Welcome! This is the second issue of Skoll eNews, the Skoll Foundation’s bimonthly update on Skoll activities and news in the world of social entrepreneurship.

Social Edge Takes Off!

In the past eight months, activity has increased more than 400 percent for both visits and page views on Social Edge, the global online community where social entrepreneurs, nonprofit professionals and other social sector practitioners connect to network, learn, inspire and share resources. Among the site’s most popular new features are weekly workshops that offer practical content to social entrepreneurs working in the field; the Nonprofit Portal, hosted by Patrick O’Heffernan, who specializes in helping nonprofit organizations develop strategic plans; and live coverage from conferences such as the Global Philanthropy Forum and the Skoll World Forum on Social Entrepreneurship.

We are pleased to welcome Victor d'Allant as the new Executive Director of Social Edge at this time of great activity on the site. A global media executive and cultural anthropologist, Victor has worked for large corporations, international organizations and entrepreneurial startups in many parts of the world.

Victor said, “I started posting a few days ago on Social Edge, mostly in English, but also a little bit in French and Spanish. Actually, a member from Calcutta said he was impressed when I posted a quotation in Latin! Altogether, I have received great feedback from our online community. It also confirmed that Social Edge should become a very practical tool, global in its scope, to have a stronger impact on the world. This is the challenge I will tackle in the months to come.”

Foundation Considers Skoll Award Applications

September at the Skoll Foundation is a time of much anticipation as we review the many inspiring letters of inquiry from applicants for the Skoll Awards for Social Entrepreneurship. We study every application, looking for organizations that have the potential for large-scale influence on critical challenges of our time: environmental sustainability, health, tolerance and human rights, institutional responsibility, social and economic equality, and peace and security. These issues are at the heart of the foundation’s vision of empowering people to create a peaceful, prosperous, sustainable world.

Following the review period, we’ll be inviting finalists in early October to submit detailed applications. The awards will be announced at the third annual Skoll World Forum on Social Entrepreneurship held March 29-31, 2006, at Oxford University.

Although the application process for this year is closed, we invite you to apply next year. Click here if you’d like to be notified when next year’s guidelines are posted. Click here to be notified when registration opens for the 2006 Skoll World Forum.

'Gandhi' Shown on the Wall

More than 200 people recently viewed the movie Gandhi on the wall of the Qalandia refugee camp near Ramallah in the Palestinian Territories as part of the Gandhi Project, which is sponsored by the Skoll Foundation and the Global Catalyst Foundation. The epic film about social entrepreneur Mahatma Gandhi was dubbed into Arabic by award-winning Palestinian director Hanna Elias. It is being shown by a collective of Palestinian nongovernmental organizations and Relief International in many cities, refugee camps and villages throughout the Palestinian Territories.

The Gandhi Project supports Palestinian civil society organizations whose actions mirror the philosophy of Gandhi. His approach to peaceful resistance as a means of fighting injustice sets an example about how social entrepreneurs can transform an “impossible” social problem into a compelling new opportunity.

In addition to the screenings, the project supports local education and community development projects.

Martin Burt Bridges Gap Between ‘Haves’ and ‘Have-Nots’

All eyes were on Martin Burt of Fundacion Paraguaya at a recent conference in Silicon Valley when he challenged the audience to imagine a world in which the poorest of the poor would have the skills and tools to lift themselves out of poverty.

“No one would ever call Martin Burt a pessimist,” said Jim Koch, director of the Center for Science, Technology and Society at Santa Clara University, which sponsored the Global Social Benefit Incubator conference. “He envisions a world where subsistence agriculture and despair are replaced by grassroots entrepreneurism, improved livelihoods and the creation of self-sustaining markets. Martin is one of those rare individuals who can soar with ideas, then reach to the ground and build the capacity that is needed to bring those ideas to reality and transform lives.”

Martin, 48, returned to his native country of Paraguay in 1983, after studying in the U.S., determined to follow in the footsteps of his activist forebears. “My dream was to use the most advanced technology not to make money for myself, but to reduce the disparities between rich and poor and create an organization where the top professionals would want to work,” he said.

At first, people were suspicious of his motives. They wondered why anyone would be crazy enough to create a nonprofit when he was capable of creating a profitable business. They thought his motive was not to provide a trickle-down benefit but to empower the poor against those who were well-off.

Of course, Martin’s goals were much more straightforward, and he was able to persuade the business community to start a microcredit program that has supported 35,000 small entrepreneurs and created 18,000 jobs. In 1995, a request by three college students led him to develop a partnership with the Junior Achievement organization that has taught more than 50,000 young people the practical skills they need to become entrepreneurs, including many disadvantaged youths not reached by the traditional Junior Achievement program.

Under his leadership, Fundacion Paraguaya took over a bankrupt agricultural high school two years ago and is transforming it into a self-sufficient productive enterprise that helps 120 young people each year learn agricultural skills as well as how to run a self-sustaining business. With funding from Skoll, he is enhancing the school’s performance as a model that will be replicated not only at other Paraguayan agricultural schools, but also in Latin America, Africa and Asia.

For Martin Burt, satisfaction comes from bringing opportunities to others and watching them grow and bridge the gap between the world of the “have-nots” and the “haves.” He said, “It is magical to show that the world need not be governed by greed but by humanism.”

He explained, “Since we have demonstrated that an organization that gives loans to the poorest of the poor can be self-sustaining, we are now trying to prove that a school that provides tools to the poorest of the poor can also be self-sustaining. The model is systemic and self-sustaining: While learning by doing, they can also make a profit.” Describing how to leverage that model, he said, “Yesterday, microfinance; today agricultural education; tomorrow, water and housing.”

To read an expanded version of this article, click here.