“I thought my life was over. I couldn’t believe this was what my life had become.”

The NYC branch of SalaamGarage, a team of photographers, videographers and journalists dedicated to bringing forth positive social change, has spent the better part of a year documenting the lives of those who have graduated the foster care system at 21 ill-prepared for what lies ahead. Headed by SG founder Amanda Koster, and led by SG Local NYC Maggie Soladay and team, the group aims to raise public awareness for their cause, and has launched a Kickstarter campaign to complete funding for a book an exhibition for the project “Aging-Out of Foster Care.”

The book, titled “Everybody Needs Somebody” is a compilation of 15 stories and photographs of those who have aged out of the system. The exhibition will take place at The Long Island Children’s Museum from June 16th, 2012 – September 2nd, 2012.

For more information on the Kickstarter project, or to make a donation, click here.
To read more on SalaamGarage Local NYC and the beginnings of the “Aging-Out of Foster Care” project, click here.

© ANDREW LICHTENSTEIN Lichtenstein impressed jurors with his fresh look at U.S. history. Above: Women at the bus stop where Rosa Parks began her famous 1955 ride.

This past November, New York City-based photographer Andrew Lichtensteinwon the 2012 Aftermath Project Grant for his project called “American Memory.” It is a series of landscape photographs of sites around the U.S. where historic struggles for civil rights, labor rights and Native American rights took place decades ago, so obvious signs of those struggles have long faded.

The $20,000 Aftermath Project Grant is intended to support photo projects about the after effects of war. Most of the six grants awarded previously were for projects exploring the open, visible wounds of recent conflicts and ethnic strife outside the U.S.

Lichtenstein thought his entry would be a long shot, so he contacted Aftermath Project founder Sara Terry to ask if it was too much of a stretch. She encouraged him to apply. Lichtenstein also notes, “The big problem with this story is trying to capture what doesn’t exist there anymore. It’s hard to photograph the absence of [an event].”

Terry, who was one of the three jurors, says awarding the grant to Lichtenstein was “an exhilarating way to expand the conversation about the aftermath [of conflict]. That’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.” The grant isn’t just for documentary projects, she explains. “From the beginning I’ve encouraged conceptual and fine-art photographers to apply.”

Terry says jurors first screened applications for the quality of the images. That winnowed 183 applications down to about 30, she says. From there, judges started to consider the merits of the written proposals.

“Andrew’s proposal wasn’t a great big statement. It was simply stated: If we don’t address our wounds, the scars don’t heal. And then he listed places he was looking [to photograph],” Terry says.

Lichtenstein told PDN that the historic sites he’s been photographing “are of particular interest to me because of my view of the struggle for justice and equality in this country. I’m not saying America is an awful place built on genocide. I’m trying to say it’s a country like any other, which is actually a radical idea if you look at what some people want to pass off as American history. There’s this idea that this nation is [exceptional] and great for its ability to foster freedom and equality. I want to stop and say, ‘Which history are you looking at?’”

He says he explained that idea in clear, direct terms on the application. “I do not know ‘grant speak’; I don’t write it, I don’t want to write it, I don’t understand it. People should just say what they mean, rather than hide it in terms of elite conversation,” he asserts. “I want it to be as accessible and honest as possible a description of what I believe the work to be about.”

Lichtenstein says that because he started the project two years ago, it was easier to write about it with clarity. “So I knew what the issues were about. It’s still a healthy process to put it on paper, and explain it to other people,” he says.

“What brought his application to the top was the degree of imagination,” says juror (and VII Photo agency director) Stephen Mayes. “His concept is new—it’s a very fresh look at American history. He’s filtering that through current social and political situations.”

Mayes continues, “The presentation was clearly written with an introduction that said he was looking for places where past and present intersect, followed by succinct bullet points saying exactly what he was talking about, and then pictures to show it.” Because the locations he photographs show no obvious signs of their historical significance, Lichtenstein’s images depend upon captions for context. But the jurors had no problem with that. “I subscribe to the idea that all pictures need some context. If that comes in form of words, that’s fine,” Mayes says.

“There were other proposals that were much more philosophical, that were compelling,” Mayes notes. “But even if the proposal is theoretical and philosophical, it still has to be clear about what the applicant intends to do and how.”

The one image that crystallized Lichtenstein’s proposal for the jurors shows three Southern women in antebellum costumes, sitting on a bench at the bus stop where Rosa Parks began her famous bus ride in 1955, launching the civil rights movement. “That image is amazing. It said so much, and got our attention right away,” says Terry.

Juror Anne Wilkes Tucker, who is photography curator of The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, observes: “Lots of people have tried to find pictures that make you understand the complications of [chosen] locations. The picture of the three women on the bench does that. I’m presuming he didn’t stage it. It’s pretty perfect.”

That Lichtenstein already had strong images for his proposed project gave him an advantage over those who applied on the strength of images from past projects. Even if those images were very good, Tucker notes, “We [jurors] just don’t know that they can translate what they’re proposing to do into pictures.”

Tucker says finalists for the grant weren’t necessarily skilled writers, “But the ideas were there [in the application]. They knew what they were going to do, how it was going to relate to the theme proposed, what was possible to do and [their idea] was focused enough … You have to know what’s a manageable project” and convey that in the application—with words and pictures.

Mayes says some proposals were eliminated “because they lacked that clarity. [We’re awarding] a chunk of money—we need to know it is going to be spent with real effect.”

