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The Awesome Foundation: Handing Out No-Strings Grants For Awesome Projects, Could Your Idea Be Next?

By Dawn Papple
Published on: 18:28 PST, Jan 10, 2015

With a slogan like, “For the Arts and Sciences and the advancement of Awesomeness in the universe,” the Awesome Foundation is spreading like an anti-cancer across the globe with one main goal: “Forwarding the interest of awesomeness in the universe.”

The Awesome Foundation chapters around the world offer grants every month to project creators in their area who wow the chapters’ micro-trustees with their awesome ideas. It started in Boston in 2009, and has since brought about some of the coolest projects. In Atlanta, the Awesome Foundation awarded a grant to BioLogue STEM Adventures, which aims to bring no-cost, hands-on activities in science, technology, math, and engineering to girls in the city, according to CBS 46 in Atlanta. In Tel Aviv, the Awesome Foundation chapter funded Equality is the Goal, a boys group that reaches disadvantaged youths through soccer with the goal “advancing values of an equal and shared society while also promoting education.”

The Tallahassee Democrat just announced that Awesome Tallahassee is looking for projects to fund, and explained how the process will work.

“How it works: Coffers of 10 or more put in $100 per month and the only requirement is that projects provide a benefit to improving Tallahassee and its residents. However, if someone or group in surrounding counties has an idea that benefits Tallahassee, those proposals will be considered, too.”

The pooled money adds up to $1,000, which is simply awarded to someone with an awesome idea.

“The money is pooled together from the coffers of ten or so self-organizing ‘micro-trustees’ and given upfront in cash, check, or gold doubloons. The chapters are autonomous and organized by the trustees around geographic areas or topics of interest,” the Awesome Foundation’s website explains. “The Foundation provides these grants with no strings attached and claims no ownership over the projects it supports. It is, in the words of one of our trustees, a micro-genius grant for flashes of micro-brilliance.”

Awesome LA spotlighted Back to Natives Restoration, which aims to bring native trees to the city. It has invested in conservation with a habitat restoration program. The plan is to collect seeds from the national forest, foster them, then plant them in Los Angeles wildlands.

Do you have an awesome idea that would make your community better? Check to see if the Awesome Foundation is advancing awesome in your area.

[Photo via the Awesome Foundation’s website]

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