Sasha Fisher's guest appearances

Sasha Fisher

Social Entrepreneur

Building a New America with Jonathan Arias

What Do You Understand?

Laura Roeder

Dan Miller

Elizabeth Sarquis

Kavita Shukla

Kate Hayes

Tim Fargo

Tweet Jukebox

Paul Bradley

Nathan Chan

Safeena Husain

Jim Smith

Stacy Flynn

Liz Forkin Bohannon

Andrew Stern

Clara Brenner

OwlTail

In this episode of What Do You Understand? Sasha Fisher, co-founder of Spark Microgrants, discusses the negative effects of prescriptive philanthropy and how grassroots initiatives give the decision-making power back to the indigenous communities.Video Link

In this episode of What Do You Understand? Sasha Fisher, co-founder of <a href="https://www.sparkmicrogrants.org/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Spark Microgrants</a>, discusses the negative effects of prescriptive philanthropy and how grassroots initiatives give the decision-making power back to the indigenous communities.<a href="https://gpfd.org/2022/05/20/episode-4-sasha-fisher-talks-decolonizing-philanthropy-through-community-driven-development/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Video Link</a>

Sasha Fisher Talks Decolonizing Philanthropy Through Community-Driven Development

Sasher Fisher and her organization Spark Microgrants help communities across Africa build communities from a grass-roots level.  Moving away from the common, but ineffective, prescriptive model of community development, Spark implements the community-driven model which leaves the decision making power to community members.  Helping communities only to organize, Spark provides a seed grant to initiate the community building process. In this episode, Jonathan and Sasha discuss grass-roots democracy and what lessons Americans can learn from abroad.  

Sasher Fisher and her organization Spark Microgrants help communities across Africa build communities from a grass-roots level.  Moving away from the common, but ineffective, prescriptive model of community development, Spark implements the community-driven model which leaves the decision making power to community members.  Helping communities only to organize, Spark provides a seed grant to initiate the community building process.  In this episode, Jonathan and Sasha discuss grass-roots democracy and what lessons Americans can learn from abroad.

#2 - Bottom-up Democracy with Sasha Fisher of Spark Microgrants 

Where were you on September 11, 2001? If you were more than three years old at the time, there’s a good chance that you remember. Sasha Fisher grew up about five blocks from “ground zero.” At the time, Sasha was in middle school. This event caused Sasha to begin to think outside of her neighborhood, her city and even her country. She began to learn about people around the world who could not meet their most fundamental basic needs. As a college student, Sasha had a chance to visit South Sudan where she observed a disturbing pattern. Outside aide organizations had started many projects which were not sustained after the aid agencies left. And, the local community was not empowered in the process. Sasha began to think that there had to be a better way. Spark MicroGrants has worked with 126 villages across four countries in east Africa. Spark supports rural poor communities to design, implement and manage their own social impact projects. They provide microgrants between $2,000 and $10,000 to enable project implementation, such as of a school, electricity line or farm. No interest or repayment of the funds granted is requested. Does it work? Spark MicroGrants see a 92% sustainability rate for their projects, which is unheard of in development projects. Also, after a community launches the initial project with the help of Spark MicroGrants, the local community launch a second project on their own, showing that they can sustain the process. 97% of the villages continue to stay organized after the initial grant process. Resources:  Spark MicroGrants: http://www.sparkmicrogrants.org Twitter: https://twitter.com/SparkMG 5 Key Traits of Successful Social Entrepreneurs: http://tonyloyd.com/socent

Where were you on September 11, 2001? If you were more than three years old at the time, there’s a good chance that you remember. Sasha Fisher grew up about five blocks from “ground zero.” At the time, Sasha was in middle school. This event caused Sasha to begin to think outside of her neighborhood, her city and even her country. She began to learn about people around the world who could not meet their most fundamental basic needs. As a college student, Sasha had a chance to visit South Sudan where she observed a disturbing pattern. Outside aide organizations had started many projects which were not sustained after the aid agencies left. And, the local community was not empowered in the process. Sasha began to think that there had to be a better way. Spark MicroGrants has worked with 126 villages across four countries in east Africa. Spark supports rural poor communities to design, implement and manage their own social impact projects. They provide microgrants between $2,000 and $10,000 to enable project implementation, such as of a school, electricity line or farm. No interest or repayment of the funds granted is requested. Does it work? Spark MicroGrants see a 92% sustainability rate for their projects, which is unheard of in development projects. Also, after a community launches the initial project with the help of Spark MicroGrants, the local community launch a second project on their own, showing that they can sustain the process. 97% of the villages continue to stay organized after the initial grant process. Resources: <ul> <li>Spark MicroGrants: <a href="http://www.sparkmicrogrants.org" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://www.sparkmicrogrants.org</a></li> <li>Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/SparkMG" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://twitter.com/SparkMG</a></li> <li>5 Key Traits of Successful Social Entrepreneurs: <a href="http://tonyloyd.com/socent" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">http://tonyloyd.com/socent</a></li></ul>

022, Sasha Fisher, Spark MicroGrants | Driving Change Through Empowerment 