!ANNOUNCEMENT!
The ChangeXchange Web site is undergoing a long-awaited revision to improve functionality and ease of use.
~ THE 2012 LAUNCH WILL SUPPORT HATCHLINGS! ~
ChangeXchange for Social Profit
Innovation that transforms communities..
No matter how creative or innovative or strategic we are in developing new kinds of change organizations, without start-up funds, new solutions don't get off the ground. ChangeXchange is a new approach to launching great ideas that create the future we want. It's an online platform that invites community members to help provide seed funds for sustainable change, launched by community members—like you.
RATIONALE
The increase in impact investing is a trend based in human interest in the human condition. While it draws source and strength from financial returns alongside social returns, it is first and foremost a movement of the heart. Recent reports back this up. To read more about impact investing, view the follow reports:
"Investing for Social and Environmental Impact," The Monitor Institute, 2009
Rockefeller Foundation's Announcement on Impact Investing Efforts, January, 2009
"Impact Investments: An Emerging Asset Class," November, 2010
The Global Impact Investing Network provides multiple reports here.
ABOUT
ChangeXchange unites the core values of Springboard Innovation—sustainability, innovation, and community—and provides a true springboard for launchers of social ventures.
ChangeXchange allows anyone, regardless of financial, educational, or social background, to become an investor in positive social change. This means that you can be a key part of the most cutting edge, innovative solutions to challenges in your own community.
Our new online platform introduces emerging and proven social ventures to community members and funding organizations alike to allow them to help fill the biggest gap of innovation—seed funding.
GOALS
(1) Seed-fund sustainable change. ChangeXchange is designed to help seed fund three different projects: 1) new, innovative ideas; 2) the replication of proven ideas into a new location; and, 3) the launch of a new sustaining strategy for proven nonprofits who are struggling to get out of grant dependence. Each project must integrate sustaining strategies into their organizational structure to be listed on ChangeXchange.
(2) Build communities of support. ChangeXchange sets the stage for a new kind of giving that provides authentic investment in the success of an idea, and greater community engagement in the process of growth and impact. Listings will not be typical charities and several unique outcomes will result: 1) investors are connected to Launchers of ideas and their projects through their online spaces called "Roundtables;" 2) Launchers build local connections with the support community; and 3) the capacity of an entire city can be increased when ChangeXchange is combined with Local Agenda, resulting in multiple social innovations.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
ChangeXchange is built on the conceptual framework of a stock exchange, only what's being exchanged is ideas, support, and communication. People invest donations into those ideas they want to see bring to bear the social profit we need. We all have our own share to give. ChangeXchange allows visitors to “invest” shares of their personal assets, however small (individuals or organizations invest their shares in units of $5 ), to increase community capital.
We the people...
The success of ChangeXchange depends on you.
Do we want to get more people involved in change? Do we hope to move our most valuable and critical organizations from the dependence on grants to more sustainable practices? Do we believe it's time for a new way of doing business? The answer must be yes. We need everyone's share to count, now more than ever.
To help, please contact us at Springboard to learn how you can move this idea forward.
“You never change anything by fighting the existing. To change something, build a new model and make the existing obsolete.” -Buckminster Fuller