Women LEAD Announced Winner of the WhyIChose.org Contest

Nepali Young Women's Leadership Organization Awarded $5,000 from Public Interest Registry

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Aug 18, 2014, 09:00 ET

RESTON, Va., Aug. 18, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Public Interest Registry, the not-for-profit operator of the .org domain, today announced Women LEAD as the winner of the WhyIChose.org Contest. Women LEAD was awarded $5,000 for an outstanding submission that demonstrated how the organization is making a positive impact on the world by helping young women in Nepal become leaders in their schools, community and nation. The organization will use the award money to support its annual Leadership Institute, which brings together young Nepali women from across the South Asian country for a two-week leadership boot camp.

The WhyIChose.org Contest is part of Public Interest Registry's ongoing initiative to empower nonprofit organizations to effectively advance their causes online. This initiative embodies Public Interest Registry's mission to act in the public interest and provide an online platform where everyone has a voice and can share their ideas and passions for making a difference.

"We launched this contest to spotlight exemplary .orgs from around the globe and we're humbled by the many outstanding submissions," said Brian Cute, CEO of Public Interest Registry. "It was tough to choose just one, but our judging panel felt that Women LEAD's submission overwhelmingly demonstrated why.org was the perfect domain to tell Women LEAD's story. We are inspired by Women LEAD and proud to help fund an organization that's helping young women become future leaders."

Claire Charamnac, executive director of Women LEAD said, "Our mission is to empower young Nepali women to not only stand up from themselves, but to lead. We're thankful for Public Interest Registry's support and this opportunity to spotlight the work we're doing in Nepal. The $5,000 contest prize will help to fund and gather additional resources for our annual Leadership Institute, where young Nepali women will learn about issues affecting their communities from Nepali trailblazers, and build critical leadership and professional skills to help make a difference in their community and the world."

The WhyIChose.org Contest opened a call for submissions in March 2014. After the call for submissions closed, Public Interest Registry brought together a panel of experts in the technology and nonprofit sectors to review the nominations and select a winner based on the following criteria: creativity and originality, quality of submission and adherence to the theme of WhyIChose.org.

For more information about Public Interest Registry and WhyIChose.org, please visit: pir.org and whyichose.org. Visit women-lead.org to learn more about Women LEAD.

About Public Interest Registry
Public Interest Registry is a nonprofit corporation that operates the .org top-level domain — the world's third largest "generic" top-level domain with more than 10 million domain names registered worldwide. As an advocate for collaboration, safety and security on the Internet, Public Interest Registry's mission is to empower the global noncommercial community to use the Internet more effectively, and to take a leadership position among Internet stakeholders on policy and other issues relating to the domain naming system. Public Interest Registry was founded by the Internet Society (internetsociety.org) in 2002 and is based in Reston, Virginia, USA.

About Women LEAD
Women LEAD is the first and only professional and leadership development organization for young women, led by young women, in Kathmandu. Since 2011, Women LEAD has empowered over 750 female high school students to become leaders in their schools and communities. Young women's opinions and voices are rarely valued in traditionally male-dominated Nepal. Our programs provide young women with intensive yearlong leadership training, skills building, mentoring, university preparation & a peer-support network.

Contact: Lindsay Hyman
202-223-9260
[email protected]

SOURCE Public Interest Registry