The School of Environmental Leadership wanted to establish a system for raising funds and tracking donations. We recommended using open source CIVI CRM integration in the website. This allows theSEL to raise $11,343 the first year, and roughly $130,000 over the first three years of this new organization’s life.

The School of Environmental Leadership is a group of parents who wanted a different kind of education option within their public schools. This resulted in Marin School of Environmental Leadership (a school within the public Terra Linda High School) which focuses on project based learning, leadership roles, and integrated curriculum.

In order to start up the school in 12 months, theSEL needed a system that would be able to track the supporters of the idea, communicate with the supporters, track donations, sell tickets, run campaigns, and manage peer-to-peer communication.

Oakgrounds formed a task force with GystMedia and built website theSEL.org.  Eventually CIVI CRM was selected and integrated into the new website. This partnership allows for quick execution of the concept (3 weeks), its implementation and training of the volunteers. We continued the training and expanded the reach to include social media.  Within 12 weeks, the new site was well on its way to raise its first $100,000. Well within 18 months, in August 2011, the Marin School of Environmental Leadership opened its door to the first students.

The School of Environmental Leadership shows how a vision, with the right technology and social media mix, can create a social force to change the public education system from within.  Oakgrounds and GystMedia are proud to play a role in this process.