The four other finalists for the grant were Christopher Capozziello, with a project about the Ku Klux Klan; Michelle Frankfurter, with a project about emigration to the U.S. in the aftermath of the Central American civil wars of the 1980s; Simon Thorpe, with a conceptual project about Sahrawi soldiers who fought for their land in the Western Sahara; and Michael Zumstein, with a project about national reconciliation in Ivory Coast after the 2010 elections there.

Lichtenstein says he’s applied for only a few grants out of necessity; editorial assignment work is no longer reliable enough as a source of income. Applying for grants, he says, “is a tremendous amount of work, and there’s no kill fee. If you don’t get it, that’s two weeks gone. The plus side is that it really helps you think about the issues of your project and put together an edit, and articulate what you’re saying in your photos.”

His advice to others applying for grants: “Look at the grant carefully to see if your work is appropriate for it,” he says. “The second thing is, there’s nothing you can say or do to make up for not having the pictures. It’s fundamentally about the work.”

Crowdfunding For Good ©89studio - Fotolia.com

Our friends at Causevox published a very helpful free ebook called “7 Habits of Highly Effective Personal Fundraisers.”  Get it Here: http://ebook.causevox.com/7habits/.  We couldn’t have said it better.  A must download for anyone running a fund-raising campaign.

Here are some of our favorite online fund raising platforms:

• Spot.us http://spot.us/ hyper local community funded journalism
• Emphas.is http://emphas.is/ specifically for visual journalists doing image based projects anywhere
• Kickstarter http://www.kickstarter.com/
• IndieGoGo http://www.indiegogo.com/
• Chipin http://www.chipin.com/ this is a widget that can be installed on one’s own blog or website.
• Invested.in http://invested.in/

Want to learn more about the differences between these platforms?

Poynter article about Emphas.is: http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/top-stories/129807/emphas-is-builds-community-of-support-for-quality-photojournalism/
Nice commentary on crowdfunding from Once Magazine http://blog.oncemagazine.com/post/4089772682/crowdfunding-and-the-future-of-photojournalism
This New York Foundation for the Arts blog post is very helpful: http://nyfablog.com/2011/07/26/the-artists-digital-toolkit-part-3/

….and for the mother-load list of 88 crowd funding platforms for raising money to support your project, check out the Dutch SmarterMoney blog for: Crowdfunding Platforms and Initiatives. Wow.

My name is Kristie McLean and I traveled with SalaamGarage to Ethiopia six months ago. For me, one of the biggest attractions to SalaamGarage is its focus on raising awareness of social issues and challenging travelers to ACT (rather than just documenting the status quo) to bring about positive change.

I am always on the lookout for long-term solutions to global social issues. While on the trip, I heard the heartbreaking story of a 22-year old woman, on the brink of suicide, who was brought to Hamlin Fistula Hospital and successfully treated, but whose husband and family would not accept her home again. I also met an Ethiopian engineer who builds water mills that help women in rural communities- and the idea of creating a mill to help both constituencies and serve as a practical solution to everyday life was born.

This water-powered mill in Western Ethiopia will grind grain for 800 families in the community of Begi and provide a safe living compound and sustainable income source for obstetric fistula survivors.

The initial $1,000 for Phase One has been wired to Addis Ababa and the local work team has traveled and researched the best site and obtained the land. I’m excited to report that Phase Two of the Ethiopian water mill project is now underway!

Please join me in the next push to raise at least $2,500 (of the remaining $10K) by July 25th! That’s my birthday, and I’m hoping that in lieu of other birthday gestures I can raise awareness and funds to re-build and empower other lives instead.

To help: please visit the Crooked Trails website (the 501c3 sponsor for this project) at http://www.crookedtrails.org/project6.php to make your TAX-DEDUCTIBLE donation. Make sure to mark “Ethiopia Water Mill Project” in the Notes field so the funds are earmarked successfully. Crooked Trails is set up for corporate-matching and happily accepts both check and credit card donations. THANK YOU for your generous support of the women of Ethiopia!

Kristie McLean

(By Conrad Chavez) I visited India as part of the first SalaamGarage team, which visited Vatsalya in 2007. I was impressed to discover that Vatsalya does not merely rescue street orphans, but is a caring community that transforms them into educated, productive persons with job skills. On our pilot trip, each of us was encouraged to interact with the community in a way consistent with our skills and abilities. I photographed the children, their classrooms and activities, and the work of the dedicated staff. Back home, our trip team mounted photo exhibits about our visit to raise awareness of the work of Vatsalya, and to help jump-start more SalaamGarage trips.

Current SalaamGarage teams commit to developing more specific projects with the organizations they visit, and I also felt I could do more than just show pictures. So I kept my eye open for a future opportunity to help Vatsalya. In 2011 Vatsalya announced a project to fund the building of a new, expanded school. I thought that the new school’s fundraising campaign could benefit greatly from having a visible, accessible presence like we often see in US fundraising projects.

The Facebook page created for Vatsalya by Caroline Poiner pointed the way, reminding me that we can use our experience with cutting-edge social media to support the goals of organizations in developing countries who may not yet be aware of the latest online opportunities. I proposed creating a web page specifically to promote the new school and that would also provide a way to donate in just a few clicks, which is how so many of us in developed countries now prefer to shop, pay bills, and donate to charity. I hoped that Vatsalya could direct potential donors all over the world to such a page, and that it would have an easy “Donate” button on it. Vatsalya director Jaimala Gupta connected me with the US fundraising organization Edge of Seven, which guided me to the online service they use for instant Web donations (crowdrise.com). I then created a fundraising page (bit.ly/vNewSchool), telling the story of the new school project in text and photographs.

