Payton Clark, assistant news editor
With the help of Enactus, girls really can run the world.
OBU’s chapter of Enactus, or “Entrepreneurs, Action, and Us” was recently awarded the Women’s Empowerment Grant from the national Enactus organization to help local women and their economic endeavors. The $1,250 grant will be used in cooperation with the local organization Project Safe.
“We have been working with Project Safe for four years now and are excited to work with these women,” Enactus president and senior Chase Lanphear said. “We hope to play a small part in encouraging them to pursue sustainable success.”
According to Lanphear, the Women’s Empowerment Grant from the national Enactus organization is used to help women achieve economic success.
“We received a $1,250 [funded by] Wal-Mart to help women in who are looking into starting social enterprises or in need of being helped by one,” Lanphear said.
Chief marketing officer and sophomore Isabella Scarinzi said OBU’s Enactus received the grant due to their established work with helping women economically.
“This grant is given out to teams that will empower female entrepreneurs in local community to create or improve a business plan and provide skills training, mentorship and resources that will offer a firm foundation as women launch their business or enable women to improve an existing struggling business,” Scarinzi said.
OBU’s chapter of Enactus competed against other chapters to receive the grant, which will help to continue their mission of serving the community economically.
“Enactus is a global, competitive team found on many university campuses,” Scarinzi said. “The team’s goal is to empower people to trans- form opportunities into real, sustainable progress for themselves and their communities through entrepreneurial-based projects.”
Scarinzi, the project leader for Project Safe, says Enactus will be us- ing the money from the Women’s Empowerment Grant to help the local organization.
Project Safe houses abused women porting costs for these women and are looking into the possibility of conducting a leadership seminar with the women where they can make their own five-year plan to give them an opportunity for hope,” Lanphear said.
Scarinzi is eager to being work with the new grant and to continue helping local women in the OBU area.
“It’s a great opportunity for us to approach the goal of women’s empowerment with enough resource to do everything that we are planning on,” Scarinzi said.
“Our expectancy is for this project to ultimately give those women from Project Safe financial independency so they won’t feel obligated to return to a situation of domestic violence.”
“Our partnership with Project Safe has been going on for about four years now,” Scarinzi said. “We’ve been able to serve them in many different ways, but this year, we are seeking to empower the women that stay at the shelter so they don’t feel the need to go back to abusive relationships.”
Enactus will interview women at Project Safe to provide them with further assistance.
“We are planning to apply the grant by interviewing domestic violence victims at the Project Safe Shelter,” Lanphear said. “We hope to understand their needs through these interviews and look into providing job training, resume building, and interview skills so that these women are not dependent on abusive situations.”
Specifically, the grant will help fund training for the women of Project Safe to obtain their own jobs.
“Because a lot of those women do not have jobs, our grant will help us provide them adequate training for job preparedness and soft-skill building,” Scarinzi said. “We want to host a leadership and professionalism seminar and work individually with those ladies in resume building and basic technology knowledge.”
The money from the grant will also be used to directly fund projects with the women of Project Safe, such as seminars and assisting them in their own economic activities.
“We will also put some of the money into transporting costs for these women and are looking into the possibility of conducting a leadership seminar with the women where they can make their own five-year plan to give them an opportunity for hope,” Lanphear said.
Scarinzi is eager to being work with the new grant and to continue helping local women in the OBU area.
“It’s a great opportunity for us to approach the goal of women’s empowerment with enough resource to do everything that we are planning on,” Scarinzi said.
“Our expectancy is for this project to ultimately give those women from Project Safe financial independency so they won’t feel obligated to return to a situation of domestic violence.”
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