Who we are
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Photo credits: Daniel Heintz
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Click here to watch a short video
Video Credit: James Cashman.
Video Credit: James Cashman.
The Mission
When all is said and done, once we’ve gathered our stories, made new friends, and explored diverse cultures, we intend to have amassed an extensive collection of cultural information, world photography, global experiences, and helpful data. It’s our hope to donate this media menagerie to the non-profit organization Catalyze Labs (more specifically, their program titled “My Global Village”) for development into an education and empowerment mobile app.
If our work is accepted, this app will be a tool to educate children and families about the diversities and cultural colors of the world at large, to let them explore the planet from their own backyards by use of technology. It will contain personal profiles from specific nations across the globe, each one answering questions like: What is it like live where you live? What is your favorite food? How do you have fun? What does 'faith' mean to you? If you could change the world, how would you change it?
If our work is accepted, this app will be a tool to educate children and families about the diversities and cultural colors of the world at large, to let them explore the planet from their own backyards by use of technology. It will contain personal profiles from specific nations across the globe, each one answering questions like: What is it like live where you live? What is your favorite food? How do you have fun? What does 'faith' mean to you? If you could change the world, how would you change it?
Learners using the app can see the similarities we share with our international family and note the differences that enrich our populations. They can witness how wonderful life can be everywhere, and how simultaneously difficult day-to-day challenges can become, for so many reasons and for so many people. When a learner discovers a part of the world he thinks can be made better, the app will connect directly with preexisting non-profits already engaged in good work in the field, where ideas, donations, or time can be contributed. If there aren’t projects on file that target a learner’s concerns, Catalyze Labs will embark to expand their network of non-profit friends and help the cause to grow.
This app would exist behind the idea that humans want to see good things happen, but not everyone feels empowered to act, knows where to start, or whether their efforts will have any kind of sizable impact. In response to the inaction, we propose a means and an incentive, to activate this enormous pool of latent but well-intentioned capital, enabling people to take their money, time, or ideas and channel them into something powerful that can do the good work they believe in.
From this process of activation through education, we feel we can show people how they can explore the world, and make it better.
Feel free to visit our fund-raising website and view a short clip.
Thank you!
From this process of activation through education, we feel we can show people how they can explore the world, and make it better.
Feel free to visit our fund-raising website and view a short clip.
Thank you!
We are pleased to announce that we have, since the creation of this blog, returned to the United States and are no longer actively gathering information or pursuing research abroad.
We thank all those who helped realize this expedition.
Stay tuned for more blog posts, as we continue to post-process the photography we captured along the way.
We thank all those who helped realize this expedition.
Stay tuned for more blog posts, as we continue to post-process the photography we captured along the way.
The Players
Thomas Pun-loving, tree-hugging, film-watching, photo-snapping, word-smithing, flaw-riddled, family-minded, food-savoring, book-worming, wonder-seeking, backpacking, blog-writing, quote-swapping, life-loving, hope-filled wanderer.
Although most of his wanderings been the musings and mental meanderings in the search for truth, beauty, freedom, and love. Thomas was born in the Beloit, WI and relocated to the Pacific Northwest in 2010. He worked his way from a lobby-level coffee stand to the 30th floor of a Seattle business tower with an international wealth management firm before trading in his suit for a suitcase. Philosophy, beauty, and goodness are his pursuits. His hopes are to improve the state of the human race (even a small piece of it) and perhaps even improve his own character during the process. "The greatest thing you'll ever ever learn is just to love, and be loved in return." eden ahbez |
Daniel "I am an illuminating ARTIST
with a divinely unique gift of perception & expression... STRIVING to awaken awareness & inspire harmony by connecting the observation, appreciation & preservation of God's natural perfection in a CELEBRATION of CREATION." Daniel feels one of the underlying problems with society today is that we are unnaturally detached & temporally distracted --trapped in a lifeless synthetic environment with little thought of the divine. He strongly feels we can become more completely whole when nourished by nature and the higher power that placed us here (whatever power we may feel that is). He hopes to assist in re-connecting individuals with the limitless wonders of this incredible world around us and hope to do so by offering them a connection via two primary tools: his images & his gardens. "Inevitably, one day, we have to stand up right upon the edge of the cliff of Life, stop thinking and surrender ourselves to the flow of our own quest." Frédéric Rey |
CEO SaraJoy PondWinning BYU’s Social Venture Competition in 2009 launched SaraJoy into a career as a social entrepreneur–a role she never plans to leave. Since building one of the world’s first impact-focused crowdfunding platforms (10,000+ donors and more than $700,000 for social impact projects around the globe) she’s worked on four continents as a professional evaluator, user experience designer, data scientist, curriculum consultant, and university instructor. Catalyze Labs is the brainchild of her efforts. SaraJoy is intensely fond of her road bike, symphonic cello, and stracciatella gelato and detests bad line-breaks, bean soup, and writing her own bio.
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