Software Donations Put Smiles on Children's Faces Across India
The Smile Foundation was founded with the belief that inequality is more than just a social problem for government to solve, and that the key to ending it lies in investing in children and youth. The foundation supports initiatives that empower children and youth through education, healthcare, and market-focused livelihood programs.
So far, more than 200,000 children have directly benefited from the foundation's work, which supports 140 grassroot projects of various sizes across 22 Indian states. The New Delhi-based group operates with a staff of 54.
For a time, employees wrestled with a number of information technology problems that hampered their ability to communicate. A donation of Microsoft SharePoint software, from the BiGTech donation program of NASSCOMM Foundation, a partner of the TechSoup Global Network, transformed the way Smile Foundation's staff works. The foundation was able to create a virtual private network (VPN) tool that provides a free and simpler way of communicating via email and voicemail.
