Five Finalists Announced for the 2021 Gregor G. Peterson Prize in Venture Philanthropy
Working to Address Issues From Prison Reform to Poverty to School Choice
Hoplin Jackson Charitable Advisors is pleased to announce five exceptional finalists for the 2021 Gregor G. Peterson Prize in Venture Philanthropy. From a pool of nearly 60 nonprofits, these five organizations offer high caliber programming and visionary leadership. Each one is less than five years old! The Prize will be announced in December 2021.
The five finalists include:
1) America First Legal Foundation led by Stephen Miller
This new nonprofit uses litigation to fight executive overreach that blatantly violates the Constitution or current law. In its short history, the organization has sued the federal government for failing to enforce laws that protect our borders and, in two separate instances, successfully stopped the executive branch from implementing racially discriminatory programs. In carrying out this mission, the group hopes to cultivate the next generation of lawyers with the grit, courage, and legal skills in this specialized area of the law to fight the increasingly common tactic of using executive authority to subvert the intent of Congress.
2) Better Together’s Better Jobs Program led by Megan Rose
Better Together is building a national network of churches and volunteers to help families in crisis. Through its Better Jobs program, the organization works with churches across the country to establish “jobs ministries” to help address unemployment in their geographic areas. Job fairs, run by church volunteers, connect job seekers with local employers, while volunteers help provide wrap-around services for those families including transportation and childcare. To date, Better Jobs has served 34,000 low-income job seekers and aims to scale the program to all 50 states within five years.
3) BLEXIT Foundation led by Candace Owens and Brandon Tatum
This nonprofit seeks to reform the culture of minority, often low-income, urban communities by promoting economic independence, strengthening family units, and providing education and resources for those in need. Its concert-like events draw 800-1,000 people to venues in large cities and feature live speakers (Candace Owens speaks at every one), Christian rappers, video testimonials, and more. Its 35 active chapters build on the work started at live events by bringing volunteers together to run career fair block parties, trash pick-ups, voter registration drives, and other social functions.
4) Recidiviz led by Clementine Jacoby
The team of software engineers that populate this fledgling nonprofit seek to reduce incarceration by using technology to provide robust, real-time data to show state corrections departments, prison administrators, and other leaders who make criminal justice decisions how prison populations can be reduced without increasing risk to the public. Recidiviz builds platforms that reliably predict those prisoners who could be safely released (e.g., someone returned to prison for missing a parole meeting) and, upon their release, monitors how well they do in the community. Their early results thus far show a reduction of the overall prison population, significant cost savings, and second chances for thousands of inmates.
5) Vertex Partnership Academies led by Ian Rowe
Thousands of students in PreK-8 charters schools in NYC and nationally lack good high school options owing to the fact most K-8 charter schools (and the small charter networks to which they belong) lack the resources and student enrollment to justify the expense of extending their charters to provide a high school education. Because of this, thousands of motivated low-income kids are thrust back to the same public school systems they were trying to avoid in the first place. Vertex is partnering with two NYC charter school networks (Public Prep, Brilla) that, together, deliver high-quality PreK-8 education to 3,000+ children who attend nine distinct charter schools. Vertex will offer graduates of these schools a character-based, IB-level high school education. If successful, this NYC-focused program will serve as a model for other major cities that have robust PreK-8 charter school networks but lack high-quality high school options.
Each one of these organizations relies upon an innovative approach to solving a significant problem. They are all entrepreneurial and inspiring in their early outcomes. We encourage you to look into each of these groups and consider supporting them.