Zoe Timms, creator of the Women's Education Project, puts the Social in Social Entrepreneur

My blog post: How my approach to securing funding for my venture has evolved through the Incubator program

In 2002, I established Women's Education Project as a 501(C)(3) to help young women from poor families, succeed in college and begin careers. At garden parties with family and friends, I was able to fund the first center, "Sudar" in Madurai, South India. The dollar goes far in India so within the next few years, we were able to hire staff, rent a center (with computer lab, library, and garden), offer 25 scholarships annually and provide 60 students with academic support. In 2008, we started our second center, "Ushassu" in Hyderabad. Today, 100 students attend WEP centers in South India.

My goal in the NYWSE incubator (as well as to start Illume - WEP's online library) was to develop creative funding streams that reach beyond family and friends support. During the first NYWSE workshops, I started to think about how entrepreneurs could help us share the WEP story - this developed into a plan to partner with women-owned restaurants in New York. 

On International Women's Day 2009, WEP partnered with eight women-owned restaurants. At each restaurant, patrons discovered the WEP story and contributed to our work at the end of their meal. After this successful pilot, we plan to expand the program to include restaurants outside of NY. 

As an entrepreneur, this type of fundraising is exciting. I look forward to developing this program, and others like it, to sustainably fund WE