Santa Clara University’s Miller Center for
Social Entrepreneurship
As a mentor for Santa Clara’s Miller Center for Social Enterpreneurship, Susan assists international startups with marketing, communications and leadership strategies that help them get ready for investment. The Center is dedicated to promoting startups around the world that are innovating solutions to the most pressing social problems, such as hunger and inequality. Social entrepreneurship is leading the way to ultimately end poverty.
Artistri Sud is a charitable organization launched in 2009 and based in Montreal, Canada. From there is responds to the needs of craftswomen in developing countries who are trying to access global markets in which to sell their goods and generate income for their families. Susan is a mentor to the companies through the Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship
Through the Miller Center, Susan works with The Harvest Fund, a non-profit social enterprise leveraging technology, finance and training to cultivate independence for marginalized African women in agriculture. The company helps the women farmers, many of whom have already lost children to starvation due to low yields, with:
• Storage that eliminates food loss
• Solar power to gain access to water pumps
• Keeping soil healthy by treating is with carefully selected nutrients that stabilize greenhouse gas emissions while increasing production
• Reinvestment of profits back into Harvest Fund to expand the company’s impact year after year.
Susan supports this non-profit regional press in the midst of California’s Gold Country in Calaveras County as a board member. She works with the group on capacity building and sustainability issues. Sustainability is driven by the pro-forma financials, which also inform capacity building. She has garnered three arts and capacity-building grants for the organization so far in 2022.