COMMUNICATION BLOG #3

Social Entrepreneur Project

Our social entrepreneur group project will focus on creating a preliminary proposal for the setup of a non-profit organization named ‘South Bronx – You can do it’ (SBYCDI). The goal of this organization is to help reduce financial illiteracy in one of New York’s poorest communities, South Bronx.

SBYCDI will provide free financial advice and coaching on managing personal banking, maximizing personal taxation returns, reducing personal debt and working on a limited budget. The project will focus on the community’s residents with incomes on or below the poverty line. Currently this segment represents over 38% of South Bronx’s total population, a significant portion when compared to the nation’s average of 22%.

By targeting local banks, credit unions and community outreach programs to form advertising and sponsorship relationships, SBYCDI aims to become independently sustainable by the end of year two.

Before this happens, we need to raise $200,000 to get the project from the proposal stage to a fully functional service. We hope to achieve our goal by convincing funders that:

• Our project will help people to help them-selves.
• Our efforts can help thousands of people in a short period of time.
• Our services on helping people to overcome the burden of financial strain allowing them to focus building their future.
• The results of our services will have a positive effect on not just adults but also children and the community as whole.

We will use real life examples of financially illiterate residents of the South Bronx to demonstrate the problem and show how our service can have a positive effect on enriching these people’s lives and the lives of people around them.