spark Girls Mentorship Program. AIM Creating a safe and secure environment to inspire girls to lighten up their communities and discover their potentials. SCOPE OF THE PROGRAM This is a grassroot program which is seeking to empower girls in high risks situations so as to empower their peers through a mentoring designed program which includes digital mentoring(visual,audio,global changemakers stories and motivations). The mentorship program will act as a glimpse of hope to rural young girls as they will be exposed to curriculum based and one-on-one mentorship which incooperates trainings on: 1.Self-esteem and self confidence building 2.Human rights and peace building 3.Community service and development 4.Goal orientation and Women's issues 5.Leadership skills and sexual health. PURPOSE 1.To enable the girls to know of their rights and be able to defend themselves and others and be the voice of the voiceless in their communities. 2.To empower a girl inorder to create a positive change and a ripple effect around her. 3.To have positive role models for young women who encourages their ambition,self confidence and supported growth,girls are inspired to achieve more through guidanceeither from community sheroes,international change agents or inspirational global stories. 4.To nurture girls to realise the impact they can have inspite of their background standing OBJECTIVES 1.For girls to expand their horizons and harness true capabilities. 2.For girls to have positive attitudes towarsds science and technical subjects in schools. 3.For girls to develop a deep understanding of their rights. 4.For girls to see life beyond their situations aiming for higher achievements and thinking out of the box. ACTIVITIES Three(3) trainings per month with twenty(20) girls participants,two volunteers and one facilitator. TARGET GROUP AND AREA *The program will be implemented in a rural school with participants ranging from 12-18years,the program is sustainable in the sense that we are able to follow the girls from primary final grade level,through high school and onto college at which point will encourage thepast beneficiaries to come back as mentors to other girls.In addition,this project is replicable can be replicable in various schools henceforth,reaching more girls.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – EcoSan Toilets for Miruya Primary School in Kenya

2014-02-17T00:00:00Z

The goal of the project is to construct 7 EcoSan (4 Arborloo and 3 Fossa alterna) toilets for Miruya Primary School in Kenya. When I visited the school in summer 2013, it had no toilets. The kids used the bush next to the playground for toilet purposes. This makes the children more susceptible to cholera. Arborloo is the compost toilet that eventually becomes a tree. A shallow pit is dug and a concrete slab and easily movable superstructure is placed on top. A mixture of soil and ash is added after each use, until the pit is nearly full – this may take 4 – 9 months. Thereafter, both the slab and superstructure are moved to another pit. A thick layer of soil is added to the full pit and a young tree is planted in the soil. Tree planting may be delayed until the rains begin. The tree grows utilizing the compost to produce fruit. After a few years the result is an orchard producing fruit with a good nutrition and economic value. The compost is never physically handled and it requires minimal behavior change in relation to using a traditional pit latrine. Fossa alterna is the alternating pit compost toilet. Two shallow pits – A and B are dug next to each other; housed within the same brick walled structure. Pit A is used whilst compost is maturing in pit B. When pit A is full, the slab is moved to the pit B for use. Pit A is then covered with soil to compost until pit B is full. Pit A is emptied of compost and used again. The compost is either stored in sacks for future use or dug into the garden to increase soil fertility. This alternate use continues almost indefinitely. As in Arborloo, a dry mixture of soil and ash is added after each use, facilitating the aerobic decomposition, reduction of odors and discourage flies. This differs from the traditional toilet pit, which is saturated, anaerobic and smelly. To ensure sufficient reduction in pathogens, the compost is processed for at least 12 or 6–9 months in warmer climates, before it is spread on the garden.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – The Dinner Party

2014-02-17T00:00:00Z

The Dinner Party is a collective of men and women out to change the way we approach life after loss, through candid conversation and breaking bread. Confronting death and issues of mortality is a challenging act at any age. For most young adults today, it's a subject of taboo. Lacking a peer community with whom to share the experience, those who have lost a parent, sibling, or partner choose to keep it private. We see the deer-in-headlights expressions on the faces of those who’ve never been there, and quickly change the subject. Without other examples to draw upon, we fear we’re not doing it right, or that there’s something wrong with us. We learn to hold back and hold in what for many of us has been the most significant event in our lives to date. We think it's high time we changed that. Through unstructured dinner parties, we invite those who’ve experienced significant loss to dive into long-tabooed territory, sharing a defining part of ourselves that rarely sees the light of day. Our story began as a casual experiment on a back deck in Los Angeles, on a Sunday evening in 2010, We didn't know it at the time, but all of us were looking for the same thing: a chance to commune with others who'd walked the same dark hallways--people who were equally willing to look forward as to look back, and who wanted not merely to survive, but to thrive. And we wanted to do it with people we consider friends, not strangers, in environments we’d gladly share on Instagram. That table has since grown to include circles across the country (and soon, we hope, around the world). Together, we’re creating space to explore the many ways — good, ugly, and everything in between — in which loss continues to color our lives & the lessons about living well we've learned along the way. Our goal? To change the very way in which we conceive of and talk about life after loss.

