Seeds of Change: Glasswing receives a Starbucks Foundation Origin Grant to empower 1,000 girls and women in Costa Rica

Published on March 8, 2024 by Glasswing

Glasswing has been awarded a 2024 Origin Grant from the Starbucks Foundation!

With this grant, Glasswing will be able to increase our efforts to uplift women and girls in Costa Rica through our “Seeds of Change” program. We will provide 1,000 girls and women with spaces for personal development. In the process, we will help strengthen their leadership and economic opportunities.

We aim to positively change community attitudes and behaviors around gender. Female coffee farmers in Costa Rica earn 40% less than their male counterparts. By supporting women in Costa Rica’s coffee-growing regions, Glasswing hopes to offset this gap in gender inequality and shift gender paradigms. 

As a result of this grant, women, girls, and community members will engage with, learn from, and grow alongside each other. That is certainly something worth celebrating this #InternationalWomensDay and #WomensHistoryMonth.

Cultivating Seeds of Change

Seeds of Change will work with girls and women in the Los Santos Zone in southern-central Costa Rica. Initiatives will include:

• Glasswing Girls Club
• Volunteer mentor training
• Parent and caretaker workshops
• Leadership workshops
• Entrepreneurship training

Girls ages 9-18 will participate in workshops where they will develop their decision-making skills and their understanding of themselves as catalysts of change. Local community leaders will have the opportunity to serve as role models. They will participate in training sessions that cover topics such as female leadership and mental health. Workshops and training programs will empower women in the communities by providing them with entrepreneurial advice and enhancing their soft skills. And parents and caretakers will have the space to openly discuss gender-based violence and techniques for improving well-being.

Origins of opportunity

Starbucks Origin Grants champion and foster opportunities for women in coffee-, tea-, and cocoa-growing communities. Glasswing is one of 10 grant recipients in 2024, for a collective impact reaching over 19,000 women. In 2018, Starbucks set a goal to empower 250,000 women in these communities by 2025. They met that goal in 2022 and now have a new one: one million women by 2030.

Laura Sequeira, Glasswing’s Country Director in Costa Rica, said:

“We are honored to partner with the Starbucks Foundation on the Seeds of Change Project, which aims to create safe spaces and personal development opportunities for girls and women. We believe that investing in women’s development has a multiplier effect and benefits entire communities. By involving the whole family in the learning process, we strengthen the leadership and economic opportunities for women in communities. We sincerely thank The Starbucks Foundation for their support and trust in the potential of these girls and women. Together, we are committed to promoting positive change in gender paradigms.”

We would like to thank the Starbucks Foundation for partnering with us in planting our “Seeds of Change.” And we would like to congratulate our Glasswing family in Costa Rica for embarking on this new chapter!

To learn more about Starbucks 2024 Origins Grants for Costa Rica, see their announcement “Empowerment in Communities and Equal Opportunity: Starbucks Commemorates International Women’s Day.”