This document describes a $600,000 innovation fund from Ashoka to support 7 social entrepreneurs. Ashoka has built the world's largest network of social entrepreneurs over 30 years. The fund will provide fully vetted Ashoka Fellows with financial support to advance innovative solutions to social problems. Testimonials from past Fellows praise Ashoka's impact on scaling their organizations and connecting them to resources. Brief bios describe each Fellow's work in areas like education, health, and the environment. Contact information is provided for those interested in the fund.

1. the
innovation
fund
Those of us who invest in Ashoka – with
our time, our money, our ideas – do
so because we see in Ashoka a unique
opportunity to catalyze big change.

2. Over the last 30 years, Ashoka has built the world’s largest association of leading
social entrepreneurs: Ashoka Fellows. These innovators are practical visionaries
who introduce and fully commit themselves to realizing an important, new idea
to solve pressing social problems and open new opportunities for citizens to be
changemakers. With creativity and entrepreneurial skill, they push ahead their
idea until it changes a pattern through wide adoption, resulting in significant
social impact.
Today, we offer you the opportunity to catalyze some of the United States’ leading
social entrepreneurs through a fund of 7 fully vetted Ashoka Fellows.
Through a tax-deductible financial contribution, you can partner with Ashoka to
shape the future of the country and support the entrepreneurs who are leading
game-changing social innovations in many fields, from health to education and
the environment. 100% of your money will go directly to these Ashoka Fellows.
· Fund Total:
$600,000
· Closing date:
August 31st, 2012

3. FELLOW TESTIMONIALS
“If one organization has had a profound impact in Lumni’s
evolution, that organization is Ashoka.”
Felipe Vergara, Lumni Founder and CEO, Ashoka Fellow since 2006
“Trust me, Ashoka is indispensable for social entrepreneurship to survive, grow and thrive.”
Gregory Van Kirk, Founder of The New Development Solutions Group, Ashoka Fellow since 2008
“I have been constantly blown away by the generosity and vision of
Ashoka. They have been unselfish in sharing donors. They have been
unmatched as a thought partner, helping me and my organization to
see connections in our work that transcend geographic boundaries
and the usual discipline silos. And they have been unparalleled as a
connector. My own experience as an Ashoka Fellow has been nothing
short of transformational.”
Jill Vialet, Founder of Playworks, Ashoka Fellow since 2004

4. THE INNOVATORS

5. David Wish
David’s organization, Little Kid’s Rock, uses music education to offer children
and teachers heightened opportunities to engage with each there as fearless co-
creators and active, inspired learning partners. David is introducing an approach
to learning music that builds twenty-first century skills, helping children see that
they can generate content, fail without fear, iteratively advance toward a goal, and
work in teams.
Begun in 2001 in New Jersey, the effort now reaches over 160,000 students and 700
teachers in 24 cities across the United States.
http://usa.ashoka.org/fellow/david-wish

6. Kirsten Tobey & Kristin Richmond
Kirsten & Kristin, both former educators, understand that the food served in schools significantly impacts students’ performance and
lays the foundation for behavioral patterns around eating that extend both to the home and into adulthood. As such, Kirsten & Kristin
are transforming nutrition in low-income communities by providing healthy, fresh school lunches and changing attitudes of principals,
teachers, and parents about what’s expected and possible with regard to nutrition standards in schools.
Today their organization, Revolution Foods, reaches 70,000 students and Kirsten & Kristin expect to double their reach and impact in
the next 2 years.
http://usa.ashoka.org/fellow/kristin-richmond

7. Paul Bradley
Paul is creating a scalable approach that enables the country’s 2.7 million
homeowners in manufactured home communities, also known as “mobile home
parks”, to achieve economic security, fuller protections against excessive rents,
reduced threat to health, safety and eviction, and full economic citizenship by
cooperatively buying and managing the land on which their homes sit.
His organization, Resident Owned Communities (or ROC USA), arranges the
financing and other supports to allow residents to jointly own the land under their
homes, build assets over time, and democratically manage their community. In
just four years, ROC USA has helped co-ops purchase communities in 12 states,
preserve over 2,100 affordable homes, and leverage over $71 million in commercial
financing.
http://usa.ashoka.org/fellow/paul-bradley

8. Philipp Schmidt
Philipp has set out to change not what we learn, but how we learn. Through his
organization, Peer 2 Peer University, peer learners from around the world connect
around topics they care about and skills they wish to master, harnessing the vast
wealth of high-quality, openly-licensed education materials currently available
over the internet. Students act as both teacher and learner, and are thus able to
collaborate throughout the course development process, beginning with design,
and extending through co-teaching and peer evaluation.
In two years time, Peer 2 Peer University has grown to a community of 1,000+
and is on the path for major scale.
https://p2pu.org/en

9. Jason McLennan
Through the International Living Building Institute, Jason is creating incentives
and new practices so that the built environment improves health and well-being
while increasing our access to a diverse and productive natural world. The result
of Jason’s approach is that builders and designers conceptualize buildings
or neighborhoods as a whole, and therefore avoid shifting burdens from one
environmental or social objective to another.
Jason launched the Living Building Challenge as a certification system that sets
up incentives for system change and enables building industry stakeholders to
re-imagine their roles. Currently, there are four Certified Living buildings and 100
projects that have registered to become certified. By 2017, Jason’s goal is to have
50 certified buildings with 500 projects registered and – importantly – shared.
http://usa.ashoka.org/fellow/jason-mclennan

10. Sasha Chanoff
Sasha is pioneering a new role for effective and professional citizen organizations
in the refugee resettlement process. His organization, RefugePoint, works to
transform and improve the sphere of refugee resettlement through a variety of
interlinking strategies centered around creating the infrastructure and know-how
for an appropriately trained citizen sector to work with the United Nations Refugee
Agency and governments in ways that improve equity and access to life-saving
solutions for the most vulnerable refugees.
While the citizen sector used to account for one percent of refugee resettlement
referrals from Africa before RefugePoint came along, thanks to Sasha’s pioneering
work, it now contributes to more than 25 percent of referrals today.
http://usa.ashoka.org/fellow/sasha-chanoff

11. Fletcher Harper
Fletcher and his team at GreenFaith, inspire, educate and mobilize people of
diverse religious backgrounds for environmental leadership. Working through
an interfaith approach, the work is based on beliefs shared by the world’s great
religions - they believe that protecting the earth is a religious value, and that
environmental stewardship is a moral responsibility.
Through his organization GreenFaith, Fletcher aims to realize wide impact over
the next decade, bringing a broad faith-based network into the environmental
action fold and position the religious sector as a key ally, distribution network
and partner for environmental improvement.
http://usa.ashoka.org/fellow/fletcher-harper

12. Contact information
Paula Recart
precart@ashoka.org
Kila Englebrook
kenglebrook@ashoka.org
717-443-1595