GlobalGiving.org: Provide Water for 150 Families and Fight Violence

New Online Social Entrepreneurship Program Under Development

Gretchen Wallace — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 01:52:05 GMT

We are excited to share, Global Grassroots has begun the development of a web-based eAcademy for Conscious Change, which will allow women’s groups in developing countries globally to access our social entrepreneurship curriculum online. To date, we have received emails from over 160 women’s groups from 45 different countries requesting our programs. We will be chosing a pilot group of women's organizations from four continents to participate in the beta version of the elearning program. Our online academy will be accessible for free, providing an interactive program that will support the development of grassroots-level social entrepreneurship projects. We anticipate the development of the site will be complete in late autumn for piloting, with a public launch in early 2012.

Next week Global Grassroots will launch its new Conscious Social Change certification program, with seven women from three countries. Once certified, this corps of trainees will be able to deploy globally to offer our core program upon request to partner organizations. Global Grassroots is eager to collaborate through partnership to support women change agents in new communties.

This progress has only been possible with your support and we extend our deepest gratitude. As we expand, Global Grassroots needs engaged investors to help us make these exciting possibilities a reality. We know that women have the potential to lead conscious social change, but many lack the resources and training to advance their own ideas. Please consider a donation to help Global Grassroots continue to support the social ventures of grassroots change agents worldwide.

New Access to Water for People w/Same Purpose

Gretchen Wallace — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 14:56:42 GMT

WATER ACCESS ARRIVES TO AREA SERVED BY PEOPLE WITH THE SAME PURPOSE

Global Grassroots is happy to share that the Government of Rwanda and the municipal water company, Electrogas, has decided to extend water access to the area where People with the Same Purpose had been working to develop their own non-profit water venture. We have consulted with the team, who believes that the need they were facing will be adequately addressed by the government, and thus they no longer need to invest in the water venture they had been developing. We are delighted that the community will have water access and that women, especially those physically disabled, will no longer be at risk of violence or exploitation in accessing clean water. However, we honor the funding that you have contributed towards this venture and your intentions for its use.

Global Grassroots deeply appreciates your donation and wants to make sure it used in the way you would like it to be used. As such, we would like to contribute this funding first towards the needs of another of our water projects on GlobalGiving, "Let Us Build Ourselves-Kanombe" (http://www.globalgiving.org/projects/clean-water-hygiene-violence/), which is just beginning construction. Any unused funds would then go towards a new Global Grassroots venture also working with the handicapped. Handicap Rwandais Reabilite Reintegre dans ses Droits (or HRD) is helping mothers and disabled children overcome extreme stigmatization and violence, where women are blamed for giving birth to a child with disabilities, and some are abandoned by their husbands and abused by family and neighbors. HRD was part of our 2010 Academy for Conscious Change, and their project is currently in development.

If you would rather these funds be used for another project on GlobalGiving please let us know by December 1. If you have any concerns or questions, please feel free to contact me directly at gwallace@globalgrassroots.org or GlobalGiving at projecthelp@globalgiving.org.

Thank you again for your support!

GLOBAL GRASSROOTS YEAR-END UPDATE AND LOOKING AHEAD TO 2011

2010 has been a turning point for Global Grassroots. We have endured hardship with the economic downturn, but are emerging leaner, more creative and more strategic. We’ve evaluated our social impact, repositioned our training program as the Academy for Conscious Change and integrated new mind-body practices for trauma healing. We’ve brought these holistic practices to earthquake survivors in Haiti and, by request, to American relief workers serving in disaster zones. We’ve doubled the number of civil society organizations our Academy has helped launch in Rwanda, and are investing in technology and partnerships to expand our reach. Today, our 300 Rwandan change agents have established 16 non-profit organizations, which are working at the root level of a social issue facing women and girls, benefiting an estimated 10,000+ people each year.

As we move forward into 2011, we have over 100 women’s groups in 40 countries requesting our programs. In response, we are expanding our hands-on approach into Northern Uganda next and embarking upon a web-based eAcademy for Conscious Change to reach women worldwide through local internet cafes. We are developing new courses, based on our core curriculum, for a range of new audiences, including students, donors and practitioners. And we are preparing to package and license our program model for partner organizations to implement in regions we have yet to explore.

Global Grassroots needs engaged investors to join with us and our change agents in a three-part-partnership to actualize the possibilities in front of us. We invite you to read more about our progress in our 2010 Year-End Magazine (available for download on our home page: www.globalgrassroots.org) and consider a donation to help Global Grassroots continue to support the social ventures of grassroots change agents worldwide.