Pittsburgh, PA – Urban RC!

2014-02-15T00:00:00Z

Marty McDaniels has been living in Homewood, Pittsburgh for 13 years. His hobby is building and racing remote control cars. For the past several summers, Marty has been racing on a 'bashing' track, a backyard track in an abandoned lot near his residence. Knowing that Homewood has a reputation for violence and negativity, Marty is seeking to turn his hobby into something positive; a public racetrack where kids and adults can race in a place free of fear and intolerance. Marty is an amazing character with a passion for his hobby and a positive outlook on what RC racing can bring to his community. Working as a dishwasher at Chatham University, Marty puts every spare dollar he earns toward remote controlled car parts, limestone dirt to give the track a professional surface, and tools needed to make necessary repairs to his growing collection of cars. Having built the existing track by himself, Marty realizes that, for his hobby to reach other people, he needs help. Marty is collaborating with DALIBORKAfilms to create a documentary about his amazing hobby. We will visit existing RC tracks in the greater Western PA area, talk to organizations promoting RC racing, visit hobby shops to learn about different RC cars, all while building our own public track in Homewood. The vision is big, but we have to start small. RC tracks are very suburban but few are found within the city limits. By creating a fun, positive, racing environment that is accessible to everyone, we can raise awareness for the sport of RC racing and the positive effects it can have on urban youth and adults. Many people want to race but there simply isn't a place within the city limits. Marty's goal is community awareness and involvement. This grant would be the first step, but a crucial step. By cleaning up the lot and putting in a few professional touches, we can begin to create a Pittsburgh RC track that everyone can be proud of.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media

2014-02-14T00:00:00Z

Founded in 2004 the Institute is at the forefront of changing female portrayals and gender stereotypes in children's media and entertainment. The Institute is uniquely positioned to spotlight gender inequalities at every media and entertainment company through cutting-edge research, education, training, strategic guidance and advocacy programs. Our mission is to work within the entertainment industry to dramatically alter how girls and women are reflected in media. The Institute is the only research-based organization working within the media and entertainment industry to engage, educate, and influence the need for gender balance, reducing stereotyping and creating a wide variety of female characters for entertainment targeting children 11 and under. We have amassed the largest body of research on gender prevalence in entertainment, which spans more than 20 years. Our biennial symposium is the only event convening over 300 decision makers, content creators, and thought leaders to share best practices and create a blueprint towards establishing a gender-balanced media landscape. Our research can be viewed here: http://seejane.org/research/index.php Our three-tiered approach of research, education and advocacy has brought the Institute to leading media and entertainment companies, organizations, educational institutions and multinational companies such as the United Nations, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Business Civic Leadership Center, the Wall Street Journal Women in the Economy Task Force and many others. The Institute's research studies are frequently quoted in major media outlets including the The New York Times, Newsweek, Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, USA Today, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, and MSNBC.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – AWESOMeFEET

2014-02-14T00:00:00Z

AWESOMeFEET is a developing foot movement that combines interest for health, physical and mental endurance, self-empowerment, film, art, music, dance, play, fun, public performance, and more! Format Participants in an AWESOMeFEET event move on their feet and are presented with unique physical and creative challenges. Each event is documented on video in a single take, a creative process in itself. I want to experiment with the endurance of long takes 30min - 4 hours and speeding them up into videos that are 1-3 minutes long. This allows one to explore new movement while remapping time in editing. The videos allow participants to share a condensed version of their enduring awesomeness and inspire others to attend an AWESOMeFEET event. In the future, I would like AWESOMeFEET to be a collaboration with creatives, athletes, and all interested participants to push their physical and creative endurance to produce some high-end one take endurance productions. Inspiration: 1. Commuting and traveling long distances via foot 2. Backpacking and the challenge and freedom of being able to carry everything you need to live and make art (music, dance, film, etc) on your own two feet. (Ex. of a future AWESOMeFEET experiment: Challenging musicians to perform a moving acoustic performance where they must run/move.) 3. The idea that much inspiration and ideas come during the act of movement: whether it's running, bicycling, backpacking over mountains, or moving on a train, bus, plane. (Future AWESOMeFEET experiment: Moving Talks/Lectures: A lecturer gives a presentation while running and moving with an audience that follows.) Purpose: 1. Incorporating health, physical and mental endurance into art. 2. Engaging community and creatives for better health and happiness and creative dialogues First video experiment tested documenting a long take performance and went viral with over 50,000 views in 2 weeks: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20131219/METRO08/312190111

