The Giving Exchange: Hope in Action Gala
By Sameed Marco, Federica Fregola, and Eliza Khan, DEIB Director and Staff Writers
Blueprint Photos by Sameed Marco
The Giving Exchange (TGE) hosted their annual gala, The Giving Exchange: Hope in Action, in partnership with the Inspire Girls Foundation (IGF) to fundraise for their cause and thank their supporters on Oct. 30 at The Clubhouse at Boundary Oak in Walnut Creek. Approximately 200 people from various nonprofit organizations as well as donors and supporters attended the gala, which featured a reception, silent and live auctions, various activities, dinner, a paddle raise, and speeches from speakers Lilian Biira and Brian Munaita.
Founded in 2013, TGE is a nonprofit focused on implementing projects in underprivileged communities. The organization partners with these communities to introduce programs focused on areas like clean energy, education, and skill training. While the organization is based in Walnut Creek, they primarily operate internationally.
The 2025 gala also highlighted the IGF, a nonprofit that works to provide resources and experiences for women’s empowerment. IGF founder Biira founded the organization after she was inspired by witnessing mistreatment of girls and young women.
“Growing up seeing how young girls were silenced, treated as brides, forced into early marriage, it kept on hurting me a lot,” Biira said. “And I knew I had to do something. I need to be the voice of these girls who can't talk, who are always silenced. I need to be a role model to them so that they can also do it, they can make it in life, they can stand up on their own.”
TGE also held a virtual alternative to the gala on Oct. 28 where they led a conversation about their cause for a farther-reaching audience.
“[TGE] draws in people from all over the world, and if there are people who can't get out or couldn't attend on the day of the in-person event, they had an additional opportunity to participate in this event virtually,” TGE volunteer Ann Mimiaga said.
TGE works to improve the economic and social conditions of under-resourced communities, particularly in Eastern African countries like Kenya, Uganda, and Zimbabwe. These countries had colonial influences that led to the circumstances that TGE attempts to address.
“The British and their ‘international’ companies pushed into Kenya and Uganda,” U.S. history and Ethnic studies teacher Brian Smith said. “This put them under the yoke of British law and economic policies [and from other countries]. This led to a depletion of resources and a disruption of local government.”
As an organization, TGE invests all of the donations they receive directly into the communities and organizations they help. The organization raises donations several ways, including the annual gala.
“Our commitment as an organization is that 100 percent of each dollar donated goes directly towards the project,” TGE Head Trainer Munaita said. “We have angel donors who cater to our operational costs so we don't touch any of the donated money. That has really enabled us to multiply our impact. This year we’re celebrating 70,000 lives touched.”
Many nonprofit and charity groups like TGE attempt to address the issue of how countries and people who benefited from colonialism can assist communities that were negatively impacted. When talking about these issues, the language people use becomes very important.
“We can look at the circumstances that led to that poverty and take accountability and look for problem-specific remedies for each country or region,” Smith said “We can also frame the conversation in a way that isn't making people/regions seem like less than and objects to pity, but people with value equal to our own.”
While TGE does receive donations that go directly to the communities they help, they also work on implementing self-sustaining projects and skills within communities to foster financial stability in the long term.
“The difference between having a good sustainable business that is able to support itself without depending on a lot of donations and a project that is wholly dependent on donations is business education, or what we call business development skilling in East Africa,” Munaita said. [Business development skilling] is done to these leaders to enable them to create income streams and learn financial management practices that allow them to both make profit and also reinvest the profit back into the project.”
The gala is not just a way for the organizations to fundraise, but also to thank their donors and supporters and celebrate the work they have done.
“This ... gala is not just an event to us, but it is a celebration of transformation, a way of thanking the partners and the supporters of TGE for the great work they're doing in the community, and telling them how each dollar, each coin they're giving… [is] restoring hope to these girls, restoring hope to the communities, to the people who had lost hope,” Biira said.