Why did I choose this particular project? I saw an opportunity to fill a need, and realized that a relatively small investment of my time could bring significant benefits to the new school project. I am happy with the results: Vatsalya is able to to raise worldwide awareness of the project by frequently linking to the page from sites such as Facebook, and four weeks after the launch of the donation page, online donors have contributed over $2200 with several more weeks of fundraising still to go. Please consider donating to this important project; visit crowdrise.com/VatsalyaNewSchool or bit.ly/vNewSchool.

To see my photo essay of Vatsalya Udayan from the 2007 trip, please visit conradchavez.com/udayan.

Come back with us to Vatsalya this fall! SalaamGarage is returning to India, and Vatsalya: click here for more info.

From LIVESTRONG to charity:water, the best nonprofits let their supporters become part of their story. But while lots of new nonprofits are great at fieldwork, few have the tech or tale-telling abilities to instantly grab their audience’s attention.

CauseVox creates custom public support and online fundraising pages that are beautiful and simple. Nonprofits can keep their own branding and design, seamlessly integrating CauseVox into their own main site and identity. The pages even allow supporters to weave their own story into the mix, personalizing their connection to the causes they love – kinda like the Tumblr of online fundraising. The best part: its easy-to-use platform is made specifically for non-techies, giving customers more time to do what they do best – changing the world.

CauseVox is offering 6 months of free services for TBD readers and friends – just sign up for notification of the public launch (which is set for January 24th — get to it before then!) and enter code “TBD.” Social good just got a lot more user-friendly.

Here is a typical moment during a SalaamGarage trip.

This is Sarah Henderson:

http://sirenapictures.com, http://theultimateride.tv.  She lives in Portland, OR and came with us on the SalaamGarage Ethiopia trip 2010. She is awesome. We were working with the Hamlin Fistula Hospital, an absolutely amazing organization.

What is happening here? Fuji donated polaroid-esque cameras to SalaamGarage so that we could give photos back to the women rather than just taking them. Sarah Henderson is photographing patients at the hospital.

Most of Hamlin’s patients are from a remote village in Ethiopia.  We found a woman in physical therapy learning how to walk again.

She had a double fistula, double meaning both her vaginal canal and the rectum lining were torn during labor. These linings are commonly torn during labor because the women are married and pregnant before they are fully developed. Much of this is due to child marriages.

Her baby died in utero. While delivering the dead baby these linings tore. As a result she leaked urine and feces uncontrollably. Her family was ashamed of the way that made her smell and built her a hut in the back of her families hut and she lived in it  for 7 years before making to the hospital. During those years her leg and foot muscles atrophied until she could no longer walk, eventually resorting to a fetal position. Her family threw food out to her as she lay on the dirt floor of her mud hut for those 7 years. She said she ate like a dog, dragging herself up to the pile of food, eating while lying there in the dirt, leaking.

She made it to Hamlin, they performed surgery on her and we are all praying it will heal properly. Currently she has catheters connected to her for drainage.

Sarah was photographing patients at physical therapy and I walked up to see what she was doing. We had extreme restrictions around photography at the hospital, so I opted to walk around and check in with people rather than work on a story.

Sarah had completed photographing women with her regular camera and pulled out the Fuji camera so that she could give her a photo of herself.

She walks with a walker, and slowly made it up against the banister where Sarah was photographing women for their turn with the Fuji.  Her feet were completely crooked. Maybe a toe or a heel touched the ground as she walked. Mangled, I had never seen anything like it. She leaned very hard on the walker avoiding any weight bearing on her atrophied feet and legs to make it up to the banister. Once up against it she motioned for us to take the walker out of the photograph. From there she did her best to slowly stand up on those feet somehow and motioned for Sarah to take the photo, now. Sarah went to take a photo and wouldn’t you know it, the camera was out of film so she had to walk away and reload.  It was sort of a photo time-out and everyone took their eyes off her, except me. I watched her lean back onto the banister with an expression of sheer agony that sent shivers down my spine.  She was in so much pain standing there for us, so that we could take a damn picture.

Sarah came back with a loaded camera. The woman stood up and I knew she was hiding the pain this time. She motioned for us to get the walker out of the way again and then lifted her chin so amazingly high… more shivers down my spine… and Sarah took a few photos.

When Sarah was done the woman took the walker back, leaned up on it again and waited in agony for the photo to develop. Once it did Sarah handed it to her and she slowly, quietly smiled. She looked up at Sarah and whispered ‘amasiganalo’, ‘thank you’ in Amharic. Her language.

She  got back on her walker and slowly limped back, dragging her completely disabled legs and feet back into physical therapy so that she could finish up her session which we interrupted.

***

SalaamGarage is an absolute privilage. We find ourselves in these situations and get to tell you about it. I ask you, reading this, would you help her? Would you donate a few bucks to Hamlin? It will take 5 minutes. Here is how you do it:

http://www.hamlinfistula.org/how-to-help/make-a-donation.html

You WILL change a women’s life forever. I know, because I met her. And now so did you.

And to us, the SalaamGarage team. We are NOT too busy. We are not at all too damn busy to get these stories out and help this woman, help the hospital. I don’t care how crazy our schedule is. We weren’t too busy to spend 2 weeks in Ethiopia. We weren’t too busy to take her photo. This woman stood there for us, in sheer agony so that we could take a photo. And then what? They weren’t too busy to tell us their story, share their lives with us. We have no excuse not to help. Get those stories out there and not for our own glory. Do it for hers.

You can start with a 5 minute presentation about  your experience at a

Ignite in your town: http://ignite.oreilly.com/.