Seattle, WA – People of the Central Area

2014-02-13T00:00:00Z

I've been interviewing residents of Seattle's Central Area, taking their photos and scanning their personal photos to give a sense of the richness of this community. It was first home to the Duwamish dating back 10,000 years. After the city was founded and platted it was home to Swedish, Danish and German settlers, then Jewish, Japanese and Chinese immigrants. After the War Effort it welcomed thousands of African-Americans (which made it home to the highest percentage of black home-owners in the country) as well as giving rise to a creative scene. This scene included: Ray Charles, Quincy Jones, Bruce Lee, Jimi Hendrix, plus more artists and activists than can be counted. It was a community of great cooperation, of significant cultural creativity and exchange, while also being a place of occasional conflict and real injustices. Each story fills out that picture through the unique voice of an individual speaking of their life, loves and times. It is wide-ranging oral history living on a blogger site. As it stands, it is less than half complete; and should be entirely complete in a year or 18 months.

Ottawa – Ottawa #PopScope

2014-02-13T00:00:00Z

February’s Awesome Ottawa award goes to Michael O’Shea and Viva Dadwal, to support Ottawa #PopScope, a series of pop-up public astronomy nights. “Many Ottawans,” explains Michael, “have never seen the wonders of the night sky: the craters of the Moon or the beautiful rings of Saturn. #PopScope is our proposal to reconnect Ottawans to the night sky – and to each other – by hosting free, public astronomy nights.” “Last fall,” Michael continues, “we purchased a telescope that we set up in a number of locations downtown. Our telescope intrigued our neighbours, who stopped by to ask questions or chat about the night sky. We were encouraged by this positive outlook and enthusiasm for astronomy, and we wondered what could happen if we extended the opportunity to look through a telescope to other residents across Ottawa.” Michael and Viva’s #PopScope envisions setting up telescopes for public use across the Ottawa region on a series of nights this spring, with the locations announced through social media. To be the first to know when and where to find them, visit https://www.facebook.com/ottawapopscope. Michael and Viva are civil servants by day and self-described community enthusiasts by night.

Nuremberg (Inativo) – HEIMAT mobil

2014-02-12T00:00:00Z

STATUS UND ZIELE: Im Alltag gibt es wenig Berührungspunkte zwischen Menschen mit und ohne Behinderung. Durch Veranstaltungen von sozialen Trägern werden wiederkehrend die gleichen Zielgruppen angesprochen. Das Bedürfnis nach Inklusion muss bei einer breiten Zielgruppe erst geweckt werden, und dies geschieht erst wenn sie erlebt wie wertvoll die Begegnung sein kann. DAS PROJEKT: HEIMAT - eine Gastronomie als Inklusionsprojekt. Wir müssen dorthin gehen wo Begegnung zwischen Menschen mit und ohne Behinderung in einem entspannten, alltäglichen und natürlichem Umfeld möglich wird. Wir schaffen einen Ort, der im Alltag der Menschen funktioniert. An dem Begegnung natürlich passiert und nicht inszeniert wird. Der Betrieb unterstützt die Mitarbeiter mit Behinderung darin eine Vielzahl an fachlichen und sozialen Kompetenzen zu erlernen, die ihr berufliches und privates Leben bereichern. HEIMAT ist im Zentrum von Nürnberg. Für Menschen, die gerne einen guten Espresso trinken und die in ihrer Mittagspause gut und gesund essen möchten. HEIMAT ist ein Ort an dem jeder willkommen ist. Ein Ort an dem sich jeder wohl fühlt, wie bei Freunden Zuhause. VORGEHENSWEISE: Das Bedürfnis Inklusionsprojekte attraktiver für eine breite Zielgruppe zu gestalten ist bei sozialen Trägern noch nicht vorhanden. Um das HEIMAT Projekt nachhaltig erfolgreich zu vermarkten benötigen wir einen "Proof of Concept". (Realitäts-Check) Daher wollen wir im Sommer 2014 mit einer mobilen HEIMAT Version auf Nürnberger Sommerfesten und Festivals unterwegs sein. "HEIMAT mobil" wird ein liebevoll umgebauter Bauwagen sein, der von uns und Schülern mit Behinderung bewirtschaftet wird. Im Angebot haben wir Pausenbrote und Crumbles - die in einer auffällig schönen Verpackung verkauft werden. Mit unserem Angebot und Erscheinungsbild wollen wir die öffentliche Wahrnehmung auf uns ziehen und in zukünftigen Verhandlungen soziale Träger überzeugen.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – DIY Sustainable Art Symposium; Upper Peninsula, MI

