Women as Agents of Change

We help grassroots teams of women provide safe, clean water access to their communities and, in so doing, solve water-related social issues that impact women and girls, including sexual violence and exploitation, girls' attendance in school, domestic violence, and water-borne illnesses, among other issues.

Global Grassroots' nine newest ventures, launched in 2016-2017, are now bringing safe, clean water access - permanently and sustainably - to more than 31,000 people in Rwanda. In addition, our goal in 2018 is to train four women-led teams in northern Uganda who will rehabilitate nine existing, though defunct, boreholes to ensure safe, clean water for their communities.

The cost of this clean water, along with important social change related to water access, equates to just $7-$8 per person. We believe we offer one of the most cost-effective water programs.

Trauma Healing

Global Grassroots operates in post-conflict countries where our participants have often been the victims of genocide or gender-based violence, or simply endure lives of chronic stress. Our program incorporates a particular evidence-based, mind-body trauma healing method called Breath~Body~Mind (BBM) to ensure our change agents are able to take care of their own rehabilitation needs before striving courageously to change their community, and so that they may share these same practices with the vulnerable communities they serve.

This year we have also begun to share this unique and highly effective practice with communities outside our exclusive Academy participants. In 2018, in partnership with the Ituze Mindfulness Center in Kigali, we initiated the only trainer's training program in Rwanda. We are now collaborating with local partners and the founders of Breath~Body~Mind, Dr. Richard P. Brown and Dr. Patricia Gerbarg, in exploring how to make the practice accessible to people throughout East Africa.