In 2017, Ray’s crypto business was gaining traction worldwide, largely due to the explosion of crypto adoption in Africa that he had driven. His company, Paxful, was making a lot of money and he’d already decided that his business model would include “giving back” – so he looked for projects in Africa that needed funding. While scrolling through Instagram one day, he read about “Education is Life” in Rwanda and contacted the organizers.
Ray approved funding for a school, a water well, and an irrigation system. Two months later the main infrastructure for the school was built, and Ray and some of his team were able to visit and check the progress of the entire project. They even helped to dig the well and the irrigation system while they were there.
On completion of the project, the district received a new 3 classroom nursery education center, 4 restrooms with a potable water irrigation system, a 35,000-liter water tank, a garden, and a children’s playground.
After the school was built, Ray said, “This is a win-win every which way because every penny we put here is not just going to help those kids. It’s actually going to build up to something that is greater than the sum of its parts. We are not just building a school here or a well there – we are building the parts of a system that is going to generate wealth into the future.”