INTEROOTS INITIATIVE
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Mission Statement
InteRoots collaborates with roots-up projects across the globe. Our goal is to partner with local communities as they cultivate and implement innovative, sustainable projects. We believe what is for the community should be by the community.
About This Cause
InteRoots partners with and empowers communities to make community-driven, impactful changes in the areas of education, health, economic development, environmental health, and cultural preservation through strategic support and short-term funding. By catalyzing innovative “roots-up” community projects, InteRoots aims to shift the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors away from top-down “charity” dynamics towards a listening, learning, and partnership model that empowers communities and decreases economic disparities. Philanthropic efforts can be positive; however, there are several glaring problems in the way philanthropy is executed. Significant economic disparities exist, which create an imbalance in power to initiate, create, and sustain social change, often leaving the charitable wealthy to determine how to utilize funds to help communities. Often, those receiving charity are told what their problems are and how to solve them, rather than leading or being equal partners in imagining and implementing community improvements. As Stanford scholar and author Rob Reich states: “the history of charitable giving is littered with instances in which the good intentions of people are a mask for the judgmental approach to the position of people who are in need and about the things they should be doing differently to lift themselves out of poverty or disadvantage”. At InteRoots, we believe the philanthropic sector can be better at supporting “roots-up” initiatives, where communities are supported in identifying and solving their problems themselves. We do this by meeting communities at parity, listening, learning, and partnering to empower projects with the tools, planning processes, partnerships, and funding needed to realize visions for a better life. Our model of fundraising and grant-making connects donors, grantors, and sponsors with opportunities to help communities create their own social change, increasing the investment of communities and the lasting impacts of projects. Our Story: The InteRoots Initiative was conceptualized by two of our current Board members, Scott Frank and Ronald Kibirige. Ronald and Scott’s friendship was sparked during a musical collaboration between students from Stanford University and children of the Peace Africa Children’s Ensemble, a nonprofit from Uganda. Ronald, a native Ugandan, founded Peace Africa as a 16-year-old using $500 he had received for touring with an Ugandan dance troupe in the United States. The money was supposed to be used for shopping, but Ronald instead used it to buy a piece of land. This decision effectively created a musical community that continues to serve hundreds of children from across Uganda. Ronald and Scott’s collaboration, beyond inspiring music and conversation, provoked a larger discussion regarding problematic dynamics sometimes present in nonprofit work in relation to local communities. In 2017, Ronald and Scott continued this conversation, spending two intensive weeks - mostly on Ronald’s rooftop in Kampala - to develop a model to address such issues. Their answer was The InteRoots Initiative – a bold vision firmly rooted in the philosophy that nonprofits must trust and empower communities to develop and enact solutions for their own challenges. Learn more about InteRoots and current collaborative projects at interoots.org!