Starting from absolutely nothing but the vision of its founder, Falasha Harrison and a core of dedicated supporters, the KStarr Foundation is a two year-old start-up non-profit organization that seeks to partner with other non-profits serving the Boston community in similar programmatic objectives.
The group took a handful of hopeful and motivated, but at-risk teens, and mentored them, and in some cases their young single mothers, in and out of school, in life skills, self-esteem, college preparedness, and community awareness and organization. The small successes, with improved grades and safe behavior for several teens, should be rewarded and replicated, but this will not be possible without grant support and on-going funding.
The foundation has operated so far with donations from personal and private funding sources, through community fund raising events and the contributions of its founders and friends. KStarr has engaged in all of the above mentioned activities with varying success and numbers during its short existence, and seeks to expand and perfect its model and develop its brand to become a significant player in the field of teen leadership development and support.
Unable to acquire public or private corporate grant support thus far, the foundation has nevertheless been able to serve 15 teens on an ongoing basis thus far.
With funding KStarr hopes to acquire space, computers more office equipment and the ability to serve 50 teens on an on-going basis. Furthermore, we envision branding the model into a replicable module that can be replicated in other cities and states.