5 Minutes. Can you give her 5 minutes?

My favorite suggested giving list is from Nicholas Kristof at the New York Times.  He is an incredible resource for NGOs that are working to solve our world’s biggest problems since his reporting often shares a way you can help.
This Year’s list  “The Gifts of Hope” and last year’s “A Most Meaningful Gift” are must reads.

As for SalaamGarage… Here is a list of the NGOs we have worked with this year and will be working with in the future. These organizations are making a big difference in areas we care about deeply. We have been there, seen the work, reported on their work, and totally vouch that these organizations are worthy of your support!

The Children’s Aid Society Next Generation Center in the Bronx, NYC.
Helping: New York City youth as they age out of the foster care system and transition out of the juvenile justice system.
“The Next Generation Center (NGC) is a one-stop center designed to meet the needs of young people transitioning to adulthood and self-sufficiency. The mission of NGC is to provide support, guidance, training and opportunities to young people, ages 14 to 24, in the Bronx — with a special focus on youth in foster care and those who have aged out of foster care.”
Donate to Next Generation Center here.

Hamlin Fistula International in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Helping: Women with Childbirth injuries called obstetric fistula. Also working in prevention through outreach, mini hospitals and midwife training.
“The Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital provides care for women obstetric fistulas ‐ the most devastating of all childbirth injuries. The Hospital has a success/cure rate of over 90%. We aim to be the world leader in Training and Research for the treatment, care & prevention of obstetric fistula.” This year the Hamlin Fistula Foundation graduated the first class of midwives from the new Midwifery College. Those midwives were dispatched to the countryside little more than a month ago. These midwives and the college are a huge step towards eradicating fistula in Ethiopia. It is possible, but they need donations to keep it going.
Donate to the Hamlin Fistula Foundation here.

Peacetrees Vietnam in Quang Tri Provence Vietnam.
Helping: Clears landmines leftover from the Vietnam War in the most heavily bombed region the world has ever seen.
“PeaceTrees Vietnam was founded in 1995 to renew relationships with the people of Vietnam and promote a safe, healthy future for its families & children. We sponsor de-mining and mine risk education, survivor assistance, citizen diplomacy trips and community building projects in partnership with the people of Quang Tri Province.”
Donate to Peacetrees Vietnam here.

Agros International working in Central America and Mexico.
Helping: Indigenous Mayan farmers and families through sustainable farming and land ownership.
“Agros International is committed to breaking the cycle of poverty for rural families in Central America and Mexico by enabling landless communities to achieve land ownership and economic stability. We have learned that the root causes of poverty extend across communities and are passed down from generation to generation, and so the Agros development model is holistic, sustainable, and focused on long term results. This commitment to the long-term sustainability of a whole community serves to break the cycle of poverty in all its forms.”
Gift a purchase at the Agros International One Seed Catalog
or Donate to Agros International here.

And finally our favorite little NGO that is constantly blowing us away with the great deeds they accomplish…
Vatsalya in Jaipur, India
Helping: Street children, orphans, neglected, abandoned and abused children. Also helping the poorest women learn to make a living. Job training for the cities uneducated youth. HIV prevention for long distance truck drivers and sex workers. Health care for commercial sex workers. Well the list goes on..
Vatsalya was founded in 2000 to provide a better life for children and rural women in Rajasthan India. Vatsalya runs a home for children, women’s self help groups, HIV/AIDS clinics for truck drivers, a health clinic for female sex workers, and outreach programs for slum kids. Vatsalya’s largest mission is the rescue of homeless, abandoned, and abused children.  Udayan is a campus style home in the countryside, away from the city, that provides education, mental and physical support, internships, and practical vocational training. 100% Indian run and founded, Vatsalya was SalaamGarage’s first partner, in 2007.
Donate to Vatsalya from the USA through the NICF (Namaste India Children’s Fund).

One week from today I will be flying to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on a trip to highlight the issue of obstetric fistula and women’s reproductive health as a member of the SalaamGarage media team. I’ve been passionate about women’s issues for many years (education for girls, child-brides in Afghanistan, women’s groups saving for water tanks in Kenya) and am excited by this latest opportunity to intersect my creative gifts with the stories of the world that need telling.

This was my first experience with Kickstarter as a fundraising platform, and I was hesitant in the beginning, both with the concept and the technology. Like others, I’ve grown up with the desire to be independent and self-sufficient and a reticence to ask for help- especially in terms of money!
The idea, however, of raising awareness around an issue that is important to me (and especially one that is treatable and preventable!) makes it easy to want to get the word out. Why should there be women suffering unnecessarily when it’s completely possible to educate and create support structures during pregnancy, labor, and beyond? This is not a woman’s issue; it’s an issue of the world and a marker of the health of our planet’s future.
The tool through Kickstarter of setting up “rewards” for different price points is an interesting one. Fundamentally, I want to come home and share about my trip. I want to share photos and facilitate discussions and create a multi-media digital story around fistula in Ethiopia and around the globe, so this feels like a natural gift for donors and anyone interested in learning more.
I’ve been touched beyond measure by the outpouring of support for this journey. People want to share the link and the message. In the beginning, donations came in from people I knew directly: friends, colleagues, folks from the varied communities where I live and work and travel. But then a lovely thing emerged: I’ve had notes and donations from people whom I’ve never met! Just like in my coaching work, it is often the communities of our communities who are also longing to help and to be part of something broader than themselves.
A common response has been, “I’m so glad you’re doing what you do around the globe! It’s necessary and important, and I can’t wait to see your photos. Supporting you is my way of helping the world!”