GLOBAL GRASSROOTS is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that supports conscious social change for women in post-conflict societies. Our Academy for Conscious Change is a 12-18 month social venture incubator, offering non-profit management skills, leadership training, personal transformation practices, seed grants and high-engagement support that enables vulnerable women change agents to launch their own grassroots solutions benefiting women and girls. JOIN US.

Links:

Transformation for Women in Rwanda

Gretchen Wallace — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 23:43:59 GMT

A Global Grassroots water venture

GLOBAL GRASSROOTS UPDATE

Global Grassroots US team recently returned from Rwanda where we visited our existing project teams and initiated our 2010 Academy for Conscious Change.This Academy cohort includes 37 participants representing 7 of the 30+ teams who applied. Having completed our intensive training, our teams will now embark upon the development of their own social ventures over the next 18 months. They are a highly motivated group working on a range of critical issues facing women:

Violence and discrimination against mothers of handicapped children Lack of clean water access and associated violence, exploitation, and disease Domestic violence Violence against and rejection of single mothers Malnutrition Teenage mothers with unwanted pregnancies (age 12-14) Education of girls, especially children of prostitutes

We anticipate great progress from these teams as we work with them over the next few months to develop sustainable ventures with a measurable social impact. We'd like to ask for your help in making that happen. Your financial contributions enable our efforts on the ground to improve the lives of the worlds most vulnerable women.

PEOPLE WITH THE SAME PURPOSE UPDATE

Global Grassroots is preparing to begin providing seed funding for the launch of People With the Same Purpose in order to provide clean water to 150 Rwandan households, including women who are physically disabled. This project has been at risk of being displaced as the local government considers commercially developing their section of Kigali. But these disabled women need relief from the hours they have to spend collecting water or the difficulty they face finding others to help them meet their daily needs each day. We still need to raise $5400 to complete this project. Please consider donating today to help this team of women get their start managing their own water venture. We will keep you updated as the project begins.

BRINGING BREATH AND YOGA TO RWANDA

For the first time in Rwanda, Global Grassroots implemented the Breath~Body~Mind (BBM) program developed by Dr. Richard Brown and Dr. Patricia Gerbarg (www.haveaheathlymind.com). This program, integrating Qi Gong and Coherent Breathing, was introduced by Global Grassroots earlier this year in Haiti to support trauma relief for earthquake victims. We are conducting a program evaluation over the next year in Rwanda to assess how this group's symptoms of PTSD change with the continued practice of BBM.

We were also thrilled to have Yoga practitioner Jessica Spain join us to offer yoga each morning during the personal transformation practice portion of the program. On the first day she taught, yoga was met with a room full of nervous and embarrassed giggles, but the next day everyone told us that they wanted another session! It became a regular part of our morning and prompted Jessica to develop special series of poses she called "Yoga for Skirt Wearers".

Gretchen Wallace has coauthored an article with Dr. Gerbarg on the use of mind-body practices in post-disaster scenarios that will be published in an upcoming issue of the International Journal of Yoga Therapy. Gretchen will also be teaching a course at Kripalu September 6-10 for relief workers in Haiti on using breath for managing trauma exposure when working with traumatized populations. This offering is a collaboration with Suzanne Jones of YogaHope and David Emerson of the Trauma Center at the Justice Resource Initiative.

Be a part of Global Grassroots! Help us continue to offer innovative programs to train and support local change makers.

Thank you!!

Rwandan women doing yoga

Links:

Global Grassroots

Global Grassroots March 2010 Update

Rebecca Perkins — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:18:03 GMT

Worldwide, 1 in 8 people live without access to safe water and 4,500 infants and children die each day from unsafe water and a lack of basic sanitation. In Rwanda, 1 in 3 people lack access to a safe water supply and 28% (mostly women and children) must travel between 30 minutes and 4 hours by foot to obtain water. Often widowed and disabled women are sexually exploited for water or must send their children for water instead of to school. Please continue to support Global Grassroots.

Global Grassroots deeply appreciates your support of this water project. To date, we have raised $1,405 of the necessary $6,363.

Funds permitting, we will launch this and an additional seven social venture projects in Rwanda this year. In June, we will return to Rwanda to host our sixth Academy for Conscious Change and, in partnership with Jewish Helping Hands, offer training for our project teams in reproductive health, social-issue filmmaking, computer literacy, English, and trauma healing through yoga and breathwork. We happily report the recent launch of Light in Our Home, a women-led project aimed at reducing gender-based violence and the stigma associated with reporting domestic violence in the Byimana sector of rural Rwanda. Additionally, we have been working in Haiti, offering the trauma healing portion of our program to women survivors of the earthquake.