2014-02-12T00:00:00Z

Thank you for revisiting our project as it develops (I've been in touch with Jennifer Raymond, who encouraged us to reapply.) Every Summer, we meet on the land, (We are now calling it the Visitor's Center, because the building that we rebuilt that started the endeavor was the old Visitor's Center at the Forest Service Entrance in the Ottawa National Forest). We have been able to slowly add a small barn, picnic tables, and two small sheds. We learned that the clay on the land is workable, so we have been testing it to make it usable. We found a kiln at a garage sale and repaired it, so we can fire ceramics. Everything we have been doing, we have been self funding, so it has been moving slowly, but steadily from year to year. We are ready to invite artists from around the country, as well as local residents of the U.P. to come to the land and take part in our DIY Sustainable Adventure Art Symposium in August 2014! It will be a rugged symposium; artists will live in tents, cook and shower outside, and will be challenged to make work outside their comfort zones. We will be offering workshops, using what we have available to make work. Right now, we are designing two workshops, clay processing (working with the clay from the land and doing raku firing outdoors) and metal casting (anyone from the community can bring aluminum cans and we will be melting them down and pouring molds). Artists can also work outside the workshops, painting, etc. We will be organizing an art show in the closest town (Ewen, population 200) and evenings where each person can present their work. Every morning we will work together on collective projects, working to add to the land for future summers. Our first collective projects will be to build the outdoor show and walls to the latrine, both of which we will be using during the symposium.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Babies In Space (working title)

2014-02-12T00:00:00Z

'We are currently living in a world dominated by technology forcing us to re-define our boundaries and limitations. This ‘no rules’ era is one where technology can corrupt natures ballot, break down biological limitations and compel us to colonise new planets'. I run an artistic laboratory that works on the fringes of magic, emotion and intuition deploying a new vocabulary on the body, beauty, health and the impact major world challenges will have on the mind and body. "Babies in Space" (working title) is a speculative artistic project that looks at the complications of growing a foetus in altered gravity environments. This research project will usher in a new era of procreation; a world in which children are created in the laboratory, gestated in artificial womb-like environments and brought “to term” without ever really being “born.” Set in interstellar conditions, where gravity is expensive to simulate, this project looks at travel between stars. The artistic outcomes intended from this project are a short ten minute film, with various aesthetic artefacts including performance, academic workshops and future prototypes developed alongside experts in the medical and life science fields. I am developing this project alongside architect, biologist and TED Fellow Rachel Armstrong in corporation with the Institute for Interstellar Studies. Themes included in this project include: – SEXUALITY, BEAUTY, ATTRACTION: The new beauty continuum If beauty is lost what are the (new) assets for generating social race and its impact on survival, sexuality, desire, love, loneliness, the mind and the human species? – RELATIONSHIP OF NEWBORN WITH ‘PARENT’: What is the relationship of the ‘hatchlings’ to the AI or other parent? – EMOTIONAL, PHYSIOLOGICAL, BIOLOGICAL ISSUES: What are the emotional and physiological issues that will confront the newborn. "If you don't know what the future looks like, create it"....

San Francisco, CA – Traveling Heart Hospital Bags

2014-02-12T00:00:00Z

We will manufacture a unique Traveling Heart Hospital Bag to give away as a free resource for rape crisis centers. In the US, someone is sexually assaulted every 2 minutes. After an assault, a woman must go through a hospital procedure or “rape kit” in order to help prosecute her attacker. This is a battery of tests and information collecting that is necessary but invasive. Sometimes she cannot shower, use the restroom, comb her hair, or change her clothes for up to four hours. At the end of her procedure, a woman is given a plastic 'hospital bag' containing clothing to return home in; but hospital bags are not always available. Often women who are in trauma, will go home in a paper hospital gown.Traveling Heart Bags are unique, hand sewn and initiate healing through beauty, connection and warmth. Bags contain a change of clothing, new underwear, toiletries, legal information as well as a personal and compassionate message of hope through a Traveling Postcard that is placed in every bag. The bags are hand sewn in Tennessee by a collective of women who are currently living in the US as legal political refugees. Our project will provide a much needed source of income to a population that rarely finds work due to language and cultural barriers. In addition, as part of the Traveling Heart Hospital Bag project, a Traveling Postcards facilitator workshop and training manual will be created and implemented for domestic violence and sexual assault counselors in the US. We want every survivor who receives a bag to return to her local sexual assault center for ongoing support and to have the opportunity to make her own Traveling Postcard. By sharing her resiliency and courage on her card, she will help another woman take back her voice, and ultimately, a pipeline of women sharing wisdom and compassion is created. We do not want our bags to be seen as a stigma of assault, instead our bags will be available in stores everywhere to purchase as a symbol of solidarity and hope.

