NONPROFIT INNOVATION GRANTSRound 1, 2014

Nonprofit Innovation Grants enable LinkedIn employees to champion initiatives that are ready to develop and test new, innovative ideas for social impact.

Today, we’re excited to announce the 25 Innovation Grant selections and their employee champions for Round 1, 2014.

Right to Play and Hector Hernandez:Right To Play will be developing a new program “Play at the Core” which aims to enhance early child education services for disadvantaged youth in New York City.

Global Camps Africa and Emily Ferdman:Global Camps Africa will deliver HIV/AIDS awareness education and care to at-risk youth in South Africa through camp programs and youth clubs.

Specialisterne USA and Matt Tague:Specialisterne will be launching a pilot a project that matches people with autism with STEM jobs in Silicon Valley.

Self Help Africa and Conor Doyle:Self Help Africa is dedicated to the pursuit of profit for Africa's poor. They’re currently working on the ‘3-2-1’ project, which would enable rural farmers in Malawi to access agricultural information via their mobile phones and to help them grow and sell more produce.

Camp Unalayee and Brian Frank:Camp Unalayee will launch a new program which builds partnerships to recruit and support more campers of color to help close the racial “nature gap”.

Vital Trust and Senthil Sundaram:Vital Trust will run a three-day personality development and psychological counseling program for poor high school students in Chennai, India.

Proboneo and Till Kaestner:Proboneo will pilot a program that matches pro bono professional volunteers with nonprofit organizations that lack resources for two-hour phone technical support consultancy around areas such as operation, IT, HR and strategy.

Jean Weingarten Peninsula Oral School for the Deaf and Brendan Browne & Tak Yin Wang:JW will develop “Baby Talk,” a speech therapy program that leverages the internet and mobile technology to change education and life opportunities for children with hearing impairment.

Imagine H2O and Emily Parsons:Imagine H2O connects the most promising water technology startups with world leaders in the water sector, government, and social enterprise to help turn new ideas into self-funding, high impact solutions. They’ll be supporting Imagine H2O's Bay Area Water Initiative (BAWI).

St. John of God Community Services and Agnieszka Legowik:The organization will support a new program, Link2Me, an accessible website that connects people who have intellectual disabilities with employment opportunities.

The Via Foundation and Dana Torres:The Via Foundation’s Schoolhouse Shock project will create a new “Mock Shock” training program to be used at school events to educate attendees about sudden cardiac arrest and how to respond, including how to use an automated external defibrillator (AED).

Sundara Fund and Daniel Green:The Sundara Fund will implement a pilot in Haiti and Mumbai in recycling hotel soaps, engaging women in micro-finance and educating community members about proper hygiene and hand washing to prevent needless deaths and illnesses.

Nonprofit-Share and Geoff Brooks:Nonprofit-share is developing Collaboration Match, a new online platform that connects practitioners in the social sector with others who have complimentary objectives, in order to drive partnerships between them.

PropellHer and Haimee Code The organization will be building out its marketing and outreach effort of a new online career mentoring platform that matches and manages mentoring relationships for women.

Crucible College and Loretta Clarke: The Crucible will provide employment opportunities in the creative sector for West Oakland youth that result in the development of public artwork.

2nd Time Grant

Winner!

Wright-Way Rescue and Mike O’Malley:Wright-Way Rescue is developing the “iPet Companion portal,” an interactive program that will allow children a virtual opportunity to play with animals at the shelter.

Radiating Hope and Neera Desai:Radiating Hope will enhance the organization’s fundraising and endowment strategies in order to build the first cancer treatment center in Moshi, Tanzania.

Greater Toronto CivicAction Alliance and Richard Wiltshire: GTCA will be creating the world's most transparent youth jobs market in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area to feed into a larger initiative called “Escalator: Jobs for Youth Facing Barriers”—an action plan that breaks down barriers so all young people can thrive and contribute their talents.

DoNation and Robbie Williamson: DoNation will support the development of a widget and API that allows users to track pledged actions to develop healthy and environmentally-friendly habits.

Ben’s Friends and Ryan KaiserBen’s Friends will build an online Doctors Directory of doctors around the world who treat rare diseases to serve as a resource for patients.

Level Playing Field Institute and Sara Harrington:Level Playing Field Institute will expand LPFI’s Summer Math and Science Honors (SMASH) Program by supporting the development and implementation of the Engineering Design Challenges (EDC), a hands-on tech learning component of the program.

Stitching ALS Nederland and Saskia Muurmans:Stitching ALS Nederland will support a research project that will map the full DNA profiles of at least 15,000 people with ALS and compare them with control subjects in order to identify the genes that are associated with ALS.

Foundation for Students Rising Above and Suanne Chen:SRA will pilot test and launch the College Knowledge Hub, an online comprehensive resource and community for low-income, first generation college students.

First Graduate, Sandy White and Luis Baez:First Graduate will enhance their social media management by hiring two paid interns to help develop a curriculum for social media management and train member organizations of the Bay Area College Success Network.

The Family Reach Foundation and Carole Zibi:Family Reach is seeking to support the development and launch of Family2Family, a crowd-funding mobile platform that connects donors with families who have children.

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