By Ain CFE Staff

Daphne Pariser ’20 (PhD Candidate in Immunology and Microbiology) founded Humans for Education, an organization that partners with schools in developing nations to create sustainable, culturally-sensitive businesses so they can generate their own income to provide for students’ needs and help build strong communities. As UR student entrepreneurs, Daphne and her team have worked in our Student Incubator since September 2016. After their founding in 2015, they have earned over $45,000 in funding from competition wins, donations, a Farash Foundation grant, in addition to individual contributions. Their enterprise, Humans for Education, officially incorporated in 2016 and is now a federally-recognized non-profit through 501(c)(3) designation.

In addition to their other successes, Humans for Education has competed in many of the Ain Center’s business competitions. Competing against more than twenty strong teams, Daphne and her team finished as semi-finalists in the 2018 Mark Ain Business Plan Competition. They also competed in the 2018 Finger Lakes Regional Contest of the New York Business Plan competition, where the team won the top prize in the Social Entrepreneurship & Non-Profit category. They later went on to beat out teams throughout New York to take home first place in the statewide New York Business Plan Competition and received $10,000 for their winning venture.

As Humans for Education’s founder, Daphne routinely shares her story with anyone who may be interested in using their own talents to make a difference in the world.

Last weekend, Daphne spoke at a TEDx event hosted by Allendale Columbia School in Rochester. There she addressed the idea of using simple solutions to tackle an incredibly complex human problem: poverty. During her presentation, she explained that understanding the data surrounding this problem can help people get to the core of the issue and create solutions that are easy-to-use and sustainable over time.

Daphne and her Humans for Education team have been implementing these solutions, starting with a small school in Kenya. She argues that the success they’ve seen there was only achievable by first listening to the people who were most intimate with the problem and then creating a simple solution. Listen to her whole session below!

To learn more about Humans for Education, visit their website. If you have an idea that you would like to change the world with, contact the Ain Center and we can connect you to the resources you need!