Dear ,
Thank you for your continued support and love over the past three and a half years! We are so grateful to have the opportunity to help emerging entrepreneurs focused on making social/environmental impact get a head start without worrying about loans or excessive paperwork. Scroll down to see what we've been up to this spring!
3 new micro-grant recipients
Kajou
Diversifying Natural Cashew Products to
Create Jobs and Decrease Food Waste in Côte d'Ivoire
The cashew nut supply value has grown over 87% over the last 10 years and while consumers pay about $10/kg for cashews, Ivorian farmers only receive $1/kg of those profits. That's why Ismael Fanny, Ayodele Akintayo, Santiago Monroy, and the other members of the Kajou
team aim to redefine the current cashew value chain in Côte d’Ivoire by bringing more value to stakeholders including farmers, suppliers, traders, governments, clients and end consumers.
By producing cashew juice and cashew flour locally, they're not only bringing jobs, food security and income opportunities to Ivorian farmers but also reducing the existing waste footprint.
The $2,000 Stardust grant will launch the summer 2019 production of cashew juice and flour.
Creopia Productions
Building a Film-Based Creative Economy
for Social Impact in Vanadzor, Armenia
Creopia Productions is an Vanadzor-based film production company with a mission for social impact. Co-founders Sashka Avanyan and Lusine Poghosyan aim to use creative services to raise awareness around social issues as well as to generate jobs in the area of Vanadzor.
Ultimately, the goal of Creopia Productions is for Vanadzor to become the main creative hub of the region, so that more people move there and work there. They want to hire 100+ employees over the next five years in order to initiate a blossoming community of all the creatives in the city and surrounding villages. Vanadzor has often been
overlooked in terms of creative education and international attention, and they want to show how amazing this place can be.
The $2,000 Stardust grant will fund a creative filmmaking and video-editing course that will begin in at the end of 2019.
Educate a Child Initiative
Reading and Technology Programs for Young
Learners in Isheri-Osun (Lagos, Nigeria)
10.5 million Nigerian children are out of school (this is the highest in the world) and the education accessibility rate is only at 20%. In an approach to tackle ever-present literacy and education challenges, Nigeria wants to make school curriculums more relevant to the needs of the labour market with emphasis on audio-visuals in classroom learning, digital media programmes, distribution of educational tablets to students,
and training of teachers in modern literacy skills. And that is exactly what Ihonwa Sylvester is doing for his community.
Educate a Child is an initiative born to reaffirm the importance of reading books and effective technology use among young people aged 8-16 years old through four different programs in the Isheri-Osun district in Lagos, Nigeria. Ihonwa began this
project last year and is currently working with 3 volunteers.
The $2,000 Stardust grant will cover Ihonwa’s rent for the new space for two years.
All of these amazing startups and more are available to look through on the "Projects" page on our brand new website! We are so happy with the way that it turned out.
Doesn't it just look beautiful?
Yes , you
can take five minutes off from work and browse. We've got new items in the store (think bookmarks and stickers), a user-friendly blog with wonderful articles, our entire origin story, ways to get involved, and much more...
We also have a easy-to-access media kit available ("Download assets" in the website footer). Find: our logo, fact sheets, posters, and more. Great for sharing with your
friends or printing out to put up at your local library!
Be the change you wish to see in the world.
- Gandhi
5
→ 10K "Named Grant" Challenge
This past April at the Stardust gathering in DC, an attendee asked if he could designate a $2,000 gift as a micro-grant in memory of a loved one who passed away. We were touched by his offer and moved by the way he was determined to “change the world” by honoring his loved one with a named grant.
This is a wonderful part of our story because, though The Stardust-Startup Factory is about finding working in the areas of sustainability health, and learning, it is also about transforming grief to purpose. For those of you not familiar with our story, check out the About Us page on our website.
We are grateful that Stardust provides an active way to help others move from grief to purpose.
How might you, too, have a
named grant that can fund micro-grant projects? Micro-grants are $2,000 each. The dollars donated could be from one single source or from a network of family/friends.
Thanks to the generosity of a longtime Stardust supporter, we currently have one named grant challenge in play.
If we raise $5,000 (money for two new named grants and $1,000 unrestricted giving) between now and July 31, it will be matched!
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Sincerely,
Laura Jean Palmer-Moloney
& Camille Babington
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