The Good Deed Foundation (GDF, Heateo Sihtasutus in Estonian) was established in 2003 to launch and scale impactful initiatives that solve pressing problems in Estonian society. The GDF supports social initiatives for 3-5 years, both financially and non-financially, with know-how from a dedicated in-house team, pro-bono experts, and partners.
GDF is a venture philanthropy organisation advocating venture philanthropy in Estonia. Launching the Good Deed Impact Fund in 2018 resulted from many years of preparation and hard work. The Fund commits to initiatives that measure their impact and operate in areas where neither simple problems nor easy solutions exist (for example, education, social inequity, public health, and the environment).
Later in the same year, the Good Deed Education Fund was established. It is a philanthropy fund founded by a new generation of Estonian entrepreneurs looking to support initiatives that solve acute problems in the education sector. The Fund focuses on alleviating the shortage of teachers, developing the quality of school leadership, and fostering students’ learning skills.
In more than 20 years of impactful action, the Good Deed Foundation has fostered the development of more than 100 social initiatives. The best known are Uuskasutuskeskus
(Re-Use Centre), which aims to put used things back into circulation and to make re-use and re-design easily accessible and commonplace for everyone in Estonia; the educational program Noored Kooli (Teach For Estonia), which takes after Teach First (UK) and Teach For America (USA); Kiusamisvaba Kool (Bullying-Free School) that tackles bullying in schools. Recurrent to all its initiatives, GDF picks the ideas and solutions with the greatest potential to positively transform Estonian society.
