Our Work
Our goals are designed around one central theme: to empower the under-resourced with the tools needed to build opportunity.
Areas of work
Four ways one opportunity becomes many.
Each area of work is designed around one central theme: to equip the under-resourced with the tools needed to build opportunity for themselves and the people around them.
- Education and Learning Scholarships, education hubs and practical skills that open doors, from the Foundation's first school in North Carolina to classrooms in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Explore Education and Learning
- Entrepreneurship and Economic Independence Microfinance, start-up investment and small-business support that let people build enterprises, employ others and lift their communities. Explore Entrepreneurship
- Youth and Community Development From the Durham Youth Alliance to new initiatives for young people: building confidence, belonging and the networks that sustain progress. Explore Youth and Community
- Community Resilience and Opportunity Essential goods, clean water and access to resources that make communities more stable, more self-reliant and better able to look after one another. Explore Community Resilience
Reimagining giving
A different way to think about giving.
We believe lasting progress begins when people have the knowledge, resources and opportunity to determine their own futures. True giving comes from the heart, and its intention is not to increase dependency but to increase independence.
- Handing up, not out
- Support is designed to end the need for itself, not to sustain it.
- Access before aid
- Access is the most important part of seeing an idea come to life.
- Culture first
- Intentions matter less than understanding the community we serve.
Our impact
Measured in lives made more independent.
Figures as reported by the Foundation, each shown with its reporting period and source.
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£12m+
Directed to community development initiatives in Bangladesh
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18,000+
Children and young people served each year by three education hubs in Bangladesh
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2,500+
Women entrepreneurs supported through microfinance and skills training
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14,000
Students benefiting from a trauma-informed education model in Sri Lanka's Eastern Province
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29
Rural communities in Mozambique reached by clean water infrastructure
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19
Ventures funded in the first round of the Startup Fund in the Americas