We want to do an experiment with real-world consequences. Right now, there is a special fundraising round on Gitcoin where you can donate $5 to our work in Barichara and help us raise a lot more.
Many of you know that Penny Heiple and I are working on a very important project in Barichara to raise money and buy a special piece of land that will become the permanent home for Sueños del Bosque.
We are going to donate $60,000 of our own money toward the $200,000 that is needed. This is how much we believe in this project.
The land is connected to the bioparque in Barichara. If we can raise the money we need to buy it and construct a school, it will make Sueños del Bosque part of the bioparque forever.
This week we have a unique opportunity where if you donate $5 or more before November 6th, it will help us get a larger part of a matching fund of $200,000. The way it works is that more donors means larger share of the matching pool.
We are looking for 100 people to each donate at least five dollars. Will you be one of them?
(All you need to do is click "Add to Cart" at the top, then go to "View Cart" when you see a pop-up window. From there you can donate with PayPal using your credit cart.)
More About this Innovative Funding Approach
This funding opportunity exists because an organization called Ma Earth has partnered with the Biome Trust and the Naia Trust to raise $200,000 in matching funds. They invited applications for land regeneration projects that meet their criteria for the funding round. Go here to learn more about the Land Regenerators round.
In essence, there are philanthropic investors who have pools of money. They trust in the way that an open-source platform called Gitcoin enables the money to be distributed using a computational approach called "Quadratic Funding" that gives more weight to the number of donations than it does to the size of each donation.
For example, the matching amount is larger if there are 10 donors who each give $10 than if there is a single donor who gives $100. This allows the money to be distributed in a more democratic and transparent manner.
We would like to see this kind of crowd-enabled funding begin to support other projects associated with the Design School for Regenerating Earth. Help us learn how by contributing to the fundraising request above.
More About the Land We Want to Buy
This is the land we want to buy for the community of Barichara. It is called Las Ruinas because there are remains of an old house that can still be seen from above. It is at the entrance to Bioparque Móncora -- the 15 year old community forest that is a shining light for the entire territory.
As you can see in the photo below, Las Ruinas is connected to the bioparque. This means by acquiring this land and placing it in community stewardship, the home of Sueños del Bosque becomes the entire bioparque!
This is associated with our work to create a regenerative learning ecosystem for the larger bioregion. You can learn more about it here.
Or watch this video I recorded from the land itself.
We appreciate all of the help we can get. If you donate $5 or more to the Ma Earth funding round, we will get a larger part of the $200,000 matching fund. This will bring us closer to our goal.
And as we learn how to do this together, we can create other funding pools together that support all of our efforts in Barichara.
Thank you!
Joe
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