This mindset is a gift and a reminder of how we are all connected. Our gifts matter. Our passions matter. Our wild-haired ideas of making a difference and working to improve the status quo: they’re important and critical in living fully our one wild and precious life!
Deep thanks to all who have donated and supported this upcoming journey to Africa- both for your monetary contributions as well as your prayers, good wishes, and energy directed toward service. And to those of you teetering on the brink of reaching out- please do, knowing that I am a good steward of your voice and hands and efforts out in the world.

All of us occasionally need a kickstart to launch a new project and to trust more fully in our own capacity. Thanks for being a wonderful part of this one!

Kristie Mclean Kenya Aug 09

“Women of the World: Afghanistan and Guinea-Bissau” at Blurb by Kristie McLean

“Renewed Hope for an Afghan Child-Bride” at Kristie Mclean’s site TravelPoet.com

Below are my notes from last night’s successful and well attended event!  It was a pleasure presenting with Katja and George.  I will be watching as their projects continue to develop!  To see the Powerpoint presentation go to “Raising Funds for your Storytelling for Good Projects” at Slideshare.

Get Funded!
How to Raise money for your storytelling for good project.

1. Create specific project, not for the overarching nonprofit or general cause.
2. Promise a compelling story with a strong human-interest angle. Give examples that prove you have done your homework. Your pitch should include a specific story as an example.
3. Create a feedback loop. Use a service that allows donors to give feedback and participate. Remind them this is their project and mission too.
4. Have a Deadline!
5. Pool your efforts by collaborating with reputable like-minded partners (swap blog space, request re-tweets, get speaking time at events).
6. Be yourself and be clear! Don’t talk too much. Don’t try to sound like an NGO, sound like you.
7. Create a call to action. Have a clear and specific “ask.” Be challenging and passionate. Ask for money.
8. Consider using gifts, contests or drawings to encourage participation and larger donations.
9. SoMe- use social media. If you aren’t on linked-in and Twitter. Do that now.

Be Ready with your ELEVATOR SPEECH!
You should be able to answer these questions in the time it takes to get to the 15th floor!
-What is the cause your project is about?
-Why should we care?
-Why does it matter now?
-Why You?
-What can they do to help?
and remember: Give a deadline and don’t forget to ask for money!

Fund Raising Sites:
Create and Run Your Project Campaign on These Sites:
-Spot.Us  http://www.spot.us/
-The Point    http://www.thepoint.com/
-Kickstarter   http://www.kickstarter.com/

Build Your Own Campaign Website or WordPress blog with DONATE Widgets:
-ChipIn   http://www.chipin.com/
-Paypal Donate   https://merchant.paypal.com

Find Causes or Volunteer:
-Idealist  http://www.idealist.org/
-Causecast  http://www.causecast.org/
-Volunteer Match  http://www.volunteermatch.org/

Raise Money for Your Chosen Non-Profit:
-Crowdrise   http://www.crowdrise.com/
-Give Zooks!  http://www.givezooks.com/
-Network for Good   http://www1.networkforgood.org/

-Big Announcement!  Launching our first SalaamGarage Local Grant at this Meetup!  The grants will support writers, reporters, and bloggers to collaborate with photographers and other image-makers to create stories that matter.  SalaamGarage has always facilitated meaningful storytelling, now we are going one step further by supporting local media makers.  Together we are making a positive impact on the social issues effecting New Yorkers.  Anyone will be able to submit proposals and first grant will be awarded sometime in November. Thanks to our friends Spot.us!

-Sign up for the India 2011 trip. We will be in Jaipur during Diwali (festival of lights) and Pushkar during the Pushkar Camel Fair.  Our favorite little NGO, Vatsalya, will have so much to show us.  Watch for the India 2011 itinerary to be announced on the SalaamGarage site Tuesday.

Some of the amazing people who will be in attendance:
-Chat with Mira Zaki who just returned from Guatemala. Mira and SalaamGarage visited remote rural villages where NGO Agros International is empowering Mayan farmers with land ownership and sustainable agriculture practices.

-Meet photographer Omotomi Omalulu Lange who just returned from Uganda where she was working with L.E.A.D Uganda teaching photography to students. Ask her about L.E.A.D Uganda and the work she did last month.

-Matt Pascarella will be available to chat about his role as Bureau Chief at Demotix and his life as a modern journalist, film maker, reporter, photographer.

-We are also hoping Santa Barbara, CA based artist/photographer/blogger Lisa Field Elliot will be there to share her travel stories and blogging tales from Rajasthan, India and Uganda this past year.

-Finally, I am excited to be on hand to talk about the upcoming trip to Ethiopia in November.  Myself and an amazing team will embark on a journey to Ethiopia to create stories about women and obstetric fistula injuries at the Hamlin Fistula Hospital.

Click here to get details and to RSVP for this awesome happy hour get together!

The SalaamGarage India team that visited Vatsalya.org this past September are in high gear working on their stories, building a book, building multimedia.  To inspire us further, we found out today that Vatsalya bought a new, much needed water buffalo for Udayan through a donation from SalaamGarage’s ’10% of profit to NGO’ policy. So, our travelers bought this little guy! Their small herd helps with farm work and provide the children with training in dairy work, farming, livestock care, and of course isn’t it cool to own and care for water buffalo?  Udayan might someday have enough water buffalo to run a small dairy for income.