San Francisco, CA – A Portrait Project at the Zen Hospice

2014-02-12T00:00:00Z

My project is awesome because it uses art to provide hospice residents with a meaningful experience as they face the end of their lives. I have partnered with the Zen Hospice Project to create a series of painted portraits of residents. I will also record informal interviews focused on their life stories, memories, lessons and reflections. The final portraits will be created on-site at the hospital so that the residents and staff can observe the creative process. The work will be exhibited at the hospice's two SF locations and at a venue for the public -- all profits from sold paintings will go towards the Zen Hospice Project. The purpose of the project is twofold: (1) to engage hospice residents in the contemplative and poignant process of telling their story and sitting for a portrait; (2) to offer the public insight into the inner worlds of people confronting the end of life: what really matters in life when you know it's almost over? Even though death may be the only certainty of life, our cultural norms prescribe a high level of avoidance towards confronting this reality. Consequently, open and honest communication between those at the end of their life and those who have it all ahead of them is uncommon. Nonetheless, the transmission of this kind of “life knowledge” and wisdom between generations is fundamental to our psychological and spiritual health. My 85 year old grandmother has always been my muse. Through my portraits of her and our endless conversations about life and death, she has helped me to understand what is really important. Combining visual art and storytelling, this project aims to offer participants and viewers a meditation on the meaning of life. Please help me to utilize my artistic practice to give inspiration to the living and a legacy to the dying.

Chicago, IL – Cook County Sheriff Beekeeping Initiative

2014-02-12T00:00:00Z

The Urban Farming Program teaches a wide range of organic farming and gardening skills to 120 men and women jail inmates per year in a supportive and constructive environment. It also provides training in all areas of business operations, including production, packaging, delivery, bookkeeping, marketing, and customer relations. The program is intended to increase the prospects of minimum-security, non-violent inmates for future employment upon release. Over its 20-year history, the program has developed numerous collaborative partnerships in the public and private sector to support and enhance opportunities for the training and rehabilitation of the inmate participants. The Cook County Sheriff’s Beekeeping Initiative project is expected to result in the following: 1. Launch the beekeeping program within the Urban Farming Program at the Cook County Department of Corrections and produce our first batch of organic raw honey for sale. 2. Expand capacity within the Urban Farming Program to produce honey through sustainable and organic methods. 3. Provide beekeeping training and certificates to inmates participating in the program at the Cook County Department of Corrections. In addition, create a learning environment that teaches all aspects of urban farming to the men and women participating in this project, which will be beneficial to obtain employment in local community garden programs.

Vancouver, BC (Inativo) – The Vancouver Fruit Tree Project (VFTP)

2014-02-11T00:00:00Z

The Vancouver Fruit Tree Project is a local, sustainable food initiative that diverts food waste and provides healthy, local, organic food to those in need. Vancouver’s climate makes it a perfect place for backyard fruit trees, but much of the fruit produced by these trees every year goes to waste because tree owners can’t or don’t harvest their bounty. The VFTP connects teams of volunteer fruit pickers with tree owners who have excess fruit, and then donates the fruit to charity. In 2013 we completed 72 picks and donated 5,341 pounds of fruit that would otherwise have gone to waste! Our most common harvest is apples, but we also pick pears, plums, grapes, cherries, crabapples, quince and even kiwis! We have fifteen community partners, including community centres, daycares, senior centres, supportive housing facilities, shelters and low-income grocery programs. The people served by these programs often have trouble accessing fresh healthy food, but our project makes this possible! Since the fruit all comes from Vancouver’s backyards it has an almost zero carbon footprint and is nearly always organic. Our volunteers come from a range of backgrounds and we are one of the few family-friendly volunteering opportunities available in Vancouver. Many of our fruit tree owners are seniors who are no longer able to care for their trees, and our pick teams help connect them to their communities, thus reducing isolation. We also run canning, preserving and tree pruning workshops to help Vancouverites learn about sustainability and take charge of their own food security. Turning waste into local, healthy, organic food for those in need - what could be more awesome!?

