Its Time was founded in early 2007 by Rob Edwards. Then he managed the foundation part-time while running his business. In June 2008, after twenty years as company director, he left the business to focus on Its Time.
Prior to establishing the foundation Rob spent considerable time designing business systems for another not-for-profit (School Aid) where he helped raise $1.5M to rebuild education facilities in disaster regions — including a new school in Aceh destroyed in the tsunami, $.5M to Beslan community in Russia after the 2004 hostage crisis and repairs following cyclone Larry. The “outreach” objectives were to enhance the lives of children in disaster regions. The “inreach” objective was to show students at home that their small fundraising efforts could make a real difference — with the hope that they move into society as more caring and philanthropic adults.
In 2007 we launched the Cool Schools project that provided tools and encouragement to schools in Australia to raise funds with the aim of installing back-to-grid solar systems at their school. This process showed students that collective small efforts can make a difference in the fight against climate change. While many schools embraced this project, it was suspended in November 2007 in light of the incoming government’s Solar Schools initiative that achieved our objectives. Perhaps the Its Time model and the hundreds of student letters had some influence on government policy.
While delivering the Cool Schools initiative, we researched the remote island projects that we now invite you get involved in. Late in 2007 Rabi High School was chosen as the site for a pilot installation and that project was opened successfully in July 2008. The Foundation then moved in to the fundraising phase that we hope will result in hundreds of systems installed in schools across the Pacific. We look forward to you joining us on that journey.
Its Time Foundation Fund is a public fund (registered charity) listed on the Register of Environmental Organisations under item 6.1.1 of subsection 30-55(1) of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997. We are not acting on behalf of any supplier, marketing group or peak body and have no association with any political or religious organization.