Project background
The Assisting Entrepreneurial Schools portal explores practical ways to improve education in communities where earlier approaches have fallen short.
It has been launched by Openworld, Inc., a nonprofit transnational venture, in followup to a Sabre Foundation- and Whitehead Foundation-backed 11-month research project on opportunities for digital philanthropy to encourage self-funding good causes, which led to publication of "New Catalysts for Sustainability."
Project Team
Mark Frazier, president of Openworld, has led microscholarship projects and eLearning initiatives, free economic zone policy reforms, business and technology park promotion, privatization and sustainable community development projects in 56 countries over the past 27 years, for USAID, the World Bank, and leading international corporations. He has directed design of the VirtualMarketOpener.com telework incubator portal for Southeast European freelancers, and has provided strategies for microvoucher and eAcademy/eCenter projects in Sri Lanka, Bulgaria, and Kyrgyzstan. A former publisher and managing editor of Reason Magazine, he holds a BA from Harvard University and is a past Visiting Fellow of the Lehrman Institute.
Soleman Idd, Openworld's Chairman, is a specialist in innovative applications of cell phone and information technology for microenterprise development. He is currently a partner in a National Geographic-backed project introducing multimedia cell phones to villages in Africa as catalysts for sustainable banking, ecotourism, and eLearning applications. Mr. Idd is also active in advising African and Caribbean Basin governments on structuring private partnerships for land grant-based free economic zone development. Previously, he has organized private initiatives for environmental preservation including incentives for carbon trading offsets for reforestation. Mr. Idd graduated as national valedictorian and pursued studies at the Mogadishu School of Medicine in Somalia. He holds an MBA from the Milan School of Business.
Shannon Ewing, Openworld's project manager for grassroots initiatives, has developed online tools and provided guidance for privately funded microvouchers to spread language and ICT skills in entrepreneurial schools for the poor in rural Sri Lanka and the Philippines. She also has led research into and profile preparation for 50+ online markets for freelancers, organized alliances with partners in Southeast Europe, and conducted workshops introducing telework opportunities to jobseekers in Kosovo, Macedonia, and Montenegro. She holds a degree in economic development from Hampshire College and pursued language studies at L'Institute Scandinav.