UrbanPromise Charlotte

Do you want to gain meaningful experience this summer, make a difference in the Charlotte community, AND have tons of fun the whole time? UrbanPromise Charlotte invites current college students to apply for the Summer Intern position. Summer Interns will serve as leaders, mentors, and “teacher coaches” for a small group of teenage StreetLeaders who serve as the mentors, teachers, and role models for the younger students attending UrbanPromise’s Summer Camp. Summer Interns will help their group of StreetLeaders to lead campers to academic and personal growth during Summer Camp. Additionally, Summer Interns will help full-time UrbanPromise staff lead training and development sessions for StreetLeaders before and during camp. This is a seasonal position that will begin June 2nd and end July 25th. Applications are due this Friday, February 7th. Apply here: https://lnkd.in/emi-VsiF. ????

?? Exciting News from the Crescent Coalition! ?? UrbanPromise Charlotte is proud to be a founding member of the Crescent Coalition. Collectively, we are excited to welcome three new members: Circle de Luz, Queen City Scholars, and Latin Americans Working for Achievement (LAWA)! Now operating under the fiscal sponsorship of Ascend Nonprofit Solutions, the expansion brings the Crescent Coalition to 11 organizations, all dedicated to supporting under-resourced students from middle school to college and beyond. Next month, we look forward to 50 team members from our member organizations gathering for the Crescent Coalition's inaugural Leadership Summit—a day dedicated to professional development and strengthening our collaborative efforts. Together, we're creating a seamless support system to empower students to achieve their full potential through college and career readiness, mentoring, and wraparound support! #crescentcoalition #charlotte #economicmobility

Last night we hosted our annual Christmas Social for Alumni Fellows and Community Members participating in our Social Capital Collective! Attendees representing a wide variety of career paths and organizations enjoyed delicious food and played fun networking games while getting to know one another and making new connections. The Social Capital Collective exists to empower our StreetLeaders and Alumni Fellows to grow in their professional skills, build meaningful professional networks and successfully launch into their chosen career paths on their paths to becoming agents of restoration. We couldn't do this without the support of our generous Community Members who are committed to advocating for and advising talented young professionals from Charlotte as they grow their own social capital. Thank you to the many Fellows and Community Members who participated in our initiatives and events over the past year! And thank you to the countless supporters of our work who make nights like this possible for our community. We're grateful for you! Nicole Williams, MBA, Elizabeth Darden, Miriam Manga, Scott Dumler, D'Onna Webster, Meredith Bandy, Miah Evans, Braielyn Peoples, Daniel Mattox, Toni Teah, Christopher Virella, Britney Vidal, Veronica Tello, Arsema Temesgen, Bront? J., Serena Roberts, Brianna Soto, Kimani Virella, Mike Ramsey, Karia Brown, Dr. Jonathan Wilson, America Guerrero, Angela Concha de Hernandez, Mollie Thorn James, Jia L., Jason Tuttle, Townsend Crocker, Theophilus Baidoo, Anita Staton, Andy Pfeiffer, Charles Hollar, Steve Gassaway, Michelle Gassaway, Matt Strader, Rebecca Strader, Kristopher Lawson Pedigo, CFA, Mark Upton, Jarian Kerekes, Dheepa Johnston, Dr. Christa Flood, Julia Oltmanns, George Metz, Jr., Rodney Goodall, Randy Darden, LaTarzja Henry, Matthew Hultquist

"It's not what you know—but who you know!" For the conclusion of our Summer Social Capital Series, we invited members from this year's Social Capital Collective cohort to join us for an evening of celebration as we honored our Alumni who made strides in their professional growth with the support of our Community Members over the past year! Hosted by the generous team at The Fran Southend and Arthur Elliott, Alumni and Community Members enjoyed time connecting with one another and sharing a meal before we passed the mic to our attendees and invited them to share about their experience in our program. An initiative of UrbanPromise Charlotte, the Social Capital Collective exists to empower our 18-to-25 year old StreetLeader Alumni Fellows to grow in their professional skills, build meaningful professional networks and successfully launch into their chosen career paths. This past year, we assembled a team of over 50 Career Coaches, Career Field Consultants and Career Connectors who have been committed to advocating for and advising talented young professionals from underrepresented communities in Charlotte as they worked to access meaningful career advancement opportunities and achieve upward economic and social mobility. We are proud to celebrate that 100% of our 2023 cohort received offers for meaningful job and internship opportunities, and as of today 75% of our 2024 cohort have received offers for compelling career growth opportunities in their fields of interest! A HUGE "Thank You" to everyone who supported our inaugural Summer Social Capital Series this month! We couldn't have done it without the support of our amazing Community Members, foundation partners and corporate partners, including the Equitable Foundation, Coca-Cola Consolidated, Albemarle Corporation & Arthur Elliott. Together, we're making Charlotte a place where more students have the opportunities they need to flourish and thrive in our city! ?? Photos by Kobi Cole

