Project Heart was created by the OtterCares Foundation, a nonprofit located in Fort Collins, Colo., that focuses on inspiring students to become entrepreneurs and philanthropists who create lasting and impactful change in their communities. Since 2009, we have equipped kids, classrooms and communities to recognize their true potential to make a difference.
Over a Decade of Impact
Project Heart started as an idea that we knew had the power to create lasting and impactful change in the hearts and minds of young people by helping to unleash the philanthropist in K-12 students. Formalized as a 10-lesson curriculum in 2010, Project Heart was adopted by elementary schools across the country and around the world. Recognizing a gap in middle and high school grades, the content was scaled to meet the needs of upper grade students in 2016 and 2017 and a fully digital platform launched in the winter of 2019.
Today, we have crafted Project Heart to be an open-source philanthropy education framework that provides K-12 educators with high quality resources designed to unleash the maker, doer and giver inside of their students. We encourage traditional classroom educators, after-school youth education leaders and others to take the free content available and make it their own, bringing the power of these resources to life in any unique learning environment.