Check out Surili and her baby buffalo!

from the original post on her personal blog

passion. commitment. focus. talent. intuition. faith. trust.

many people ask me ‘how do you make your projects happen?’ what people really want to know how on earth i fund them. well, with money of course. but that’s not the real question. anyone can run a credit card. i know several millionaires who are miserable, lost, spent it all, searching, drunk, still working. it doesn’t take money to follow your passion.

it takes having, trusting and following your passion.

that’s the real struggle for most everyone i meet. their initial question ‘how did you/do i fund this’ isn’t the real question. their real question is ‘how do i discover my passion?… how do i know this is my real passion?’ I say if you are asking the question, you are pretty darn close.

at first i charged everything. didn’t dig credit card debt so i discovered grants. i started applying for grants, and was awarded several: The GAP grant, Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, and The Puffin Foundation, to name a few. i took a fund raising class and learned it’s faster to raise the money myself. i held fundraisers. raised money from my own community who wants to support me. i literally threw parties and made my intentions very clear: ‘this is a fund raising party. I am going to morocco to work on project x, and am looking for financial support. i need to raise x amount of money by x date. this is what i plan to do and this is why it is a good idea.’ then started meeting with universities and now corporations. There are also viral ways to raise money, using the social media tools we are already familiar with. it all works.

amanda working in morocco thanks to her self-taught fundraising skills

its all a collaboration in my eyes, and my work has always been about the greater good. i have found that people want to help. they want to be involved. they too want to get those orphans off the streets in to a legitimate home, put that aids orphan through school, give female, sufi muslim musicians some praise and honor. they just may not know where to start. some people, like me, choose to go to kenya an create these documentaries, these stories. others can help fund it, others can help get it published, get it on tv, in books, on gallery walls, etc. This has all happened for me.

key has been to share the project, and also ask for support. its all a collaboration and once i shared my passion i found they had it too, and were happy to collaborate. then, as if by magic, it all came together. it helps me a lot to be very clear and articulate about my intentions. not only does that help me find support, it helps me pinpoint my vision.

now with SalaamGarage trips people are emailing me asking how to work out the money part.

many of the participants have raised the money on their own, just the way i did. by raising money via blogs, twitter, Facebook, paypal, personal communities, etc., this creates the viral/social media platform and a system of accountability for participants. the people who support them to go on the trip then look forward to seeing results. in turn, this creates goal for the participant to create a project, follow through and share it upon return, which then gets the message of the NGO out there. this also creates a sense of ownership, and also the trip starts when they register vs. when they land in say, Guatemala. helps them pinpoint their vision. (see?)

to break it down it looks like this:

1. discover the passion

2. commit

3. come up with a plan

4. share the passion

5. ask for support

6. get support

7. do the work

8. share the work

9. watch the magic, the whole time.

-Amanda Koster

Center for Investigative Reporting Grants
and
Pulitzer Center Grants

We talk about SalaamGarage team member Daysha Eaton and her grant application with Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and her fundraising efforts here.

Spot.Us is a nonprofit project of the Center for Media Change. Spot.us gets its funding from the Knight Foundation who also fund Printcasting.com, which I write about on this blog. Spot.us is “an open source project, to pioneer ‘community funded reporting.’ Through Spot.Us the public can commission journalists to do investigations on important and perhaps overlooked stories. All donations are tax deductible and if a news organization buys exclusive rights to the content, the donation is reimbursed.”
If the story you post is not purchased with exclusive rights by a news organization then it is the made available to all through a Creative Commons license. Spot.us calls itself “a marketplace where independent reporters, community members and news organizations can come together and collaborate. Choosing Spot.us to tell your story is probably not the first place a SalaamGarage humanitarian citizen journalist should post their stories. Because we believe the stories created with SalaamGarage need to be read by as many people as possible, one would have to create a story specifically aimed at sale for exclusive rights. But I do recommend Spot.us for independent and personal projects in your community. To read more about Spot.us check out this “Lessons in Crowdfunding” article by Spot.us founder DigiDave

Raise the money with a campaign here:
Kickstarter.com is a very fun very clean way to raise funds for your project, story, or idea. The website is full of musicians, photographers, journalists, activists, and some total nuts!

ThePoint.com Easy and Effective Group Action
“Whether you’re raising money, organizing people, or trying to influence change: if you can’t do it alone, you can do it on The Point.”
The great thing about campaigns on The Point and at Kickstarter is that no one is charged for their pledge to your project until the minimum pledge action or financial amount is met or exceded. So people can donate and feel good that their money is going towards the project they are supporting.
Hint: if you are raising funds in different ways like events along with an campaign online keep the Kickstarter or The Point campaign minimum amount lower than your actual ultimate fundraising goal.

Idealist.org run by Action Without Borders
If you take one thing away from Idealist.org, it will likely be that you are not the only one working to cause change in the world.
Action Without Borders runs the website Idealist.org. “Idealist.org is a website that facilitates connections between individuals and institutions that are interested in improving their communities.” This is a great place to build a network around your; cause, community problems, or to find a cause to work for or with. Idealist.org hosts podcasts and a news blog, as well as multiple in-depth forums. I also saw listed about 5,000 jobs, about 18,000 volunteer opportunities, and almost 89,000 organizations listed.

http://www.globalgiving.com/open/

GlobalGiving is an online marketplace that connects people to the causes and countries they care about.
nominate your own project at GlobalGiving
Provide them with details about your organization and your work through the self-recommendation form. If you meet eligibility requirements, you will be invited to participate in an upcoming Open Access Challenge event.

