Jim Fruchterman is the godfather of using technology for social good, dating back to 1989 before most technology as we know it existed. In 1989, Jim founded Arkenstone, a nonprofit social enterprise, to produce reading machines for people who are blind. In 2000, the nonprofit
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This is the fifth post in a weekly series covering each of Fast Forward’s nine tech nonprofits. The statistics are scary: by the third grade, 67% of children are not proficient readers, and 80% among low-income families. Adult literacy in the US hasn’t improved in
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As a mission-driven organization, your goal should be, well, to focus on your mission. Financial sustainability can do wonders for an organization, considered by some as the holy grail for nonprofits, promising freedom from the shackles of fundraising, letting you and your organization focus on
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Some simple math can help nonprofits increase fundraising efficiency and decide whether pursuing certain fundraising opportunities is worth it, according to Wen-Chih O’Connell from the Silicon Valley Community Foundation and Jessamyn Shams-Lau from the Peery Foundation, who recently spoke to our teams about fundraising from
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This is the fourth post in a weekly series covering each of Fast Forward’s nine tech nonprofits. In the San Francisco Bay Area, hundreds of companies cater meals for their employees every day. Around the world, thousands of stadiums host enormous events where they feed
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Alisa Cordesius, Manager of Social Innovation and Design at Indiegogo, gave our cohort advice on crowdfunding for nonprofits on Indiegogo. Indiegogo is one of the largest crowdfunding platforms, helping entrepreneurs around the world fund projects from technology to engineering to clothing. The biggest campaigns are
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This is the third post in a weekly series covering each of Fast Forward’s nine tech nonprofits. We take it for granted: credit cards, online bill payment, savings accounts, mortgages, or sending a check to a friend. Two billion unbanked people, however, have nowhere to
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Kiah Williams from SIRUM, Chase Adam from Watsi, and this week Kushal Chakrabarti from Benetech spoke to the Fast Forward cohort about philanthropic rounds for tech nonprofits, where an organization aims to raise a set dollar amount in a specific window of time. While the
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This is the second post in a weekly series covering each of Fast Forward’s nine tech nonprofits. Jessica Ladd, Kate Lazarov, and Kelsey Gilmore-Innis join Fast Forward from Project Callisto, a college sexual assault reporting system and part of Sexual Health Innovations. Callisto empowers sexual
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