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Who We Are

Passionate about education

Sun FundED was founded by two proven education entrepreneurs looking to invest their time and deep educational experience to make a positive and tangible impact in today’s challenging school environment. Since then, we have been joined by a growing team of people who hold this same passion to positively impact the classrooms and bottom lines of schools across the country.

The Sun FundED Way

Our primary focus is to make solar energy easy for you and your school, enabling you to dramatically cut your operating expenses while supporting sustainability, and educating students about green power — all at no upfront cost to your school.

  • We EXCLUSIVELY serve education.
  • We QUALIFY your school. To ensure that our proven process will help you meet your goals and mitigate your risks.
  • We do everything. Development, financing, construction, operations, etc. So you can stay focused on education.
  • You have one contact to call. Which means far fewer headaches.
  • We’ve got SAMI™. The only educational program like it in the US.
  • You can choose CASH back option. We’re the only team offering cash back for your school/classrooms.
  • You get the benefits of a SOLAR-as-a-SERVICE This unique model totally simplifies solar for schools – one team, one process, – NO middlemen.
  • You can expect total TRANSPARENCY. You’ll be in the loop every step of the way – through open communication and collaboration.

SAMI™

Nowhere is our passion for education more evident than our SAMI (Sunbeam Acknowledgement & Moonscape Initiative) program. To amplify the benefits of Sun FundED system, we devoted thousands of hours of time and expertise to building SAMI for schools.

SAMI is an integrated, web-based platform through which you can easily inject solar education into your classrooms. SAMI can be customized to your school’s specific needs, offering a full menu of STEM projects, solar lesson plans, scholarship programs, and even outdoor solar learning labs. And like everything else, we do all the work!

OUR FOUNDERS

Kelly Hipskind

Kelly Hipskind

Co-Founder

Kelly’s lifelong path serving educational clients began with his founding of OWN IT! Evaluations – technology developed to empower school leaders and teachers to improve instruction more effectively and ultimately inspire students to engage and learn. From there, he moved to Herff Jones where he served on the executive team responsible for $500MM in annual revenue and serving thousands of educational clients across North America.

Patrick Poer

Co-Founder

Prior to co-founding Sun FundED, Patrick was the co-founder of Synovia – a technology platform for school bus tracking, student safety, and fleet management. When Synovia was sold in 2019, it was being used to coordinate over 125,000 buses, in over 1,500 districts, with millions of parents using the Synovia app.

Kelly Hipskind

Kelly Hipskind

Co-Founder

Kelly’s lifelong path serving educational clients began with his founding of OWN IT! Evaluations – technology developed to empower school leaders and teachers to improve instruction more effectively and ultimately inspire students to engage and learn. From there, he moved to Herff Jones where he served on the executive team responsible for $500MM in annual revenue and serving thousands of educational clients across North America.

Patrick Poer

Co-Founder

Prior to co-founding Sun FundED, Patrick was the co-founder of Synovia – a technology platform for school bus tracking, student safety, and fleet management. When Synovia was sold in 2019, it was being used to coordinate over 125,000 buses, in over 1,500 districts, with millions of parents using the Synovia app.

Our Advisors 300+ Years in Education & Energy

Craig Jackson

Energy & Finance

Group CFO, MasTec, Inc.
Former CEO, Dayton Power & Light (DPL), Indianapolis Power & Light (IPL)
Former CEO, US Strategic Business Unit, AES Corp.

Blair Dowden

Higher Education

President Emeritus
Huntington University (22yrs)
Recently Interim Head of
School Traders Point

Sam Odle

Public Affairs

Indianapolis Power & Light Advisory Board
Former CEO, IU Health
Former Indianapolis Public Schools (IPS) Board

Erin Murphy

Regulatory (Federal)

Former Managing Assistant General Counsel, Midcontinent
Independent System Operator (MISO)
Former Senior Counsel, Entergy

Richard Benedict

Electric Markets

Former IPL executive
40+ years in energy industry

Rafael Sanchez

Strategy

Former CEO, Indianapolis Power & Light (IPL)
Old National Bank President, Private Banking

Wayne Stec

Grid Strategist

Chair of IEEE 1547-2 – Guide for DER interconnection an internationally recognized standard
40+ years in energy industry

BEEN BURNT ON SOLAR BEFORE?

Contact us today and we’ll show you the RIGHT way to bring solar to your school.

GET STARTED
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