The Amazing Megan Parks

Megan Parks recently took on the Appalachian Trail as a way to help contribute to AI. She rallied her family, friends and co-workers to make donation pledges to AI on behalf of her hike. Most of her supporters decided to pledge on a per mile basis and some decided to pledge a lumped sum upon her completion of the 2,181 mile expedition. When it was all said and done, Megan raised nearly $3,000 for AI, created an amazing blog recounting her experience and participated in a challenge that changed her life. Needless to say, we were rather impressed by all this and thought, "what an amazing way to get people involved with our work." We realized that we could take the model that Megan had created and provide it to the rest of our community to garner their support. This is exactly what we have done with the Self-Started Initiatives program.

We must tip our hat to Megan, for she has laid the way for our entire community to get involved with AI on their own terms. Check out her blog to see what an amazing experience she had.

http://ridgelines.wordpress.com/

Haven't Posted In A While

As you may have noticed, it has been a number of months since we last posted anything. Don't fret, we are still very busy finding new ways to get our community more involved in bettering the world we all live in, here at home and abroad. What was originally a project a couple of skiers put together, has become a full fledged 501c(3) non-profit over the past year. Once the IRS declared AI a non-profit, we quickly realized that there are a million things that must be accomplished in order to develop an organization that will withstand the test of time. We have been working tirelessly to put in place a strong infrastructure for AI's continued work. In addition to all the organizational development that has been going on, we have been researching new projects, revamping the website and creating new programs that will allow for you to get more involved in AI's work. When we aren't busy doing all that, we are most likely out on the slopes enjoying the pursuits that bring us all together. Here is a quick overview of what we have been up to since our last post in Nov.

Finished the dining hall at our first project KACH

Launched the AI Back Country Awareness program in Vail, CO

Began a new project in Madagascar in collaboration with Hope For Madagascar and their extraordinary leader Fanja Slyvie Rakotonirina

Raised $1500 at the AI Dive Day fundraiser in Steamboat. The divas voted and decided to donate the funds to a greenhouse project at the Steamboat High School

Began the design phase of our second project in Kenya, The Ruiri Amani Community Home (RACH)

Began collaborating with our partner IPI to create a sustainability plan for our first project KACH

That's the jist of what we have been up to for the past couple months. Lots more to come in the near future.