Irish Projects We Love #1: ChangeX

07/06/2016

 

 

 

"I’m a long-time supporter of and believer in the power of grassroots movements and ChangeX has the potential to really accelerate their growth and impact and that’s important for the world” Jerry Greenfield, Co-founder, Ben & Jerry’s.

 

All around the world, we see some amazing community projects doing their bit to make the world a little bit sweeter. At Ben & Jerry’s, we’re all about positive change, so we want to shine our spoons on one project that caught our eye recently, introducing ChangeX!

 

What is ChangeX?

ChangeX is a global platform that makes it easier for people to access proven ideas that will help them improve their local community.

 

ChangeX began in Dublin, Ireland, when its founder, Paul O’Hara, decided to tackle some of the social challenges in his own local community. Through his work with some of our friends at Ashoka (a global network of social entrepreneurs), O’Hara was aware that many of the solutions to society’s greatest challenges existed already, but the difficulty was in making these solutions work for different communities around the world. Sometimes social entrepreneurs and changemakers find it hard to make the kind of impact they set out to locally. Paul O’Hara decided to make the process more effective and more efficient, so he created ChangeX as a global platform, to make it easier for local communities to access ideas that can create positive change!

 

What do they do?

This platform of proven ideas allows people to discover really clever, successful, community-changing ideas from all around the world. Communities and individuals are provided with all the information and support they need to get these ideas up and running in their local area.

 

ChangeX provids local changemakers with with a step-by-step-guide on how to get something started whatever their interest: health, education, inclusion, or the environment. ChangeX guides them through the process, connecting community leaders with a "change buddy", someone who knows what they are doing because they have set up the same idea before!

 

Why are they important?

Most importantly, ChangeX provides a whole network of people who also care about their communities  and want to see positive changes made around the world. ChangeX makes improving communities a shared experience allowing changemakers to share and learn from each other. In this way, ChangeX strives to create a bigger impact, bringing people together to make great things happen.

 

Who have they helped?

Here’s a list of some of the great initiatives ChangeX has partnered with to help communities around Ireland…

 

CoderDojo, a Ben & Jerry’s Join Our Core winner, is a global network of free, volunteer-led, community based coding clubs for children aged between 7 and 17. At CoderDojos young people learn how to code, develop websites, apps, games and more, in a social, collaborative learning environment.

 

FoodCloud, also a previous winner of Join Our Core, connects businesses that have too much food to charities in their community that need food through an app and website. Through its community Food Rescue Project, FoodCloud aims to help communities across Ireland ensure that no good food goes to waste where people are going hungry.

 

Wheelmap empowers mobility-impaired people to find accessible places like restaurants, concert venues or cinemas in your community. With a web and mobile app and an easy to use traffic light system, you can mark places on the map and add information about the accessibility of that place!

 

For more information on ChangeX or to find a project to get involved in visit their website here.