Do Something is offering weekly grants of $500 to help out projects addressing different causes around the world, from different young people all around the country. Did you recently create a sustainable community action project, program or organization or have a great idea for helping your community? If you answered "YES!", you're eligible to apply for a Do Something Grant. These grants will be awarded weekly throughout 2011 apply now! Read about our winners from November and December below.

Samantha Smith, 25

New York, NY

Buttons for Birth
After volunteering with Saving Mothers, Samantha decided she wanted to start a project that educates new mothers in the US about the needs of women in Guatemala. Guatemala has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in Latin America, as the resources and technology offered in the US is unavailable to these women. The Buttons for Birth Campaign is dedicated to women's health, education and empowerment; it will provide new mothers in the US with a button along with an informational brochure and letter encouraging them to recycle their excess maternity supplies. These will be donated to Guatemalan women and ultimately provide them and their health care providers the tools they need to reduce maternal mortality rates while raising awareness in the US. Samantha’s Do Something Grant will fund the Buttons for Birth campaign and further its work abroad through Saving Mothers.

Yooha Park, 16

Atlanta, GA

Stories of Our Lives
Yooha started Stories of Our Lives because she feels strongly about the importance of providing opportunities for the elderly to share their life experiences. Her project aims to provide a bridge between the younger generation and seniors by creating a nexus to share their thoughts and feelings. Stories of Our Lives will provide the seniors with a chance to remember and celebrate their lives while giving students advice and thoughts about how to live meaningfully. Following these conversations, the students will create scrapbooks with the stories of their elderly friends that will provide them with an opportunity to reflect on what they have learned. The Do Something grant will allow Stories of Our Lives to create higher-quality scrapbooks and they hope to create at least fifty of them by the end of the year.

Theresa Ell, 23

Bismarck, ND

Camp Ready Child
Theresa is passionate about literacy education in the home and Camp Ready Child responds to this need. The vision of the project is to educate parents/guardians about how to care for their young students and provide important literacy activities at home. In addition, students will be engaged with educational lessons, activities and experiences throughout the camp and will receive resources to aid in their understanding of core curriculum subjects. The Do Something grant will help Camp Ready Child by providing funds to purchase books, crayons, markers, pencils, paper, and activity booklets to give to the Kindergarten-6th grade students who attend. It will also allow them to purchase lunch for the event and purchase materials for their educational experiments.

Daisy Ochoa, 22

Cape Coral, FL

Tice, Tice, How Does Your Garden Grow?
Daisy comes from a community where parents struggle to provide meals for their families and is passionate about proper nutrition. She wants to organize and plant a community garden along with the Science Club at the school she works at; the food from the garden will be donated to their cafeteria and to local families. Daisy already took a course in gardening and knows about how to conduct soil samples, the proper growth season of different plants, and how to use compost and fertilizer. The Do Something Grant will help Daisy and the Science Club purchase the supplies they need and create a garden that will last for many seasons.

Tina Hovsepian, 24

Glendale, CA

Cardborigami Instant Space
Los Angeles is the homeless capital of the United States with over 50,000 homeless individuals, and only 38% are sheltered. Cardborigami's vision is to bridge the gap between design and humanity by attracting attention to social issues such as homelessness through design. They are going to provide an innovative portable shelter for homeless individuals that can quickly collapse to a fraction of its size for storage or easy transport by one person. In addition, the Cardborigami staff will provide them with resources such as job placement organizations and social service groups. They hope to show the homeless community that the world cares about them and provide them with a sense of inspiration. Cardborigami is currently working on raising funds so that they can begin the mass production and distribution of their shelters. The Do Something grant will allow them to produce and distribute thirty shelters. They will also collect data about the durability and lifespan of the shelters through these individual’s experiences that will allow them to improve their design.

Nicole Reyes, 25

Stamford, CT

Serving While Achieving Greatness Inc.
For children growing up in low-income communities like the South Bronx, poverty exists as a barrier that confines them to an experience limited to the walls of their community. This isolation acts as a ceiling to their potential and dreams. Through exposure, inspiration, and empowerment Serving While Achieving Greatness, Inc. (S.W.A.G) aims to develop SWAG leaders that become agents of change empowered and ready to lead a change within their communities. Through leadership seminars and an innovative curriculum that will include guest speakers and experiential, non-traditional, and skill-based learning, S.W.A.G will give these kids the opportunity to establish student-led initiatives aimed at solving a specific issue within their community. SWAG’s Do Something grant will be fund the space for their seminars as well as their work with professionals to design metrics to assess their impact.

Emily Bornstein, 22

St. Louis, MO

Middle Way House Art Program
Emily works with children of battered women who have witnessed domestic violence in their homes and range from two to ten years old. Each year, an estimated 3.3 to 10 million children witness domestic violence, and these children may then suffer from many long-term effects including emotional, physical, social, and academic problems as a result of their experience. However, intervention can make a real difference in lessening these impacts. The Middle Way House in Bloomington, in Bloomington, IN, shelters and provides programming for women and children escaping a violent relationship. Currently there are about 55 families and 115 children living in their shelter and transitional housing. Emily conducts art therapy programs at The Middle Way House and creates a safe supportive environment in which these children can express feelings and thoughts they may not be able to verbalize. Her goal is to allow the children to explore and create using a variety of mediums, while they learn to listen and follow directions, express their emotions, and enjoy themselves without fear. Emily will use her Do Something grant to purchase art supplies for the children and provide better project opportunities with improved materials.

Tasmiah Khan, 21

Bridgeview, IL

Brighter Dawns for Humanity
Bangladesh is one of the most flood-prone countries in the world, and yet, its people are in dire need of clean water sources. Due to bacteria-laden surface water and arsenic contaminated groundwater, Bangladesh is a country where water related illnesses are rampant, and diarrhea, cholera, and typhoid are commonplace, accounting for 24% of all deaths in Bangladesh. Furthermore, a large portion of these illnesses can be attributed to poor hygienic practices. Brighter Dawns hosts awareness events and builds wells, latrines and shower rooms, Brighter Dawns seeks to combat both sanitary ignorance and the inability to access safe sanitation. Tasmiah was raised in a household with Bengali-speaking parents, and her cultural acumen combined with her public health interest led her to this endeavor. Over the next year, Brighter Dawns plans to provide 10 tube wells, 20 latrines, and 2 bathrooms in the region of Khalishpur, Khulna. They hope to then move on to other projects in the area and to open chapters in High Schools and Universities that raise awareness about the issue. Their Do Something grant will particularly help them build the two bathrooms in the Khalishpur.