Karma for Cara Foundation awards microgrants to youths 18 years of age and younger who spearhead exceptional service projects in their communities. Microgrant recipient Eve from Minnesota founded Students Making A Difference in November 2016. When she personally witnessed the bullying of peers because of poor hygiene and delved deeper, she realized the breadth & depth of the issue and saw a need. Her project provided hygiene kits to kids who may not have had the essential items available to them. SMAD provided 250+ kits to kids in her community through monthly drop-offs to schools, recovery centers, and Head Start programs.

1. How many volunteers participated in your project? How many hours did it involve? Approximately 15 people have volunteered to help SMAD. 14 of them are from the high school interact club and have volunteered about 15 hours each, through helping selling raffle tickets, putting kits together and helping at fundraising events. One other student volunteer put in approximately 8 hours.
2. What did you learn from this experience?I learned a lot about time management skills, how to put together a budget, how to use spreadsheets better, how to give back to the community, and how to advertise and get the word out in the community. One skill I really struggled with was public speaking, but now I have talked up to 250 people about SMAD.
3. How will your project continue having an impact in the future? It will continue to help each person who receives the hygiene kit, and all the volunteers get a feel of helping their community.
4. Overall, summarize how your project was completed and how you think it went. SMAD is an ongoing project. I hope to bring it to other schools in the county. This may take lots of time and work, but I am prepared to do it!
5. How was the Karma for Cara microgrant helpful in the completion of your project? The K4C microgrant helped SMAD purchase many basic hygiene items like shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, socks and band aids.