Thank you to the Alumni, StreetLeaders and Community Members who joined our Career Panel + Networking Dinner last week! ?? The second night of our Summer Social Capital Series was graciously hosted by Albemarle Corporation with support from the Equitable Foundation and Coca-Cola Consolidated. This event invited Community Members, UP Alumni and StreetLeaders to build relationships over dinner in small groups designed to foster conversations around shared interests and career fields. Then, we invited five dynamic panelists from the community to share insights from their personal and professional journeys with our group. Special thanks to our panelists, Anita Staton, Bront? J., UP Alumna Kimani Virella, Meredith Bandy and Theophilus Baidoo, for sharing such thoughtful wisdom and insight! UrbanPromise Charlotte is tremendously grateful to our corporate and foundation partners for strategically investing in the creation of social capital pathways across our city. Our Alumni and StreetLeaders are amazing, thoughtful leaders on their way to becoming agents of restoration in their communities, and we're thankful for the opportunity to provide these high-quality professional development opportunities to them with your generous support. And thanks to UP Alumnus, Kobi Cole, for the wonderful photos!

Our first night of the Summer Social Capital Series was a huge hit! ?? Generously sponsored by the Equitable Foundation, last week's Uptown Night with the Knights event brought nearly fifty UrbanPromise StreetLeaders, Alumni and Community Members together for an evening of fun, connection and networking while enjoying baseball on a perfect summer night. Our StreetLeaders and Alumni are committed to investing in their career development on their path to becoming agents of restoration. We often say, "It's not what you know—but who you know", and in a city like Charlotte where economic opportunity and access to resources can vary neighborhood-by-neighborhood, these events are designed to empower our students to foster meaningful relationships with professionals in their career fields of interest. We are grateful for Jarian Kerekes, Dheepa Johnston and the rest of the team at Equitable for coming alongside our vision to improve the flow of social capital across our city and setting up our StreetLeaders and Alumni to flourish and thrive as they transition into young adulthood! Photography by: Kobi Cole

Can you think of a summer in your childhood, youth, or young adulthood that changed everything for you? At UrbanPromise Charlotte (UPC), we believe that summer has the potential to change everything- for our campers, StreetLeaders, and interns! This summer, we will serve over 360 campers, 130 StreetLeaders, 13 interns, and get to connect with so many of our UPC alumni. Thanks to the unwavering support of two dedicated friends of UrbanPromise Charlotte, every donation between now and June 1st will be matched dollar for dollar, up to $20,000! Your support will go twice as far in providing a summer experience that will be truly transformative for our campers, StreetLeaders, and alumni interns. A summer that changes everything! If you want to get involved in our Summer CAMPaign at UrbanPromise Charlotte and support us financially, please visit our Giving Page here: https://lnkd.in/egzHwpst.

If you've been wanting to learn a little bit more about UrbanPromise Charlotte, here is your chance! Our Executive Director, Jimmy McQuilkin, sat down with The Best of LKN Podcast Host, Jeff Hamm, and got to share a little bit more about the amazing students, staff, volunteers, and programs at UrbanPromise Charlotte. Listen Here: https://lnkd.in/ewktwJPg.

Last week, our StreetLeaders had the privilege of attending the "See the Possibilities" career exposure day hosted by the wonderful team at Barings! Joining high school and college students representing several other community organizations in Charlotte, our StreetLeaders had the chance to hear from a diverse panel of company leaders who shared openly about their professional journeys and offered thoughtful advice to our students as they are dreaming about their future career paths. Later in the day, our StreetLeaders participated in breakout groups where they learned from company leaders who support various areas of the firm, including Investment Management, Legal, Marketing + Communications and Real Estate. And one of our StreetLeaders, Gladis, won a set of AirPods as a member of the student group that won the afternoon Speech Competition hosted by Barings employees! The team at Barings went all out to create a memorable experience for our students, and we want to give a special shout-out to Elizabeth Cooper for intentionally inviting our students to attend and coordinating such a well-planned event. Thank you to Barings and our many employer partners for the ways you empower young leaders from our community to thrive in their professional growth!

Yesterday, we had the joy of collaborating with Little Diversified Architectural Consulting to host a special Career Exposure Day for members of our StreetLeader and Alumni communities! The wonderful team at Little opened up the world of their career fields to our students, generously showcasing the work of Architecture, Engineering, Interior Design, Visual Arts and Sustainability at the firm before providing a delicious lunch for our group. Our visit was especially meaningful because our students had the joy of hearing from Chanda Gurung, an Electrical Engineer at Little and UP Alumna (Camp Hope, Class of 2019) as she shared her professional journey with our students. Special thanks to the following Little team members for generously offering their time and talents for our tour: Heather McQuilkin, Jonathan Nathan, Nicole Palmer, Chanda Gurung, Jacob Ellerbrock, Patty Wong, Anna Pooler, Santiago Vinueza, Christopher Hoyt, Ryan Davis, Skylar DeMatteis, and Nicole Norris. We're so thankful to Little and the rest of our employer partners who are committed to providing meaningful career exposure and development opportunities for our StreetLeaders and Alumni!