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – IRCA CAPACITY STARTUP BUILDING

2014-02-10T00:00:00Z

IRCA Start up Capacity Building. Short Introduction: Idaho Refugee Community Association Inc. is a volunteer based not-for-profit organization that helps and provides a number of free services to refugee community in Idaho: -free interpretation/translation services, - helping refugee to search jobs, fill application and get ready for interview. - sometimes we provide skills training in our small office - help refugees find and apply low-income housing - help them find available resources. Sometime we refer them to know resources offices. - from time to time we run special free English classes with translation services - help driver training using our volunteers - we provide mentoring services to some of the weakest families - provide free consultation, when they are lost and mad, and could't figure out what to do. - provide mediation in between refugee and their resettlement agencies, when they cannot understand each other. The organization also advocates for refugees when they need help for their rights. The organization has been registered legally in August 2011, and has a small office in Boise. This program is to strength the organization, materially and physically. We are equipping with minimum office equipment (furniture and machinery) so that the organization can acquire to perform its mission. Currently the organization is using old and used furniture and borrowed office machines from its members. Also we have the 2nd phase in parallel with that, which is training the volunteer staff and Board members for their role of responsibility and tasks Here, we are asking your organization a small grant to cover the costs of a small portion of our project. Namely, computer software and IRS Tax exempt fee. We make ready the tax exemption application

Boston, MA (Inativo) – Increment

2014-02-10T00:00:00Z

2.8 million children in the US have a special need. 89% of these kids have a sibling and 67% regularly attend school, so most of these kids spend the majority of the time with other children. However, there is a divide in the toy market: many toys today lack accessibility, educational value, and material honesty, especially for kids with special needs. Yet, toys in the special needs market often highlight disabilities, creating a stigma of being different or sick. No child should have to feel that way. We have designed a toy that benefits ALL children, by keeping in mind the needs of those who are visually impaired and have physical impairments. Our toy is called the O-Rings: a full-body, sensory toy for kids of all abilities. The toy is a set of 4 stackable rings, with each ring differing in size, weight, density, texture, and color. They can be used for seating, building, exploration, and therapy, for sensory stimulation, gross motor activities, and spatial reasoning. Adults can play too and suggest prompts, whether you’re a parent, teacher, or physical therapist. The O-Rings become more than just a toy or game--they are sensory learning playthings that foster developmental skills for all kids, with and without special needs. We have interviewed, designed, and tested with kids, parents, teachers, and PT/OT therapists to create production quality prototypes, and we’ve had very positive responses. With the goal of bringing the O-Rings to market, we’ve established relationships with manufacturers and we are preparing for a Kickstarter campaign. In Providence, we’ve worked extensively with Meeting Street School, who have been a major inspiration for us by fostering inclusion in all they do. We have seen the amazing benefit they have had on kids, families, communities, and the culture of learning in Rhode Island. We strive to create products that have a similar impact, and we believe in bringing inclusive play and accessibility into the heart of the massive toy market.

Baltimore, MD – Host Kit for Baltimore Soup

2014-02-10T00:00:00Z

Baltimore Soup is a new endeavor dedicated to bringing people together over good food to network and raise funds for local projects through community-awarded microgrants. Attendees pay $5 to eat soup, listen to 4 projects, and vote on the project that wins the proceeds of the dinner. We’re inspired by Detroit SOUP, a group who first gathered in 2010 and since then Detroiters have given Detroiters over $40,000. We believe this model can change Baltimore too. Our first projects included: yoga mats for a Rec Center fitness program for young men re-entering the community, rodent-proof food storage containers for a school’s food pantry, a book scholarship for a young undocumented student, and supplementing memberships for a new food co-op. Our first dinner engaged a diverse group of city residents and we plan to reach an even broader audience. We have reached out to professors from MSU’s School of Community Health and Policy, young people at New Lens Productions, graduate students and professors at JHU’s School of Education, ministers at Loyola Blakefield, staff at Mi Espacio at CASA de Maryland, service providers at the 29th Street Community Center, and look forward to continuing to broaden Soup’s network. Our commitment is that each Soup reflects the same diversity of residents, talents, and dreams that exist within our city. Baltimore inspires us. In 2013, our city strove to be the most giving in America and raised over $5 million on Giving Tuesday. Baltimore Soup expands on this giving nature to make Baltimore a place that not only gives more but does more. Small grants empower people to act instead of allowing their project to rest as a daydream. After submissions are accepted we meet with applicants to help them organize their own network of support and design their presentation. The Soup dinners offer applicants an opportunity for alternative forms of support as well--all attendees discuss how they can collaborate across projects or connect to other projects.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Open Arms

