Kathryn Hall-Trujillo worked for the state of California from 1976 to 1991 as a public health administrator, and during that time, noticed that families often struggled to pay for the care of infants born with serious health problems. When she realized that pregnancy care for expectant mothers would cost less than 0.01 percent of the funds used to stabilize a sick infant, she created Birthing Project USA -- a nonprofit organization that improves birth outcomes by recruiting and training community volunteers to provide guidance, education and social support to pregnant and parenting teens and women. 
An award-winning social entrepreneur and musician, Gemma co-founded the Global Women’s Water Initiative along with Jan Hartsough and Melinda Kramer in 2007. Prior to stepping in as Director of GWWI, Gemma was the Founder/Executive Director of A Single Drop (USA) and the Founding Director of A Single Drop for Safe Water in the Philippines, developing innovative programming developing income-generating community-based water service organizations. For this innovation, Gemma received national and international best emerging social entrepreneur awards from Echoing Green, Ernst Young and Schwab Foundation, and others. Her programs also won accolades including the Tech Museum Tech Equality Award and Warriors of the UN Millennium Goals, sponsored by Kodak Philippines. Gemma is a musician and seasoned traveler, journeying to 45 countries experiencing the global water crisis first hand. She is the architect of the WE RISE Million Voice Choir, a global peace mission to unite people in celebration of water as a source of peace and equality. Mmore on Gemma http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liNjK0gNRT0 
"Leaders from industry have a vital role to play in helping to fix South Africa's failing schooling system", writes Louise van Rhyn. There are only seven countries in the world with education outcomes worse than South Africa. "Depending on who you speak to, we have between 19 000 and 25 000 failing schools. There are about 14-million children in the South African school system and less than 20% of them are getting the education they need to secure an economically sustainable future for themselves. The current and future cost of the failure of the education system is enormous for all sectors of society. We already have more than four million angry youths whose dreams have been shattered by our failing education system. We are sitting on a time bomb" Louise van Rhyn is a finalist of the Ogunte Women's Social Leadership Awards 2012. More on www.symphonia.net 
Elinor Ostrom was the recipient of the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2009 — the first woman to achieve the distinction — for her analysis of economic governance, especially the governance of common property like air, water and public spaces. Virtually all the world's most urgent problems require collective action. Be it environmental protection, the international financial system or the dimensions of inequality, Ostrom's work sheds light on the direction society must follow to avoid misuse of shared resources, "the tragedy of the commons." Read more: http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2111975_2111976_2111960,00.html #ixzz1tzV7Ymdd 
Asylum Access, however, because it has the power to transform refugee rights from paper promises to on-the-ground reality. “For half a century, international law has given refugees the rights to live safely, seek employment, send children to school and rebuild their lives. But those rights are meaningless unless they are respected on the ground,” she says. “Asylum Access provides a rare opportunity to fill a gaping hole in our human rights system – by making refugee rights a reality for real people.” 
Bidna Capoeira’s vision is to use capoeira as a psychosocial tool to help support children in refugee camps and vulnerable communities. "Our objectives are to provide relief, to support development through strengthening resilience and most importantly to bring joy into the harshest of environments. We use sport, music and play, through the non-competitive art form of Capoeira. Originally brought to Brazil by slaves from Africa, its precedents of creativity in creating social cohesion and resilience in the face of oppression remain relevant to the communities we are working with today. We also use life skills classes, counselling sessions, art and theatre as part of our psychosocial programme of activities." More on their work: www.bidnacapoeira.org | @BidnaCapoeira Ummul is a finalist of the Ogunte Women's Social Leadership Awards 2012 
The Adventure Project is part of a movement to honor the dignity of individuals who require assistance by helping them find work on life sustaining projects. The 10-year goal of the organization is to create one million jobs worldwide. With current operations in India, Haiti, Uganda and Kenya, they focus on projects related to four areas: environment, health, hunger and water. Through strategic branding and PR, Becky Straw and Jody Landers have built an enthusiastic “tribe” of supporters. Individuals, families, even swim teams, support a project and become part of an adventure. It’s direct engagement of the best kind! People see their charity dollars investing in vibrant and innovative social enterprises that put people to work. In their first year, they raised $250,000 in small donations to fund 170 entrepreneurs in four countries, serving 100,000 people. 
Panmela Castro is known as Anarkia Boladona: "I created a graffiti project to educate women about the Lei Maria da Penha (a law that protects women from domestic violence) that was a great success. Because of this I won a human rights prize from a US institution called Vital Voices that was founded by Hilary Clinton when she was first lady. After this a group of us female grafitieiras created a network called Rede Nami – Feminist Urban Art Network – that uses graffiti to promote the rights of women." 