Hold a fundraiser- sell tickets through Eventbrite to look slick and official while keeping track of your benefit’s attendees

Also see the detailed instructions in the previous post “SalaamGarage Funding your Project Guide” where you can learn to create a Sponsor Me page at Facebook and how to start a campaign on WordPress.

-Maggie Soladay
Maggie Soladay | 

http://wootastic.org/funding-your-passion/

SalaamGarage – Funding your Project with WordPress or Facebook Campaigns
You might be reading this because you feel called to participate in a trip with SalaamGarage. I am going to detail a few specific tools and technical resources available to help you with raising funds for your project, but I want to stress that the success of these tools is going to rest first and foremost on your passion. People have a natural desire and attraction to support people in their vision and dreams. Your intention is the fuel that will drive you towards success in your goal.
The two methods for raising awareness and money documented here each have their advantages. Facebook is quicker, easier and does not require any technical background. Hosting your own site and blogging with WordPress is more technical, but it provides more customization options. I would suggest reading through the process to get started with each method and moving forward with which feels the most comfortable, or even developing both.

Facebook
Anyone who has used Facebook knows that one of the greatest aspects of the site is that you can not only reach your friends, but can expand your message into each friend’s own network of friends. If your message resonates with others, it has the potential to grow viraly well beyond the scope of your immediate friends and family. There are a couple of ways to use Facebook to help raise awareness of your SalaamGarage project and help raise money for your trip. I believe the best way is to make use of the Facebook fan pages, the Sponsor-Me application and PayPal.

The combination of these tools will allow you to publish your intentions, share this with friends and families and raise money to help support your desire to experience the trip.
There are several steps required to build the infrastructure. If you already have some of these in place, you can skip the directions for that step and proceed to the next.

Building the infrastructure:
-Create a PayPal Account
-Create a Facebook Account
-Install the Sponsor-Me Facebook application
-Create a Facebook “Fan” page
-Publish and Promote

Creating a PayPal Account
A PayPal account can be created at http://PayPal.com. There will be an option to “Sign Up” for an account. There will be several options for the type of account to create. As of the publish date of this document, the correct option to receive donations is a “Premier” account. The PayPal site itself will
have the latest information and can guide you through completing the registration process. Also take note of the latest fee schedule for PayPal as they will charge a small fee for you receiving payments/donations.
There is no need to create a new PayPal account if you already have one, but you should upgrade it to “Premier” if it is a “Personal” account. A “Business” account is fine if that is what you already have.

Creating a Facebook Account
A Facebook account can be created at http://www.facebook.com. Part of the registration process includes adding Facebook “friends”. There are tools that will assist you in adding friends who are already in your address book. I highly recommend making use of these tools to quickly build your Facebook social network.
Install the Facebook Sponsor-Me Application
Here is where things get fun! The first step is to install the Sponsor-Me application at http://apps.facebook.com/sponsor-me/. From this page there will be an option that states “Click here to add Sponsor-Me”. This will take you to a page where you will be prompted to “Allow” the application to be installed and have access to your profile. Selecting “Allow” will take you to the application page.
From this page there will be an option to “Create a Campaign”. This is similar to creating a group page for Facebook. There are several fields to fill out, including some optional ones. Most of these fields can be edited after you create the Campaign, with the very notable exceptions of the Campaign Title and the PayPal email.
Once you have customized this page with pictures, descriptions, fundraising goals, etc., the next step is to start inviting friends!! There is a limit of 20 friends per day, so make sure you visit every day and send out invites to build your network of support. Of course, you can also always post a link to your campaign via your status, or by adding the link to your profile.

Create a Facebook “Fan” Page
The next step is to create a Facebook “Fan” Page. This step is not required to raise funds via Facebook, but it greatly increases the chances of expanding your audience beyond your current Facebook “friends”.
Begin by navigating to the Facebook “Ads and Pages” application. The quickest way to find the “Ads and Pages” application is to select the “Ads and Pages” icon from the Facebook website. The icon will be bookmarked on the bottom left hand corner of the Facebook navigation tool.
From the “Ads and Pages” application, select to create “Create Facebook Page”. There will be several options for the type of page. To create a “Fan” page, select “Artist, Band or Public Figure”. You are the artist, and should name the page with your name.
A Fan Page is very similar to a user page. You can publish a variety of information about your project and yourself. I would highly recommend that you set your webpage to your “Sponsor Me” page so that people are directed to the location where they can make donations towards your project.
I would highly recommend using the “Edit Page” function (link just below the page picture) to add custom functionality to your page, including setting up and publishing events and video.
Publish and Promote

Your “Fan Page” will not be viewable until you select to “Publish This Page”. Once published, you should start to aggressively promote the page. This includes suggesting the page to your Friends, adding the “Fan Page” to your personal pages ‘favorites’ and publishing regular updates.
Once your page is setup you can always use the “Ads and Pages” application to track views, fans, etc.
Keep the content steady and compelling, and link back often to your Sponsor-Me page. Publish pictures, ideas and other content to keep people visiting the site. You should take advantage of the “Send an Update to Fans” functionality to keep your fans engaged and active. The Events functionality is a great way to inform your fans of fund-raising or other social events related to your project.

Host your own Website and use WordPress
WordPress is a powerful and free tool for managing your blogging website. There is a wealth of free themes and plug-ins that allows you to customize your site and that can be used to help raise funds and automatically provide recognition to your donors.
The directions for setting up your website and WordPress will make use of many external links. The technology and options change quickly and the external websites will have the latest information for installing and using their applications.
It should also be noted that this path is best if you are familiar with web publishing and technologies. Although most of the steps are automated, if there is a problem you will likely have to work with several different sources to troubleshoot (including your host, WordPress and the authors of specific themes and plug-ins). The good news is that the latest version of WordPress provides wonderful tools for customizing your site with a minimal need for using other web management tools including cPanel and an FTP client.