2014-02-09T00:00:00Z

Open Arms is a project born of love and service. Central Texas Birth Center's staff has been serving Central Texas and surrounding for almost three years now, and have poured their lives into countless women and their families in immeasurable ways. This project seeks to give care to low income families who receive health care coverage through Medicaid. Midwifery care is a whole-family, wellness-based approach to pregnancy, birth, and childbearing years. The Open Arms program will have a dedicated team of midwives, students, and staff trained to cater to the needs of the families in the program. Whether it be education on the best carseat for the lowest price or a how to cook healthy on a budget, the families in Open Arms will be loved and supported throughout their journey just as every other CTBC family is. Prenatal care will be based on the Centering Pregnancy approach, whereby prenatal visits are group centered so that families may learn from each other. Expectant mothers (and dads too!) meet once a month with the other mothers that are due in the same month. Midwives will lead discussion on a different subject each month, and at the end of the meeting each mother has a “belly check” where she has private time with a midwife to discuss her concerns and ask questions, as well as check in on baby. Centering Pregnancy has been proven to lower the rates of preterm labor, lower incidences of emergency room visits during pregnancy, and increase overall satisfaction with the prenatal and birth experience.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Pop Up Repair

2014-02-09T00:00:00Z

Pop Up Repair is an itinerant repair service for household items of all kinds. A challenge to the cycle of use-and-discard, we launched in June of 2013 with a one month repair shop in Inwood, NY, staffed by theatre artists. The project is radically simple - we provide convenient, drop-off repair services for people, in their community. In Inwood 2013, we repaired over one ton of broken stuff, and got our community thinking and talking about repair, consumption, and our habits of waste. Our goals are to: Fix people’s stuff. Provide an alternative to the cycle of use and discard. AND Inspire change in our habits of consumption and waste - with our customers, with retailers and manufacturers, and in our communities. From the start, Pop Up Repair has sparked an enormous response - in our community, in the press, and in the larger sustainability community. We think that people are ready to begin rethinking our relationship with stuff. We just finished a 1 week "follow up care" and alternative holiday fix Pop Up in Inwood, and we are planning on how to replicate and expand the project. Upcoming projects involve: future pop-ups, an education session at a local school, and workshops for people who want to learn to fix their own stuff.

Tel Aviv - קרן בקטנה (Inativo) – Therapeutic-Occupational Garden

2014-02-09T00:00:00Z

This therapeutic garden provides work for an inspiring group of women with Autism and Down Syndrome. We love this project because it gives hope and pride to those who need it in our community.

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – The Edgehill Bike Club - Nashville, TN

2014-02-07T00:00:00Z

You can read all about the Edgehill bike club in the Tennessean here: http://www.tennessean.com/article/20131124/COLUMNIST0101/311240062/ I started a program for the neighborhood kids to be able to get bikes, learn how to fix them, and then go on regular rides. The program gives the kids something positive to do, keeps them out of trouble, helps them see another world outside of our neighborhood. It helps them make friends and stay healthy. We have helped more than 100 kids in our neighborhood get a bike. We are always fixing them up and going on rides. Through this program kids learn important mechanical and bike safety skills and stay active. http://vimeo.com/78511527

New York City, NY – The 90-Second Newbery Film Festival

2014-02-07T00:00:00Z

The 90-Second Newbery Film Festival, founded in 2011 by James Kennedy, is an annual video contest in which kid filmmakers create movies that compress the stories of Newbery-winning books into 90 seconds or less. Ever since 1922, the Newbery Medal has been recognized as the most prestigious award in children’s literature. But it turns out any book, no matter how worthy and somber, becomes pleasingly ludicrous when compressed into 90 seconds. Here's 25 of the finest of the 100s of videos they've received over the past 3 years: http://bit.ly/1ajiAJt The best of each year's movies are shown at FREE yearly screenings across the country, in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Oakland, Portland, and Tacoma, co-hosted by James Kennedy and celebrity children's authors such as Jon Scieszka, Kate DiCamillo, and Blue Balliett. The shows combine movie screenings with kidlit comedy cabaret bits. Their shows have been at capacity from the start, with crowds of hundreds, including the young filmmakers themselves—who often get to meet the author whose book they filmed! See photos and video from the most recent screening in Chicago here: http://bit.ly/1fYpdBe Curious? THE NEW YORK CITY SCREENING of the film festival is 3/22/2014 at the New York Public Library main branch, in the Bartos Forum, co-hosted by me & bestselling author LIBBA BRAY. Come! Details:http://bit.ly/L5t1HF The mission of the 90-Second Newbery: 1) Entice students into reading and discussing Newbery winning books—especially older, unjustly forgotten titles. 2) Encourage the close reading necessary to write a script that wittily sums up a book in 90 seconds. 3) Give opportunity for students to use new technologies, such as video equipment and editing software, in a constructive way that promotes literacy. 4) Throw awesome screenings to celebrate the kids' great movies!