For more than 40 years, Gloria Steinem has been the near-singular voice of the women’s movement. Why, in all that time, has no one emerged as her successor? 
Fiona Ednie is founder of Smart Childcare in Inverness. A childcare social enterprise on its way up. “We were living on Orkney when my eldest entered pre-school education just as the government were formalising child care and making it available for all. I’ve not always lived rurally so I noticed quickly that childcare is a huge barrier for parents in rural locations. It can stop them pursuing education, employment or even socialising. It can be really isolating.” Direct Childcare was born in 2004 to deliver out of hours childcare to families, helping them to get into work, education and to have a break when they need it. Six years later Fiona had spotted gaps in the childcare market and a need for more flexible crèche services. She decided to set up Smart Childcare as a social enterprise to provide and market mobile crèche services to parents. Smart takes childcare to parents wherever it is needed from weddings to campsites and the company generates income that is ploughed back into Direct. Fiona is a graduate of the Scottish Social Enterprise Academy. 
Goodies in Hoodies is a youth action group that creates activities and opportunities for young people through a volunteering reward scheme, reducing relationship barriers and aiming to diminish anti-social behaviour. At the age of 16, Maisey conceived and founded the youth project Goodies in Hoodies to dispel the negativity associated with teenagers in hoodies on a Fairwater estate. It is now a widely acclaimed project and recognised as an example of best practice across the UK.
Tara Hopkins' main interests have always been greater equality and empowerment from a grass-roots level. She established the first program for civic participation at the university level in Turkey, and initiated the Ashoka program as the first country representative. She has taken her idealism to a different level now, down to the trash can, at long last acknowledging that some things cannot completely change but they can be modified. Çöp(m)adam is a social entreprise she co-founded, with more than 200 women contributing on the project. More than 20 tons of waste material are being re-used in the past two years, thousands of handbags are being produced and took their places in the wardrobes. Products of Çöp(m)adam are being sold in tens of shops all in big capitals as well as all around Turkey through online shopping websites. "çöp" means "garbage" in Turkish; "madam", the same as the French word indicates. "Çöp(m)adam" (Garbage Ladies) is symbolic of this meaning – taking garbage and turning it into something fashionable and fun; even though it sounds weird. A description of the Make a Wave Pre-Incubator programme, with 12 Women Social Innovators who boosted their ventures and personal development, as well as the hosting investment and funding organisations. |
February 15, 2012, Naomi climbs aboard her bike saddle in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and begins her journey from Vancouver to Rio de Janeiro, covering 130 or so days and some 11,200 kilometres. Her final destination? The Rio+20 summit, also known as the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development. Her goal is to journey these 11,200 kms with a minimal environmental footprint, but achieving maximum awareness about sustainable transport, global environmental concerns and the potential for each of us to make a difference by the choices we make and the people we meet everyday. Follow @naomidevine / @ride2rio 
Our goal, ultimately, is to create a world that’s more balanced in terms of gender and the distribution of opportunities, wealth and education. For us, it’s not enough that our business thrives: we need to help women around the world be successful.
Audur is business based on “feminine” values: More on the founders and AuDur Capital: http://www.audurcapital.is/english/about-audur/the-founders/ 
Ruby Cup is a menstrual cup, a healthy, high quality and long-lasting menstrual hygiene product made of 100% medical grade silicone that can be re-used up to 10 years. In developing countries, the lack of safe and affordable menstrual hygiene products causes school drop-outs and hinders women from achieving their life opportunities. Together with her two partners, Veronica developed Ruby Cup, moved to Kenya, and set-up a for-profit social business. Today, Ruby Cup is the only menstrual cup company that specializes in serving the Base of the Pyramid and is distributed and sold through a network of female entrepreneurs in order to create local employment, increase education, and solve the problem with a simple and easily scalable solution. More on http://www.ruby-cup.com/ 
For decades, Brenda Brathwaite has been a major figure in the field of game design. Famous for her work on the role-playing series Wizardry, she’s also known for her work on Def Jam: Icon, Playboy: The Mansion, and Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes.
It's never easy to get across the magnitude of complex tragedies -- so when Brenda Brathwaite's daughter came home from school asking about slavery, she did what she does for a living -- she designed a game. In 2008, she began work on her non-digital series, The Mechanic Is the Message, dedicated to expressing difficult subjects through interactive media. Train, a game derived from the events of the Holocaust, won the Vanguard Award at Indiecade in October 2009. 