Building the infrastructure:
-Create a PayPal Account
-Find a host and create your website
-Install WordPress on your site-Install the Donate Plus plug-in and activate it on your website
- Using the Donate Plus widget and shortcode
- Play and Publish

Creating a PayPal Account
Creating a new PayPal account is not required if you already have one. Click here to see the directions earlier in this document on creating a PayPal account. IMPORTANT NOTE: Please make sure the email address you associate with PayPal is the same one you use when installing/registering WordPress (during the WordPress install).

Find a Host and create your website
You will need a host for your new website, or use your existing host to install WordPress.
WordPress itself has a list of sites that support the “1-click” installation of WordPress. I would suggest choosing one of these hosts if possible as they all have the required versions of PHP and MySQL.
http://wordpress.org/hosting/
For my testing, I used JustHost.com. The pricing was reasonable, and I was able to quickly build the site.
http://stats.justhost.com
Please follow the directions from whichever host you choose to specify a domain name, and start hosting your site.

Install WordPress on your site
WordPress 2.8 was released on June 11, 2009. There are a number of enhancements in this version, including the ability to install Themes without having to upload to your site via FTP.
The latest version can be found at http://wordpress.org/
If you selected a host that supports “1-Click” install, please login to the web sites admin tool and run the tool. For example, if you are using JustHost.com: Simply navigate to your site name and append /cpanel to the URL (yoursite.com/cpanel) and enter your username and password (provided to you by your host when you signed up). Under “Popular Choices”, select “WordPress”. Then follow the directions to install “WordPress” to your site.
If you chose a host that does not support 1-click install or you wish to custom install WordPress to your site, please visit the WordPress site (http://wordpress.org/download/) and refer to your website documentation for details on installing WordPress in that environment.
NOTE: As WordPress 2.8 is a recent release, the 1-step install process may install an older version of WordPress. Simply navigate to the WordPress admin page and select to upgrade to the latest version of WordPress page (http://yoursite.com/wp-admin) before moving on to the next step. If you do not see the option to upgrade on the WP-Admin main dashboard, simply select “Tools, Upgrade” from the menu options on the left sidebar.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Please make sure the email address you use when registering WordPress is the same as the email address associated with PayPal.

Install the Donate Plus plug-in and activate it on your website
Installing WordPress plug-ins has greatly been simplified in the latest versions. Simply navigate to your sites WordPress admin page (http://yoursite.com/wp-admin). Click on the “Plug-Ins” option on the left menu, and choose “Add New”. There are several options for searching and choosing Plug-Ins, but the simplest is to simply search for the term “Donate Plus”. You may get a message stating that the Plug-in has not been tested with the latest version of WordPress, but I have confirmed that it works with 2.8
Once the Donate Plus plug-in is installed you can activate it by navigating to the Plug-ins section of the WP-Admin tool and choosing to “Activate” the plug-in.
If you are running an older version of WordPress that does not support installation of the Plug-in via the WP-Admin tool, you will have to manually install the plug-in via FTP. Please refer to your website host
for details on authenticating to FTP, and review the installation instructions below for information on uploading/installing plug-ins to your WordPress site.
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/donate-plus/installation/
http://www.village-idiot.org/archives/2008/06/19/how-to-upload-a-wordpress-plugin/

Using the Donate Plus Widget and shortcode
Once the Donate Plus Plug-in is installed and activated, you can start to add the functionality to your site. The first step is to navigate to the Appearance, Widgets section of the WP-Admin tool. Installing Donate Plus will have added several widgets that you can drag to various sections of your blog page. Experiment by dragging either the “Donate Plus Total” widget, “Donate Plus Wall” widget or “Donate Plus Form” widget to one of the sidebar or footer sections. Once done, you can select to “Visit Site” to see how each widget looks when added to different sections of your site.
Each of these features can also be used directly in your blog posts or pages by using “shortcode”. For example, I created a separate page for people to send donations and simply added

Play and Publish
WordPress has a wealth of customization options available via themes and plug-ins. Many of these tools are available for free and allow you to create some incredibly professional looking sites. http://wordpress.org/showcase/ is a good place to review some WordPress sites and get inspiration for creating your own site.
Experiment and play with themes and plug-ins to find the right mix to showcase your project goals. Look ahead to determine how WordPress can be the avenue for publishing your project when you complete your trip. Visit the http://wordpress.org site and view the docs section for information on getting started, and the forums section to request assistance with specific issues or functionality.

-Michael Armijo

Blue Earth Alliance

Collective Lens: “promotes social change with your photos. Upload a photo and help bring awareness to important issues around the world. You can inspire others to become involved.”

FeatureShoot

FiftyCrows: They get social documentary work out there. Distributing it in new and original ways to build awareness, start conversations, and provide networking and financial support to help documentary photographers cause social change.

Fotovision: Their “mission is to advance documentary photography and storytelling. … through education, dialogue and community. … to inspire and enable positive change by creating a global photographic community that gives voice to the human condition.” They teach workshops in San Francisco Bay Area.
Photocrati.com: Sponsors of the Photocrati Fund, a nonprofit that provides grants to photographers working on important environmental and humanitarian projects. Also a online community for photographers

socialdocumentary.net

The Digital Journalist: Online journalism. Photographers are writers and photographers. Reporting from around the world.

-Maggie Soladay