A local organization is doing just that.
Earlier this year a group of 10 women on Oahu started their chapter of The Awesome Foundation. They each donate a hundred dollars and give the money to someone with an idea or project.
"We have the Awesome Foundation website where people go and apply for the donation and it’s a thousand dollars every month for anyone with an awesome idea," said Melissa McGuire, of The Awesome Foundation Oahu. "We are actually looking for a plethora of ideas."
This month’s grant was given to an Oahu woman who lives on the North Shore. Carly Ragragola was inspired by her good friend, Heather, who lost her son to bacterial meningitis five years ago.
Heather lives in Arizona and started the Joyful Life Library as part of a movement to collect books to comfort children who are hospitalized.
"Because she is in Arizona she can only go so far and start so many libraries and so I teamed up with her to get this one started at Kapiolani," Ragragola said.
Ragragola, whose son was born with a heart defect, spent a good amount of time in and out of hospitals including Kapiolani Medical Center. She felt they needed a library and applied for The Awesome Foundation grant and was chosen out of 35 other applicants.
"There’s definitely a need because the children are going in and out and a lot of the books do go home with the kids and so there’s a continual need for new books," Ragragola said.
So far, hundreds of books have been donated to the foundation. Ragragola says the money will go to "more books, lots of books and actually being in Hawaii its important to have multi-cultural books."
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See the original article at: KHON2 Local News
