How Mobile Home Communities Are Adapting for Climate Change

Refugee camps save lives in emergencies – but often refugees languish there for decades. Two columns on programs that allow refugees to live normally in cities, with an ATM card taking the place of a camp.

In an effort to break the cycle of poverty in Memphis, a government organization is using conditional cash transfers, paying students if they earn good grades and adults if they maintain a full-time job.

Most insurance companies avoid insuring poor farmers because the transaction costs are too high, but a non-profit in Kenya created a sustainable way to cover them.

Through the Burbank Senior Artists Colony - a community created by EngAGE - low-income seniors learn how to become artists. The recreational classes hosted by the community keep people feeling phsyically and mentally young, allowing them to focus on recreation instead of financial hardship.

An innovative program by an unusual bank allows low-income people in Cambodia to take out a 15-year fixed mortgage with little or no documentation - contradicting traditional loan assumptions and creating means for some of the country's poorest people to completely change their lives. The bank and its investors are now making a profit, and more than 700 mortgages and building loans have been provided.

In India, many farmers, especially women farmers, have transitioned to organic farming. While it requires a serious set of skills and knowledge, organic farming increases yields and decreases costs by eliminating the need to buy pesticides. The move is both ecological and economical, and the Indian government is trying to spread the solution.

Milwaukee County’s mental health system put more resources in expensive emergency care rather than invest in programs that offer continual care. As a result, Milwaukee County identifies nine solutions from other cities that have had success in repairing mental health systems. Solutions include the ending of reliance on emergency care, expand community support programs, change laws, and supportive housing.

More Than Wheels, a New Hampshire-based non-profit offers an economically stable solution to the high cost of owning a car. The program offers low-cost car loans that go toward the purchase of fuel-efficient vehicles.

For millions of students who could succeed in college, the limiting factor is money. Is it possible to finance higher education the way we finance start-up companies? A company called Lumni uses “human capital contracts” to offer loans for students contingent upon 14 percent of the student's salary for 118 months after graduation. There are risks to this approach and not a lot of years or data available to be sure of its efficacy, but results are promising already—with a default rate under 3 percent.

At a time when university students lack opportunities and financial help to test their innovative business ideas, the Resolution Project supports higher education students who have ideas for socially responsible businesses and charities. Resolution offers small awards to start businesses as well as mentor opportunities that enable networking and business collaboration with experts.