Stone Soup’s programs
are intended to provide a boost to rural communities and the people residing in them.
Stone Soup’s goals are two-fold:
- Capacity-Building: Magnifying the entrepreneurial assets of rural communities: To enhance the abilities of residents to earn a living by training youth and adults in entrepreneurship and applied information technology. Stone Soup offers workshops and opportunities to learn by doing to assist people in making the leap from a fear of computers and computing to an understanding of how information technology can transform their lives.
- Marketing: Opening new economic opportunities: Stone Soup strives to open new markets and economic opportunities that are accessible to all rural entrepreneurs by using technology to reach new customers and to link potential business partners and suppliers. Part of our effort includes educating the public about the ways in which information technology can enhance their economic opportunities.
Stone Soup is working to meet the above goals by offering the following services:
- www.shopthefrontier.org, a web site that connects rural entrepreneurs to urban markets. Launched in November of 2005, www.shopthefrontier.org has already had 400,000 individual visits and 2.5 million hits, with over $22,000 in sales. We have over 90 members from eastern Washington, northern Idaho and Oregon. In addition to providing new markets, the website also provides an opportunity to train entrepreneurs on relevant technology skills and helps rural communities understand that information technology is the key to their economic future.
- Stone Soup provides a free eight week business training course to rural entrepreneurs. At the end of the course graduates are eligible for micro-loans from Stone Soup. We have provided this training to over 100 rural entrepreneurs in Ferry, Okanogan, Lincoln, Stevens, and Island counties. This business training course is based upon curriculum from Washington CASH which has been providing this training in urban communities for ten years.
- Stone Soup recently received a grant from Microsoft to provide free technology training on digital photography, web design and computer basics. The curriculum used for this training is Microsoft’s Unlimited Potential. With this training and thanks to a grant from HP, Stone Soup is opening a Computer Training Center in Republic, WA for our members and other interested community members.
Through these services we are creating a community of entrepreneurs who can learn and network across distance. Our programs break down communication barriers and help these communities realize their dreams of self-sufficiency and success.
