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Alex Palmer, a senior at Greenwich High School, founded GreenCardinal DAO to give to local charities while utilizing global technology. The organization’s slogan is “Think globally, act locally.”
Alex Palmer, a senior at Greenwich High School, founded GreenCardinal DAO to give to local charities while utilizing global technology. The organization’s slogan is “Think globally, act locally.”
GREENWICH — Greenwich High School senior Alex Palmer hopes people worldwide will donate to charities in and around town — and he created a way to make it happen using cutting-edge technology.
The organization Palmer created, GreenCardinal DAO, which he describes as “supercharged crowdfunding,” is the product of his love for philanthropic organizations and interest in cryptocurrency.
Palmer’s idea began when he was working on his eighth-grade capstone project.
“My project was bees and why they’re dying at alarming rates. So, I feel like that’s what spurred my interest,” he said. “I thought there are some ways that I could probably give back to community related to this.”
Palmer became involved in the Greenwich Land Trust and the Save the Bees club at school, and he founded a biology club.
“What I wanted to do was something that can raise money,” he said. “I didn’t really want to do something traditional because I feel like it wouldn’t get any traction.”
In 2021, Palmer became interested in cryptocurrency, or digital money, and learned about DAOs, a model used by for-profit organizations nationwide and a few charitable groups like his. The DAO, or decentralized autonomous organization, has rules at its structure but no main authority. The community works together to approve new members, who give digital money to join, and propose initiatives.
He contacted Upstream , a DAO-creation platform, and the company helped him bring GreenCardinal to the web.
He named his creation GreenCardinal DAO, pulling together his eco-friendly purpose and the Greenwich High School mascot: a cardinal.
Palmer registered the organization as a limited liability company in Wyoming, a state compatible with cryptocurrency-based filing. He said he wanted to file as a nonprofit, but it was too difficult with the cryptocurrency medium.
GreenCardinal DAO launched at the end of August and has a few members. Palmer can’t contribute yet because he is a few months shy of 18, when he will be old enough to purchase cryptocurrency.
“Partially, it’s experimental, just to see if this works. I thought it was a cool passion project that I could do,” he said. “But I think honestly, it could build into something really big, really quickly, just based on what I’ve seen with other examples.”
Palmer looks to the success of the trailblazing nonprofit Big Green DAO, which gained attention quickly, as inspiration. He recently began creating social media platforms and a website located at greencardinaldao.com as part of his plan.
His next goal is to provide a list of 20 organizations that will accept grants from the DAO. Save the Sound has already indicated its support.
GreenCardinal DAO’s motto is “Think globally, act locally.”
“DAOs are online; they’re digital and truly anyone can contribute to this. It’s focused on these organizations in the Greenwich and Connecticut area. But anyone can contribute,” he said.
Upstream staffers made the first contributions.
Palmer initially tried to make his idea part of an independent study class at the high school but decided to work on it in his free time instead, dedicating five to seven hours per week to it.
“It’s been a big learning experience for me. It was just kind of trying to find my own path, trying to find out how I could orchestrate this,” he said.
Palmer isn’t locked into his future college major but is interested in finance, biology and biochemistry.
He’s looking forward to turning 18 and making his first purchase into GreenCardinal DAO.
annelise.hanshaw@hearstmediact.com
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