Philanthropists that Bankroll Social Enterprises

Pierre Omidyar/Wikimedia

On Saturday, Barron's released its list of 'The 25 Best Givers' -- high impact philanthropists who are changing the world through their donations. Many of these consisted of grants to help further educational, health or human rights issues in developing countries. Some of them consisted of funding for social enterprises -- ventures that once lifted off the ground, would be self sustaining.

Here's a look at some notable social enterprises being funded by the men and women who made the list:

Skoll Foundation (Jeff Skoll)

APOPO -- trains rats to detect landmines and tuberculosis. 

Kiva -- online platform for peer to peer microlending

Kickstart -- develops irrigation pumps suitable for steeply sloping land -- they push water uphill as well as pulling it from the source

IDEI-  affordable irrigation products that provide water one drop at a time

Gates Grants: Combating Malaria through Light, Drug Resistance through Gold

Image credit: James Gathany

The Gates Foundation has announced the second round’s winners of its Gates Grand Challenges Exploration Project, which aims to incubate projects that adopt innovative approaches to solving global health problems. 

 Nine projects have been awarded $1 million. Here’s the Gates Foundation’s description of a few of these:

• Dr. Mark Davis from Stanford University is working to create a new method to quantify and profile cellular immune responses to vaccinations, specifically for the influenza and rotavirus vaccines, to improve effectiveness;
• Dr. Dan Feldheim at the University of Colorado is exploring how small molecule-coated gold nanocrystals could be tailored to circumvent many viral and bacterial evolutionary drug resistance mechanisms;

Gates Foundation Earmarks $20 Million for Education Technology

Image credit: Gates Foundation

The Gates Foundation is offering $20 million in grants to individuals and institutions who are harnessing or developing innovative technologies to make students more successful.

In a blog post, Bill Gates introduces the Next Generation Learning Challenge, a project that aims to “accelerate the integration of technology in ways that substantially improve learning.”

The program will provide grants and gather evidence about effective educational practices in order to facilitate the development and implementation of affordable, high-quality tools in order to meet the needs of students within the budgetary confines of today’s education system. 

The first round of grants is focused on technology that can aid post secondary students complete college. Grants will be given in waves of 6-12 months, with each period focusing on a different topic area.