Crowdfunding sites have become increasingly popular over the years with entrepreneurs seeking financial support for their big ideas.  

William Michael Cunningham, the founder of BlackCrowdfunding.net, recently launched the new crowdfunding website specifically to help African-Americans, who are still unemployed at numbers higher than the national rate.

“Most people start a business by taking out loans on their houses or going to friends and family and raising money that way,” Cunningham said to the Washington Post. “If you’re in a demographic where your housing wealth has been impacted significantly negatively, then that’s less of an option with respect to raising capital.” 
The African-American unemployment rate for March was 13.3 percent according to figures released this month by the Labor Department. The national rate for March was 7.6 percent.

Cunningham will be teaching crowdfunding at the D.C. Hive (Home of Innovators, Visionaries, Entrpreneurs), located in Southeast D.C., and encouraging students to use the site as a tool to raise money.

"These are independent, ethical and entirely new approaches to addressing economic issues in African American, minority and women business communities," Blackcrowdfunding.net writes in its mission statement.

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