Forty UNDER 40, Prince George’s County Social Innovation Fund's flagship initiative, recognizes top talent in the County in the areas of arts and humanities, business, education, health and fitness, public service, and science and engineering; and then seeks to engage them more actively in civic and socially oriented ventures through advisory, board service, and advocacy opportunities. After five years of successfully recognizing next generation leaders in Prince George’s County (200 Honorees to date), nearly 25% of honorees have joined non-profit boards and advisory committees throughout the County. The recognition makes it easy for organizations to identify top talent! Honorees have also engaged in policy discussions with the Prince George’s County Executive and the leadership at the Prince George’s County Chamber of Commerce on issues ranging from public education to economic development and residency preferences for employment and contracting.
Forty UNDER 40 is an asset to Prince George’s County in its unique ability to network a vibrant community of young leaders across a variety of sectors and motivate them as individuals toward collective action. The initiative creates a center of gravity for increased relevance, connectivity, and innovation in Prince George’s County.
Our work is based on a fundamental belief that through innovative solutions, alignment across and within sectors, and a keen focus on results, Prince George’s County can quickly shift course on a broad number of issues facing its most vulnerable populations. PGCSIF’s vision is to continuously identify appropriate models that support the County’s infrastructure across public, private, religious, and non-profit sectors for improved quality of life. Our expectation is that by identifying best and innovative practice, supporting the local infrastructure, and aligning outcomes, we can bridge these gaps and quickly increase impact.
From the onset, PGCSIF has worked as a catalyst for social impact. Our mission is to invest in new ways of solving old problems in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
As an organization, we have recognized the pockets of opportunity in the County, as well as the disconnection between the multiple stakeholders who are attempting to address many of the same issues, largely in an unorganized or uncoordinated way and bringing people together has been central to our work. We understand that when we as a community join together, we have the opportunity to share, listen, and learn from one another and we see no place better at facilitating rich dialogue than a Seat at the Table.
Creating space to discuss issues that matter to most of us has never been more important and a Seat at the Table will connect individuals of diverse perspectives to do just that.
From mid-August to early September each year the PGCSIF Advisory Board in collaboration with Forty Under 40 recipients will open their homes, businesses or community centers to take part in this community wide initiative to discuss ways in which we can use our collective genius to generate ideas that strengthen our communities economically, lead to more equity and improve the quality of life for all of us throughout Prince George’s County.
How do you energize a community and create a culture that inspires vibrancy, trust, and collaboration?
You start by making sure everyone has a Seat at The Table. This creates the space to connect individuals of diverse perspectives to discuss local issues and use their collective genius to generate ideas that strengthen our communities economically, lead to more equity and improve the quality of life for all in Prince George’s County. You then publish a guiding set of beliefs that will shape the culture. The Prince George’s County Innovation Manifesto provides a belief system that is consistent in communities with thriving innovation ecosystems and that model the culture we need locally to unite the community towards collective action. Next you convene to have a larger discussion about the art of what’s possible and the distinct action steps to get there. That is Innovate Prince Georges, a forum for sparking the connections and implementation of new ideas that aids in the County’s transformation.
As Prince George's County, Maryland continues to experience considerable community and economic development activity the Innovate Prince George's platform focuses on connecting these likely participants that normally commute outside of Prince George's County to the local assets and resources. The goal is to increase local talent focus to help quickly bring solutions to a broad range of community and economic development challenges. The goal of the platform is to build a stronger economy, stronger families and ultimately a stronger community which will results in a more thriving community where less residents leave the County daily for employment and are able to invest their time and talents to ensure that the County benefits from and is part of the larger ecosystem of innovation that is occurring in the region.