About

At we Edify believe that educating the poor is the greatest opportunity for Christian transformation in the developing world. A young person with book smarts and life skills can create a small business or find employment that will lift his or her family out of poverty; a young person grounded in the Christian faith will develop the moral foundation necessary to transform a culture and remake a society. With a dedication to serving the poor, Edify proposes to increase access to Christian education and improve the quality and relevancy of what's taught in Christian schools.

We direct our attention to the little-known, yet widespread phenomenon of "affordable private schools." In slums and rural hamlets across the world - from Accra, Ghana, to Hyderabad, India, to Lanzhou, China.

The education entrepreneurs, or "edupreneurs," who own these schools charge a very affordable $5 to $15 per month for tuition and provide a surprisingly robust education - often far superior to the government alternative, when one exists. Many of these tiny schools were started by Christians in the community, perhaps a retired schoolteacher or a local pastor.
No matter the differences in geography or context, these schools almost always share the same headaches: a lack of capital for expanding their classrooms and facilities, and a lack of academic and extracurricular resources to provide a strong Christian education for the 21st century.

Reach

Edify's goal is to finance the education of 1 million impoverished children over the next seven years. To achieve this extraordinary outcome, we will need to raise $20 million to make loans to 4,000 schools averaging 250 students each.

Curriculum Information

We aim to solve those challenges by providing loan capital and business training, so the edupreneur can borrow money to expand and run his school more effectively and efficiently. And we intend to help mold future generations of the poor with Biblical principles by working with schools to offer Christian curricula, after-school discipleship programs, entrepreneurship education, and teacher training sessions, among many possibilities.

Program Information

Edify, a non-profit organization registered in the U.S., is focused on delivering 3 key resources to help Christian edupreneurs lift their communities out of poverty:

• Capital to expand facilities at affordable private Christian schools, thereby increasing access to education for the poor.
• Curricula and other tools to strengthen schools' Christian message and training.
• Business and teacher training for proprietors and educators to improve education.

Our efforts are predicated on the fundamental notion that the poor are already finding ingenious ways to help themselves. And among the poor, there are followers of Christ who are blessed with an entrepreneurial spark, a vision for educating their communities, and a desire to share the Gospel with the young. We have the privilege and opportunity to come alongside these Christian edupreneurs and help them achieve spiritual transformation through affordable private education.

Edify depends on the financial generosity of individual donors and private foundations to finance its operations.

Relevant Links

Website: http://www.edify.org/

Annual Report 2010: http://www.edify.org/annual-report-2010