Founded by students in Bellevue

A problem measured in daylight

In Bellevue, homework happens under kitchen lights nobody thinks twice about. In much of India and Sub-Saharan Africa the arithmetic is different: school lets out around 3 PM, the sun sets around 6 PM, and a student in a home without electricity has two or three hours of daylight before the book closes. Studying stops at sunset whether the student is finished or not.

That gap is the one a group of Bellevue students decided to work on. Flash Forward Foundation was founded in 2024 by students, and the team built its first solar study light prototype the same year.

Why education

There is no shortage of problems to pick. Some 655 million people lived without electricity in 2024, according to Tracking SDG7: The Energy Progress Report 2026, and a small nonprofit cannot work on all of them. The founders chose education because it compounds: an extra hour of study tonight becomes a better exam, a stronger record, more options for the student years from now.

For students, by students

From that first prototype, the organization has grown into a student-run 501(c)(3) public charity, recognized by the IRS in August 2025. Student interns in Bellevue have built 72 study lights and delivered all of them to partner organizations in Haiti, India and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In August 2026, executives with professional backgrounds joined to help build out departments and an internship program, so more students can take part in the work. The idea has not changed: students on one side of the world building lights so students on the other can keep studying after dark.