Yerevan – Public piano under the open sky

2014-02-07T00:00:00Z

The idea is simple!!! Put a piano in a public space under the open sky and motivate passing-by-people to play on it. That's all!!! I am fired with this idea for already 3 months and want to add this new cultural spirit to Mashtots Park in the center of Yerevan. This park has become a symbol of civic activism in Armenia when a group of young people saved this park from becoming a trading place. The struggle lasted around 3 months and Yerevan municipality at last had to make a decision to demontage trading boutiques being constructed in the park.Cultural events were taking place during Mashtots park 90 day-struggle like violin, guitar concerts etc. Now this park has become a green, fresh and vivid place where different active groups gather and discuss their plans about their actions and civic protests. During Soviet Union time almost every person could play on some musical instrument. For instance playing on piano is quite popular in Armenia. There are a lot of unknown people who can play on this instrument. People just play on it for their friends and family members. This public piano idea can become a good platform to reach a new audience for these people in a beautiful atmosphere and surroundings, Besides, there is a birth-giving hospital near this beautiful park and I find it great if newborns could relate to art just minutes/hours after they are born. There is a lot that can be organized around this piano, like art evenings, birthday celebrations, piano classes and concerts. And the most important, it will be really public one. Everyone will have a chance to play on it, enjoy it and make others enjoy the music :)

Awesome Without Borders (Inativo) – Modern Loss

2014-02-06T00:00:00Z

Quite simply, we are trying to break the unspoken taboo on honest, individualized talk about loss. ModernLoss.com is a place to share the unspeakably taboo, unbelievably hilarious, and unexpectedly beautiful terrain of navigating your life after a death. The site is filled with resources for support, personal essays, and even a rad advice column. While our primary target is young people in their 20s and 30s struggling with grief — this topic has universal appeal and we have received feedback from folks of all ages and backgrounds. We think this is because of our candid approach to all aspects of loss and our unique, accessible (and often tongue-in-cheek) tone. This project grew out of my (Rebecca) and my colleague's (Gabi) separate experiences with sudden and traumatic parental loss and our struggle to find resources that weren’t too clinical, overtly religious, patronizing or, frankly, cheesy. Together, we wanted to use their skills to help other young people struggling in a new environment where stress over social media protocol after a loss compounds the silence and suffering. We launched on November 13, 2013. and our mission seems to be striking a chord with many. Within three weeks we attracted more than 1,000 Facebook likes and have received nearly 300 story submissions through our site from people who are connecting with our mission and have tales to share. Our web traffic has been quite high, with nearly 15k unique visitors in the first week, and we have been contacted by publishers and agents asking if we've ever considered writing a book. Quite simply, we're stunned by the overwhelming response in such a short timeframe. But more than stunned, we are thrilled that our mission, which is to open up this conversation which for so many people is a conversation they don't feel welcome having in public, is resonating with so many wonderful folks, We can't wait to see what we can accomplish if we received a little financial support.

Sarnia (Inativo) – STOP THE BURN .... !!

2014-02-06T00:00:00Z

My STOP THE BURN project has a double meaning (burn from the sun and burn from an arm extended in the air for a long period of time) - picture this if you will ... an amazing sunny day, breeze blowing, sunglasses on, BBQ sizzling and 4 group homes coming together for a great evening. Now get a little closer and watch as the sun starts to join the party, hot and bright, taking in all of the fair skin that we've brought into one gathering, skin that is made more susceptible to the sun's rays by some medications, conditions and diagnosis. For me, just being a nice shade of porcelain makes me burn ... now look to the right ... to the left ... front of the yard ... back of the yard ... hmmm ... NO SHADE ... Now, picture if you will ... staff ... dedicated, caring supportive staff, arms high in the air holding the biggest, gaudiest umbrellas in captivity. Arms shaking after hours of taking turns holding them, trying to provide shade for the people we support and each other. We draw straws to see who has to actually stand holding the umbrellas because they won't stay standing on the uneven ground and the only other alternative is in the garage where in order to join the rest of the party, it would require xray vision to see through a cement wall that is between the garage and the yard. If only we had some shade ... perhaps a couple of shade trees!! Unfortunately with the government funding, a request for something like this, which would richly enhance the lives of the people we support is laughable. There is no room in our limited funding for such 'frivolous' things.