Feel Good Friday - Hope for Haiti

Oh how we're in need of a Feel Good Friday. After some recent, disparaging remarks made about the country of Haiti, I want to share the story of an organization that's working directly with Haitians to make positive changes.

Hope for Haiti was founded 28 years ago by JoAnne Kuehner with a simple mission, "We work to improve the quality of life for the Haitian people, particularly children." As explained on the website, their model is a holistic approach that "connects, heals, and empowers rural communities on the road to sustainable, long-term development." You can watch the short video, Rethink Haiti, to see the people Hope for Haiti is helping.

Their programs focus on five key areas for development: education, nutrition and healthcare, clean water, infrastructure and economy. They partner with local organizations to support work already being done to increase the success rates. Examples include providing financial support for schools, advanced medical training for Haitian medical professionals, and installing and maintaining solar-powered Ultraviolet water purification systems.

The impact of the work is impressive! Hope for Haiti has distributed $100,000,000 in cash and in-kind donations for program support. This money has been used to train 137 teachers, provide 45,000 books to students and build 12 classrooms. They've hired a full-time, Haitian clean water technician to maintain their 13 clean water sites and trained 38 men and women in traditional and modern culinary practices, 70% of whom are applying their skills in the community.

You can read the impact section of the website for even more stories. With 95% of revenues from donations going directly to the core programs you know that if you donate, you'll be helping the people of Haiti. You can also get involved by purchasing jewelry or cookbooks at their online store.

As always, like their Facebook page and follow them on Twitter @HopeforHaitiFL to give Hope for Haiti some social media love.

Feel Good Friday - KIOO Project

Happy Feel Good Friday! It's a new year and no doubt you took some photos during this holiday season to document your experience and create a memory for your future self. Today we're going to talk about an organization that teaches photography to vulnerable children around the world.

The KIOO Project was founded by photographer Babita Patel after a trip to Haiti brought her in contact with children who had never seen photographs of themselves before. The mission, as stated on their website is a simple one, "to teach photography to children from communities with limited creative resources."

Right now KIOO Project offers workshops in Kenya, India and Haiti and their vision is "for every child to develop self-confidence by discovering who they are through photography."

You can hear and see how this is affecting the children by watching this video of students in Kenya or this video of students in Haiti. In their workshop in India, girls were taught about photography during the first week of the program. They then developed leadership and presentation skills by teaching photography the boys who came in the second week of the program.

If you like the work KIOO Project is doing you can support them by buying some of the student photos, straight up donating money, or liking their Facebook page and following them on Twitter @kiooproject.

Now get out there and do something with those photos of yours!