Our Mission

The Soldmann Marsh Foundation is driven by the passions of five individuals looking to impact the lives of others to change their communities, countries, and the world. While each of the five share a common connection that bonds them together, it is their different perspectives on empowerment that guide our programs.

Donna - Women's education

Donna has always made education and learning a top priority for both herself and her children. Her passion for women's education is born from personal experience. While her initial dream was to obtain a college degree, she accomplished so much more in the process. Donna began caring for her parents at an early age. Her grit and determination led her to open several of her own businesses and provide for her parents, but she still had thoughts of pursuing her dream. As her life progressed, she found herself with the difficult decision of whether to place her three children in school or to home-school. After much thought and research, she went with her intuition and began home-schooling as a way to help each of them reach their potential. While she will tell you, there were days that the logistics were difficult there was never a day she regretted her decision. 

As her children grew, she, again, thought of her goal to attend college. While it seemed impossible to most, she found time to research universities and programs that were sympathetic to a working, single mother with three small children. After much research, she settled on a college founded by women and well aware of the hard work women accomplish daily. She was accepted into the program and completed several courses before having to abandon her dream due to financial demands caused by divorce. 

Today, her three children are each college graduates. Each have received many awards and are experts in their own right. Donna uses her experience to empower women looking to reach their full potential through education. 

melissa - pet therapy

Melissa is one of the most caring people you could ever meet. Her ability to connect with people and animals appears boundless. While she has always had a love for dogs, it was her experiences in college and following graduation that solidified her passion. While in college, she volunteered with the Ronald McDonald House Charities where she saw first hand the difficulties children and their families go through. While volunteering, she would try to help the parents by making fresh meals and the kids feel more at home. Following graduation, she volunteered at the Pet Alliance. She worked with sheltered dogs; walking them, playing with them, and just giving them some time outside with people. It was these two experiences that created the foundation for her pet therapy program. She saw an opportunity to help sheltered dogs find a new purpose while giving children in unfortunate circumstances a little piece of home. Her dream has evolved into a multi-faceted initiative to help certify dogs for pet therapy which provides the dog more outside time and can lead to higher adoption chances as well as bring joy to children and families.    

cameron - innovation

Cameron looks for difficult problems to solve. He has always found learning and finding patterns fascinating. Whether it was working with numbers in Algebra or solving business cases in college, he is never satisfied with "that's just how we do it" or "we really don't know why". While some problems produce bad answers at first, Cameron believes we need to continue working on them until we find a better answer. To this end, he works with organizations and individuals looking to improve our communities in the areas of Education, Healthcare, and Government. The approach he takes includes increasing access to resources and funding to grow great ideas, continuing research into cutting edge solutions for complex challenges, and implementing meaningful change through advocacy and execution.  He understands the journey is not a short or easy one, but an essential one. 

abigail - young women's leadership

Abby has built her leadership skills through several organizations and activities both in and out of school. She got her first taste of leadership as a young cheerleader in elementary school when she befriended the coaches. These coaches, while only high schoolers, appeared larger than life to many of the young girls. The coaches not only worked on cheerleading, but on life principles such as time management, responsibility, and conflict resolution (on occasion one of the young cheerleaders would take another's pom poms).

As Abby grew up, she found her second leadership learning lesson in high school as the captain of the DECA team. She led the school fashion show and helped organized other events such as the annual talent show. It is during this time, she learned the challenges and rewards of leading others.

Her third experience with leadership was in college as President of her sorority. She held several other positions over her college years but capped them off with President. It is here that she learned how to delegate and work with a group of 180+ young women with many different backgrounds and goals. She learned how to interact with each slightly differently in order to meet them where they were, not where she was. She is now working in an Alumnae capacity helping mentor young women.

Her personal experiences have opened her eyes to the importance these and programs like them have on individuals. She credits much of her success to learning these key skills which have helped her in her career and throughout life. 

She seeks to provide access to programs that empower young women to take leadership positions and which support learning. She also works with organizations and individuals to encourage mentorship at a young age.