about
About The Pure Project:
In December of 2015, I was working for the nonprofit Empower2Play managing college and post-graduate interns, coordinating event and social media schedules, designing and executing marketing strategies etc. Although I believed in their cause empower children via sports, I was introduced, by a school friend, to the Haitian water crisis. My friend initially approached me for a bit of graphic design help for a single fundraiser to send LifeStraws to Haiti. As I learned more about the water crisis in Haiti, my passion for this issue snowballed. Clean water is a fundamental resource and its effects are felt far beyond any populations physiological health. It affects economic development, women’s rights, safety and opportunities, violent regional conflicts, religious and cultural distributions, and so much more. After much research, I determined that clean water solution with the maximum potential impact was through two parts: (1) sanitation education, and (2) biosand filters. So we scrapped the LifeStraws idea and decided this was going to be much bigger than a one-time fundraiser. At the time, I was working closely with the founder and CEO of Empower2Play, who began to mentor me over the winter months on running a nonprofit and how to apply for 501(c)3 status. With little to no help myself, the friend who originally approached me, and another passionate new recruit embarked on the year long journey that was the official 501(c)3 nonprofit: The Pure Project by S.A.M. inc.
TEAM
At the time of filing for 501(c)3 status, none of us were 18 and officially speaking only one of us could be on the official The Pure Project by S.A.M. inc. board. Ashley Achin, who had the original idea for a LifeStraws fundraiser, served as the CEO. I was the unofficial COO. Meredith Butler was our unofficial CFO. We also had a high school ambassador program with 10+ students across the Tampa Bay area and managed 20+ volunteers.
