BU student wins $100,000 for non-profit organization

When Boston University School of Public Health student Katia Gomez started Educate2Envision after spring 2009, her plans were to send school supplies to rural communities in Honduras.

But soon after, Gomez said, she realized the problem was bigger. The children in Pajarillos, one of the villages, had no access to education past the sixth grade.

Through E2E, Gomez said she took it upon herself to establish a high school in Pajarillos. She enlisted 10 students from the village and neighboring communities who passed the sixth grade to create the program.

“We have to bring not only high school, but leadership roles to the community,” Gomez said. “We’re creating a precedent in the community, creating role models. We’re empowering the students so they can feel capable enough to break the mold.”

On August 21, Gomez and E2E won the $100,000 grand prize of VH1’s Do Something! Awards to fund the organization she created.

E2E provided 90 percent on the materials to build the high school and the additional 10 percent came from the government. However, the students’ families did the labor themselves.

“They’re going to have that much more a sense of pride and accomplishment,” Gomez said.

DoSomething.com is the largest organization in the U.S. for teens and social change, said Business Development Manager, Baylee Greenberg. Founded in 1996, the Do Something! Awards give young adults the opportunity to apply for grant money to support their causes.

“The really exciting part about Do Something is its wide range of causes,” Greenberg said. “We want to get young people to take action. The awards are given to young people who are doing work and bettering communities.”

Gomez founded E2E in 2010, gathering most of the donations from on-campus bake sales and personal money from her five-person student team.

“When I started E2E, it was the first time in my life that I saw something that I will be 100 percent dedicated to,” Gomez said. “I’m in this for long haul. It’s not a fad. These are people’s lives I’m working for. It’s going to be my life’s work.”

E2E sponsors 80 percent of a student’s school tuition for the first year in high school. If the student shows commitment and continues after a year, E2E pays it in full.

“It only takes $50 per year for one student to attend high school, which is a very reasonable price,” Gomez said.

After the high school was established, Gomez said she saw incredible changes in the community. Enrollment in primary school doubled, adolescent pregnancy rates went down and parents began to see the benefits of schooling.

“It’s great because there’s need there,” Gomez said. “No one else in these areas work in education. We aren’t overlapping with other organizations.”

Gomez and the E2E team went to Honduras this summer for a month and a half to help develop the leadership workshop to empower young girls and teach older girls to be role models.

Financial struggles were also a problem in the past, Gomez said, but with the Do Something! Award, things are turning around.

E2E focuses on three communities and more than 1,000 people. With the grant money, they plan to reach out to 30 communities and more than 5,000 first-generation high school students and buy the first official E2E car, Gomez said.

“We loved that Katia’s passion is so tangible, but she still really thinks through it,” Greenberg said. “She thinks strategically. You can have a grand idea about students and getting them into a school, but Katia planned things carefully.”