Meet This Month's Finalists and Vote!

Urged by disparate participation rates of urban minority youth within water-related activities, Lydia Boddie-Rice seeks to set up Y-Row, an Equity In Access youth rowing program. Y-Row builds on pilot programs that expose adolescent co-ed youth to this under represented sport, while focusing on cultivating and training youth for competition in the annual national USRowing/America Rows Diversity Invitational as well as other races. With Y-Row, Lydia aims to increase the participation of the underserved and economically disadvantaged of Rochester, New York. Her main goal is to utilize all the resources, time, treasure and talent to "Make Waves and Change Lives."

As an Immigrant activist, Krista Jensen has worked with DREAMers for 5 years and would like to create a website that will allow her to coordinate with regional immigrant groups to organize forums and webinars so DREAMers can work and live without the fear of deportation. Because DREAMers have limited access to scholarships, and no access to grants or loans to assist in college tuition, the Marigold grant will allow Krista to develop a database to support deferred action , scholarship opportunities, collect student stories, and conduct outreach to educate people about the DREAM act and undocumented students.

In the world of business, entrepreneurs are constantly looking for start-up funding, but for some individuals who maintain low-to-moderate incomes, access to capital or loans is oftentimes not an option. Venus Lockett wants to launch an asset building program that will offer financial education and counseling, business planning and viability assessment, coaching, and an opportunity to participate in Individual Development Account (IDA) savings specifically to entrepreneurs who have negative or no credit or no start-up funding. It is her hope that this program will break the cycle of poverty that is associated with being disadvantaged by empowering those individuals to build economic stability for themselves, their families, and their communities.

At the time of her job transition, Molly MacDonald received the news that she was diagnosed with breast cancer. Having to pay overly expensive medical bills as well as maintain her family’s health insurance, she lived in a place of despair and hopelessness with the constant threat of homelessness. That’s why, over the past six years, she has been developing and raising funding for The Pink Fund, her organization that provides critical but limited short-term financial support to breast cancer patients in active treatment. Her idea is to supply a financial bridge to help women and their families with basic cost of living expenses up to 90 days, so that they can focus on healing and returning to the workplace.

After meeting two young charitable Guatemalan painters, Mira Talbott Pope was so inspired by the idea of giving back through art that she was able to set up her own service - providing families with a basket of food once a month, painting classes, a meal every Saturday morning, and aid with school expenses when needed. Through her organization, Mira wants to improve nutrition, school attendance, right/left brain balance for better learning, and self-esteem by stressing individual thinking, responsibility, cooperation, and originality.

Gail Shore, an experienced globe trekker and photographer, strongly believes that international photography can be a creative teaching tool for educators in the classroom to illustrate diverse cultural backgrounds. Her nonprofit, Cultural Jambalaya, volunteer-based organization that uses cultural photography to broaden student thought through the production of one-of-a-kind educational DVDs that feature images and narratives from across the globe, uses international photography to promote understanding and respect for all people, to break down cultural barriers, and to encourage students to admire and value each other’s similarities as well as differences.

By blending her creative expertise, pioneering spirit, tenacity, and life experiences, Sheila Warnock has actualized her true calling as a caregiver and a teacher through her organization Share The Care. Share The Care is a grassroots model that empowers ordinary people (friends, relatives, neighbors, and co-workers cutting across racial, geographic, gender, and socioeconomic lines) with a step-by-step roadmap on how they can maintain their own unique caregiving family to help someone who’s on the verge of being overwhelmed. It is the organization’s mission to turn “what can I do to help?” into powerful action that influences all involved.