Today’s youth are tomorrow’s leaders. Students of the Hill Spring International School, Mumbai lived up to this phrase when they partnered with Habitat for Humanity India. 68 students from grades 8, 9 and 11 volunteered to provide water wheels for women living in rural Maharashtra. The students started a crowdfunding campaign on a web portal Fuel A Dream. The 30-day crowdfunding campaign had each student voluntarily engaging in advocacy and fundraising, reaching out to friends, families, parents and school faculties. The campaign ended up collecting INR 34,04,815 overachieving the goal of INR 13,60,000. The funds raised will be used to provide over 1000 families with
water wheels in Nagpur, Yavatmal and Nanded district. This will ensure ease of access to water for the families and will ease the burden off women and girls.

“Our goal is to create change-makers and leaders who will make a difference to the community. Crowdfunding allows them to do that. The initiative to provide water wheels to women in rural Maharashtra is something that has a clear and tangible outcome. Our students were aligned to the cause and used crowdfunding to make a massive social impact,” says Nalini Pinto, Principal, Hill Spring International School, Mumbai.

“Women in rural Maharashtra walk several miles daily carrying pots of water. I took part in Habitat for Humanity India’s Water Wheels campaign to help bring a change in their lives. I definitely did not anticipate that I would raise this much. But I am glad that over 150 women will be supported through this campaign. I would love to take this up in the future too,” says Neysa Shivedansani, an 8th grade student. She topped the leaderboard by
raising INR 3,83,100 - the highest amount raised by a student in the campaign.

“Advocating for the Water Wheels has made me realize how fortunate I am. I was moved by how every person I spoke to acted with such a sense of responsibility and compassion. It is so empowering to know that even as children we can contribute to the greater good now,” says Veda Sanghviwho raised INR 2,42,100.

“Crowdfunding for Habitat for Humanity was a lot of fun and I learned a lot. I was really happy to contribute to a good cause. It was joyful to see how people had many questions and wanted to help with the cause. In the end,
I crossed my goal by a big margin and it felt really good,” says Shiveka Jain, who raised INR 1,63,000.