The support will be used to establish a Women’s Business Training and Micro Loan Program in the village of Viard, Haiti. A minimum of thirty women in the village will receive the business training and business loans, with the average size of the loan being $200. In addition to the initial three-days of business training, the women will receive ongoing technical assistance as they work with their businesses and will participate in monthly group meetings with the trainer.

4,000 participants are expected at this new event marking the 25th anniversary of its founding this year, CASEL has now been considered a major platform and a trusted source for knowledge about high-quality, evidence-based social and emotional learning (SEL), as they support educators and policy leaders and enhance the experiences and outcomes for all PreK-12 students in the US and the world.

Sponsorship of the annual CMF gathering maintains our presence with other Michigan philanthropies and signals our interest in SW Michigan as a targeted geographic area.

Support for a fellowship program for a cadre of emerging, media savvy scholars who will conduct research at the intersection of religion/spirituality, democratic values, and processes in order to promote informed debates that powerfully counterbalance destructive, unfiltered impulses propagated by social media (and other means). The research will be mainstreamed by providing training to fellows that will enable them to pursue op-eds, posts in blogs, white papers, and other platforms and formats that would reach broader constituencies.

Sponsorship of GrantMakers for Education with the theme “Supporting Students in Overcoming Adversity: Agency, Justice, Equity” which aligns with our work supporting the moral and spiritual development of children and youth in the world.

Planning, development, launch, ongoing support and hosting of a microsite and interactive, outreach activity related to the Fetzer Spirituality Study.

Leveraging the findings from the Study of Spirituality in America, the strategy will include internal communication to inform the Institute's work, partner education and activation, which will deepen conversations, public engagement campaign into spiritual inquiry and exploration.

Sponsorship of the SSSR, a key gathering for social science researchers interested in spirituality and religion. Our work around the Spirituality Study will be shared in a panel at the conference and we will be able to signal the significance of our work and increase awareness among current and rising scholars.

Collaboration with Stanford and their Center on Adolescence to investigate experiential aspects of the impact that QUESTion Class is having on students and teachers who have participated in the program, and to provide data-driven feedback to program leaders for the purpose of program refinement and possible improvement.

General support for Pachamama Alliance. The Alliance is not just important for what it does; it also serves as a model of how, with a bit of expertise brought in from the outside, indigenous peoples can begin to take control of they own lands and design their own futures, and not succumb to the predatory intent of the greediest, most self-serving of capitalist corporations.