Rising Stars: Meet Nick Jordan

Today we’d like to introduce you to Nick Jordan.

Hi Nick, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
As an Irish Immigrant, I had worked in the real estate business in Laguna Beach for several years. Through the efforts of a fellow Irishman, I began funding schools in rural villages in Uganda. As a former schoolteacher, I was led to visit one of the schools that I had funded in honor of my late sister. While there, I noticed there were no girls in the classrooms. I was saddened to see that their primary role, along with the women, was to spend the majority of their days walking over 3 miles each way to fetch and haul water procured from ponds, groundwater, and other infected sources back to their communities. I quickly recognized that lack of clean water was the taproot of poverty. I felt led to spend my efforts creating clean water, sanitation and hygiene training for these rural communities who lacked the basic resource of clean water. I founded Wells of Life in 2011 and set a goal of funding 1,000 wells in the next ten years. With very humble beginnings, God introduced many supporters, including donors, future board members, staff and the means to create a healthy Non-profit Orange County as well as a full staff with NGO status in Uganda.

Currently, our office is in San Juan Capistrano, and we have created a standard of sustainability unmatched by most water organizations. Our commitment is to stay locally engaged in the communities in which we are working and share our best practices with other water organizations to play our part in solving the world water crisis in our lifetime.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
If I knew then what I know now, I’m not sure I would have made such a bold and audacious goal. The reality is that only 6% of all America’s philanthropy is directed toward foreign aid. Non-profits working in Africa face an uphill battle in bringing the harsh reality of life without access to clean water to people who have an endless supply waiting in their faucets. Developing relationships with donors, creating a sustainable donor model, and addressing the needs of a billion people was overwhelming to say the least. This is why we focused only on Uganda, to ensure we were creating sustainable water resources as well as able to assure our donors that their water well would continue to work for 25 years. Building a staff three continents away required many visits to Uganda, as well as creating our NGO status there. Maintaining long-term relationships with Legacy Donors, who fund the cost of running a business, has been key in keeping the cost of drilling wells at an affordable price of $8,000.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Wells of Life, Inc. We are a Non-profit Christian organization who brings clean water along with sanitation and hygiene training to rural communities in Uganda.

We set up our own NGO entity in Uganda with a full staff. We do the work ourselves to ensure the highest quality product and sustainability.

We believe our sustainability sets us apart from other water organizations. We focused our attention on the poorest served district in Uganda (access was only 36%). This allows us to create a scalable model for ourselves and other water organizations to utilize in other districts and surrounding countries.

We also engage our local community through an annual event, educating them on the water poverty in Uganda and how they can each make a difference. We are forming the heart of giving and awareness among our youth and partnering them with schools, churches and businesses to create family and community-wide efforts to solve the world water crisis.

For every well we drill, we also rehabilitate an abandoned well. This way, past efforts are not wasted.

What’s next?
We have been developing a capital campaign to build a Visitor and Training Center in Uganda. This will allow donors, schools and other Non-profits to visit, learn and work from, and further empower the impoverished communities to become self-sustainable. Our model in the United States is to expand to multiple states. Once we have secured Uganda, we plan to move to other countries experiencing water poverty.

Pricing:

• New Well – $8,000
• Rehabilitated Well – $4,000
• Healthy Village Educational Program – $8,000

Contact Info:

• Website: www.WellsOfLife.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thewellsoflife
• Youtube: @wellsoflife5088

Image Credits
Adrian Laurentiu