Karma for Cara Foundation awards microgrants to youths 18 years of age and younger who spearhead exceptional service projects in their communities. Meet 9-year-old microgrant recipient Grace Lauren from the Philadelphia area. She used her award to purchase new toys to donate to The Child Life, Education and Creative Arts Therapy Department at the Philadelphia Children’s Hospital. Grace worked with her Service Learning Club and created a toy activity box that is now installed in the department.

Karma for Cara Foundation awards microgrants to youths 18 years of age and younger who spearhead exceptional service projects in their communities. A 13-year-old from Summerville, SC, John Michael used his award to give back to members of his community in homeless shelters. His project involved learning how to cook and teaching his peer volunteers how to cook and man the grill. John Michael prepared and distributed full meals for men in a homeless shelter which included a protein, a veggie, and a side dish.

8 year-old microgrant recipient Jaiya used her award to launch Project JPAC (Just to Bring You Joy, Packed with Fun!) which provides ‘Bags of Fun’ for children who are ill in hospitals. JPAC bags contain fun activity items to keep children occupied during hospital visits including crayons, coloring books, stickers, books, colored paper, color pencils, pencils, markers & wrist bands.

Karma for Cara Foundation awards microgrants to youths 18 years of age and younger who spearhead exceptional service projects in their communities. 14-year-old microgrant recipient Leigha from Louisiana wanted to help the Morning Glory Ministries in Kansas City during a National Ministry Convention. Leigha and her group of volunteers served meals and distributed snacks, toiletries & other supplies to homeless youth.

With their award 15 year old microgrant recipients Kyra & Emilia taught art classes to children at LA Family Housing which serves homeless & low-income families in Los Angeles. 

14 year old Abbey used her Karma for Cara microgrant to assemble 65 dental care kits & deliver them to the current residents at Place of Hope Children’s Shelter in Florida. When Abbey was 11, she founded her own non-profit Hygiene for the Hopeful so she had experience with providing dental & other personal care kits to children prior to this project.

Karma for Cara microgrant recipient Sydney (17) & volunteers built a children’s center for fifth through eighth grade children at Life Haven, a shelter for pregnant women and single mothers. Prior to construction, older & younger children co-existed in a space that was often loud and full of toys and commotion.  After construction, the older children have a quiet area to do homework, work on projects, and socialize together. 

Cousins Michael (12), William (9), Christopher (9), and Kevin (7) made care packages for senior citizens with their microgrant. Having previously distributed small packages at the VA center in San Francisco, the boys needed help to produce a larger quantity of packages with more useful items and worked with Meals On Wheels to distribute the packages to seniors.

17 year old microgrant recipient Frishta from Anaheim, CA used her award to facilitate a service day run by youth for youth. The purpose was to provide vital health education to African-American and Latino children in low-income, minority neighborhoods who are overwhelmingly developing diabetes and heart-disease. Local high school students were recruited as volunteers to carry out a free health literacy workshop. Frishta hopes this event will strengthen her community as well as raise awareness around these preventative health issues.

15 year old microgrant recipient Christine from Redmond, WA used her award to create an outreach program for minority groups that are underrepresented in STEM related career fields. Her project missions are to make a science education accessible to everyone regardless of their financial backgrounds and getting more girls involved in STEM. Christine worked with a local Girl Scouts Troop and hosted a free workshop for girls to try STEM experiments in order to educate them and hopefully spark their interest over the long term.