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In 2004, LiNK was formed with the hope of spreading awareness and effecting change. The organization quickly grew and became a movement of activists empowered by the stories of refugees and motivated by the urgency of the issue. LiNK’s work focuses on awareness through mobilizing the grassroots and telling these stories of hope and survival. LiNK meets with governments, NGOs and institutions to advocate for the North Korean people, while working directly with refugees through a network of shelters in China and Southeast Asia – protecting, educating and assisting them to eventually find freedom and empower them to live new lives.

LiNK focuses on three areas of action to improve the plight of North Korean refugees: The Movement, The Underground and The Transition.

The Movement

This arm of LiNK seeks to raise awareness of the issues facing North Koreans within their own country and the risks of defecting. They provide direct outlets for people to get involved—volunteers are encouraged to host tours of documentaries, starting chapters on their college campuses, and contacting elected officials and the media to spread information.

The Underground

Beyond raising awareness about refugees, LiNK’s efforts bring them in direct contact with North Koreans. The organization maintains a network of safe houses for refugees, aids with acculturation by providing resources to learn additional languages and employment skills, and provides medical care and counseling.

The Transition

LiNK’s transition programs include helping refugees learn new languages, obtain jobs or education, and providing financial assistance through micro-loans and scholarships. LiNK staff members also serve as translators for resettled North Koreans whenever possible.

The Hundred

LiNK is working to help 100 refugees escape North Korea. They need to raise $50,000 dollars to do so. That may sound like a lot, but if you think of the incredible amount of logistics and planning that goes into this kind of endevour, in addition to the support and structure after the fact – it’s very little. Please take some time to look at the work that they’re doing. It’s remarkable and fascinating, and it deserves our attention.

Their Shop

I’m obviously a sucker for tshirts and cool design – check this sucker out. (For you youngsters or oldsters – it’s a play on RUN DMC). Definite opportunities for xmas presents. I love when organizations get great design involved – it’s hard to be excited about wearing a polo shirt with a brush stroke person icon on it.

(Image: Brown pelicans off Morro Bay, California. Credit: mikebaird/Flickr through a Creative Commons license.)

Founded in 1951, The Nature Conservancy is a conservation organization working globally to protect ecologically important lands and waters for nature and people. With a membership more than 1 million strong, The Nature Conservancy has worked to save habitats such as grasslands, rivers, and coral reefs while also addressing threats to conservation such as climate change, fire, and invasive species.

The Nature Conservancy utilizes a science-based approach that determines where to work, what to conserve and what strategies will be best to meet their goals. With plant and animal species disappearing at alarming rates, the Conservancy is working to conserve “enough of everything,” such as habitat types, not just endangered species. Employing over 700 staff scientists, the Nature Conservancy’s action goes far beyond the lobbying for conservation they do with other groups—the Conservancy develops innovative conservation approaches and gets citizens invested in their own area’s biodiversity through community restoration.

“…we believe the needs of people and nature can coexist, and through sound science, diverse partnerships and careful compromise, balance can be restored,” explains President and CEO Mark Tercek. “With a global, ecosystem-based approach to conservation honed over nearly 60 years, The Nature Conservancy understands that to have maximum impact at one spot on the globe, you must understand its place in the whole. And that ability to be big and small at the same time is, I contend, The Nature Conservancy’s great strength.”

Water and Forest Producers Program

This initiative was designed to help protect the freshwater supply for Rio de Janeiro. Launched in Rio Claro, located on the Guandu River watershed, this program compensates rural landowners for the forest restoration work they do, which in turn protects the freshwater resources. The watershed provides about 80% of the fresh water and generates about 25% of the electicity used by residents of the Rio de Janeiro metropolitan area. By planting trees, which hold water and help minimize erosion, sediment and nutrients stay on land and out of the rivers. Landowners who plant are rewarded for doing so with payments from the water-dependent utilities and industries in the area.
Since May, 18 rural landowners have enrolled in the program and are receiving payment for their forestation efforts.

Seagrass Restoration

In the early 1930s, a noxious slime mold and the powerful Chesapeake-Potomac Hurricane combined to devastate seagrass meadows in Virginia’s coastal bays. While sea grasses did regenerate in the Chesapeake Bay, they never returned to Virginia’s other coastal bays. Over the last ten years, the Nature Conservancy has aimed to regenerate the seagrass.

• More than 100 volunteers spread the grass seeds shoots throughout the bays.
• 23 million seeds and shoots have been planted across 200 acres.
• The South, Spider Crab, Hog Island and Cobb Island Bays now support this seagrass.

Invisible Children is my favorite kind of organization Created by three filmmakers in 2003, they use film to bring attention to the war in Northern Uganda. Lots of people head to africa and make documentaries. Don’t get me wrong, that’s good work and we want to encourage it. But these guys go a step further. The now tour the United States sharing their films and raising awareness.

“We are story tellers. We make documentaries about war-affected children in east Africa and tour them around the world.

We use the power of media to inspire young people to help end the longest running war in Africa. Our model has proven effective, and hundreds of thousands of people have been called to action through our films and the volunteers that tour them. “

That alone would be incredible, but they don’t stop there. They’ve leveraged their storytelling success to do on the ground development work. Working directly with a 95% Ugandan workforce, Invisible Children rebuilds schools, emptied mentors, provided 690 scholarships, and implemented a series of micro-economic initiatives.

The Visible Child Scholarship Program

The VCSP directly provides scholarships to 585 secondary and 180 university students in Uganda. It develops leadership and life skills. The program targets youth facing some daunting challenges. Special consideration is given to orphans, heads of household, kids living with HIV and aids, and child mothers.

Some stats from their website

Secondary Student Stats
• 45% of students are girls; 55% are boys
• 91% of students are orphans—44.9% being partial orphans and 46.1% beingtotal orphans
• 26.1% of students are orphans because of HIV/AIDS
• 23.9% of students are orphans due to war
• 5.5% of students are members of child-headed families
• 4.3% of students are child mothers
• 13.7% of students have been abducted by the LRA at least once *as of 2008

Schools For Schools

The Schools for Schools program is Invisible Children’s initiative to help develop education initiatives within Uganda. Schools in the united States raise money and compete for an opportunity to send a student to their sister school in Uganda. It’s more than just a simple exchange program. The money raised goes to some cutting edge technology and development strategies. From interlocking soil stabilizing blocks, to traumatic war counseling, the IC team has done a remarkable job taking development initiatives to the next level.