"Global Grassroots' Academy for Conscious Change begins by identifying among the most underserved groups of women those emerging change agents who have a personal commitment to transforming their communities. Our participants include widows, genocide survivors, women living with HIV/AIDS, survivors of sexual violence or domestic abuse, and individuals living on less than $2 per day. Though we target vulnerable women, we also welcome into our program men who are eager to combat the underlying issues affecting women and girls. On average, approximately 10 percent of our participants are men. We try to identify change agents working on women's issues, but at the earliest stage of their idea development, so that the design and implementation of their work will be driven by a compassionate understanding of society's ills. Working with these "inner-driven and outer-focused" groups, Global Grassroots invites representatives of each team into our 12-18 month Conscious Change Academy." Check www.globalgrassroots.org 
Playing for Change supports social entrepreneurs who help children and youth to a better life". Sara’s vision is a meeting between the motivation of the nonprofit sector and the professionalism of the business sector resulting in a better world for children and young people – initially in Sweden and now globally. Playing for Change’s mission is to find and support social entrepreneurs with innovative ideas and methods that can improve the world by removing obstacles to play. Play is a vital aspect of every child’s development and we are confident that even in the most depressive environments and hazardous situations, play can be a key to the future, empowering children and young people. Their selected social entrepreneurs – the "Playmakers" – are invited in to Play for Change's incubator. The incubator is not a physical space, but a context where the social entrepreneurs get help to in turn help as many children and young people as possible. http://www.playingforchange.se/en/ Sara is a finalist of the Ogunte Women's Social Leadership Awards 2012.
Women Effect Investments is a field-building initiative that seeks to mobilize more investment dollars toward improving the condition of women and girls worldwide. We are doing this because when women are economic agents and leaders, social change accelerates and returns multiply. The returns of women-focused investing can be measured in our families, our neighborhoods, and on the other side of the world. This is The Women Effect. 
In 2000, after witnessing the rape and murder of her best friend, and after an infant died in her arms, Christine Schuler Deschryver decided to devote her life to alerting the world to the femicide and massive rape against women and children in DRC. This year she was honored in DRC and in Geneva for her human rights work, and has been featured in a film by the well-known French journalist, Patrick Forestier. Christine is currently assisting the V-Day and UNICEF Campaign “Stop Raping Our Greatest Resource, Power To The Women And Girls Of The Democratic Republic Of Congo,” and is overseeing the work being done on the ground to create City of Joy, a refuge for healed women, survivors of rape and torture who have been left without family and community. For more information on the Campaign and City of Joy please visit http://www.vday.org/drcongo 
If you happen to find yourself in Kampala, Uganda, make your way to the Old Taxi Park. From there, grab a taxi van to Matuga. Jump off at the end of the line, and hop on a boda boda to the Cornerstone Leadership Academy. After a (bumpy) ride along a dirt road, you will find yourself in the company of some of the most intelligent and committed young women in Uganda. 
After 20-years working with horses Avril Oliver, Founder and Director of Big Heart Horses, noticed how people with learning or physical difficulties responded to the animals. She decided to set up a business to address the lack of services and set up Big Heart using land attached to her house. “Seeing horses and ponies interacting with people who had acute needs inspires me. Their confidence improves, their communication improves and there is a general ease with people for some of them that wasn’t there before. Avril Oliver is a recent graduate of Social Enterprise incubator residential Ignite, an initiative by The Scottish Social Enterprise Academy. 
It all started when a group of mums decided to take action to give their children a better future. Now, as Cathy Owen found out, they have an organisation that helps hundreds and has a turnover of nearly £1m THEY used to say that the best thing about Gellideg was the road out. But 13 years ago a group of mothers decided they wanted to create a better life for their children by organising discos at a disused church hall. It was only meant to happen a few times to give the young people something to do other than hang around on street corners. But over the years, those few discos have grown into a community group and registered charity that now employs 45 people and 100 volunteers who deliver a programme of clubs, societies and health groups that help all ages of the community.
For more information go to http://gellideg.net 
Emily Harrison, Founder and Executive Director of Innovaid, a company which specialised in Strategic Philanthropy and CSR in Mumbai, India. Strategic Giving is becoming more and more crucial in a country like India in which the social divide is enourmous. The visit by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett in India for the "Giving Pledge" did not seem successful but it started a ripple effect of wealthy Indian starting to think about sharing some of their riches to bring much needed social change in India |
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