Organization selected as one of 20 worldwide to receive seed funding and support to continue expansion both in United States and Uganda.
Building Tomorrow, an international non-profit organization empowering young people to raise funds and awareness to benefit vulnerable children in sub-Saharan Africa, has announced that it has been awarded a prestigious Echoing Green Fellowship. As a 2007 Fellow, Building Tomorrow Executive Director George Srour will receive $60,000 in unrestricted funds during the next two years. The funds will allow Building Tomorrow to continue to establish new student chapters throughout the U.S. to sponsor awareness and fundraising activities that build and support educational infrastructure projects in Uganda and neighboring countries.
“I am delighted that Building Tomorrow has been awarded an Echoing Green fellowship,†said Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Building Tomorrow’s honorary chairman. “By building new schools in sub-Saharan Africa, Building Tomorrow is opening doors that children and their parents never imagined. I commend Building Tomorrow most warmly and am thrilled to learn of this accomplishment.â€
Each year Echoing Green awards two-year fellowships to emerging social innovators creating new organizations. Nearly 900 organizations around the world applied for the fellowship program and only 20 were selected to make up this year’s class of “up and coming social change organizations,†with two others focusing their efforts on the African continent. Annually, Echoing Green awards approximately 20 fellowships to individuals with innovative ideas for creating new models for tackling seemingly unsolvable social challenges. With $1 million in seed funding and technical assistance available, these fellowships offer recipients the opportunity to manage and grow organizations that implement and continually expand their ideas for creating lasting social change.
“This is really a testament to the thousands of young people who are already working through Building Tomorrow to achieve social change,†said George Srour, founder and executive director. “This announcement comes on the heels of plans to provide classroom space for 1,000 vulnerable children in Uganda for the start of the 2008 academic year with the construction of three more primary schools in the Wakiso District throughout 2007. I am humbled to be part of the Class of 2007 fellows; what this group has and will achieve is truly an inspiration.â€
About BT
Building Tomorrow is an international non-profit organization empowering young people to raise funds and awareness to benefit vulnerable children in sub-Saharan Africa It has student chapters at 12 universities nationwide and a service partnership with Key Club International, the world’s largest high school service organization. Building Tomorrow is based in Indianapolis, Indiana and opened its first school in Kampala, Uganda in 2006. For more information, visit www.buildingtomorrow.org.
About EG
Launched in 1987, Echoing Green’s mission is to spark social change by identifying, investing, and supporting the world’s most exceptional emerging leaders and the organizations they launch. Through a two-year fellowship program, we help our network of visionaries develop new solutions to society’s most difficult problems. These social entrepreneurs and their organizations work to close deeply-rooted social, economic, and political inequities to ensure equal access and to help all individuals reach his/her potential. To date, Echoing Green has invested $25 million in seed and start up grants to nearly 450 social entrepreneurs and their innovative organizations. For more information, visit www.echoinggreen.org.
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