Soren Harrison from SolSolution on Two Schools, Two Realities, One Building, One Dream

Two groups of students shared the same space, but that’s about all that they shared. One group was full of excited, eager students from high-income families. They had new textbooks and fresh school supplies. They had an attentive and confident teacher, and parents who involved themselves in the educational well-being of their children.  These students went on great field trips and had amazing opportunities, as all kids should.  In short, they were well supported in everything they needed.
The other group of students, too, was full of energetic, eager students, who happened to come from low-income families. They had tattered textbooks and hand-me-down school supplies. Their teacher may have been strong and confident as well, but struggled to educate her students well with the few resources available. Their parents did not have the time or ability to involve themselves in their children’s school lives.  These students didn’t get to enjoy the experiences and opportunities of the kids next door.
Both groups of students did, however, share one other thing: assistant teachers, one of whom was my wife. Christine saw these discrepancies firsthand as she taught classes in both of these schools every day. It broke her heart, and when she came home to tell me about it in the evening, it broke mine, too. We had many impassioned discussions about how clearly unfair the situation was, as well as how widespread the problem really was. By no fault of their own, certain children simply did not have access to the same opportunities, resources, and support structures as their peers. The existence of the “education gap” was unmistakably clear.
The baseline requirements for both schools were identical. They shared the same building, had the same standard classroom hardware, and they paid the same utility bill for both water and electricity. All of those expenses stand for a significant and invariable portion of a schools’ educational budget. With my previous research in new energy technologies, it seemed ridiculous to me that the green innovations we have come up with could not help at all to solve such a pertinent and serious social issue as this education gap.
One morning, after a particularly emotional discussion of this issue the night before, I asked myself, “Why can’t schools spend more money on effective education and less money on electricity? And how can green energy, such as solar power help them do this?” That was the spark that lit the fire in my heart to build SolSolution.
SolSolution’s mission is to simultaneously generate clean, renewable electricity and increase the quality of education in underprivileged schools.
How do we do this?  We install solar panels in low-income schools, and then reinvest what would normally be profits in the school’s educational budgets. SolSolution adapts a proven, for-profit business model as a high-impact, self-sustaining nonprofit. We also provide educational offerings for students that focus on science, technology, engineering, mathematics, as well as green entrepreneurship.  For even greater impact,  we provide professional redevelopment for teachers so that they are comfortable and confident teaching their students these subjects.
SolSolution brings funding and resources to low-income schools across the nation, and solar power to all schools across the nation.  We want to inspire and train today’s students to solve the most pressing problems of tomorrow. Here in Massachusetts, through our programs and our example, we want to equip our students to become the next generation of MassChallenge Finalists.
How can you join SolSolution in achieving its mission today?
Through the end of August 2010, SolSolution is competing in the Pepsi Refresh Project, an online competition in which ideas, projects, and organizations from around the country compete for grant money from Pepsi. The winners are decided entirely by the number of online votes, and SolSolution would like to ask the help of our friends in the MassChallenge community to take us to the top of the leaderboard. We currently have two Massachusetts-based schools on board with us, and the grant money will go directly towards installing solar panels on our first school installation in Dorchester, MA.
All you need to do is visit our voting page for all of the options to vote. You can vote everyday in August using your email address and your phone. That’s two votes per day. Each time you vote, you can also enter our weekly raffle with a grand prize of a sleek Apple iPad to come at the end of the month. The more times you vote, the better chances you have of winning each week! All the information is right on our website.
Thank you for all of your support! We need to get resources to our students and power these schools with solar electricity. We can do that by winning this competition with all of you behind us!
Thank you for your support of SolSolution and clean energy for education.
Dr. Soren Harrison
CEO  & Founder of SolSolution, Inc.