Location: Phoenix, AZ

With over 200 professionals, Playworks is a fast growing national nonprofit that provides safe, healthy play and physical activity to low-income schools, helping create a positive environment for improved learning and teaching and reduced bullying and teasing.  Our organization is in a rapid growth mode expanding from 170 schools to over 500 schools.  Playworks transforms recess from an environment maximizes the value of recess, making play a part of every day ultimately transforming the learning environment for hundreds of schools across the country. We put trained adults on the playground to introduce classic games that are disappearing from schoolyards, like kickball and four-square, as well as new games designed to build leadership and foster teamwork. When Playworks partners with a school, kids are more physically active and they return to class focused and ready learn so the whole school day goes better. Playworks’ track record of success across the country has attracted multi-million dollar investments from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, AmeriCorps and private philanthropists.

Playworks was recently featured on ABC’s Nightline.  Follow this link to see the story:  http://tinyurl.com/playworksnightline

Location: Tulsa, OK

KIPP, the Knowledge Is Power Program, is a national network of 99 college-preparatory charter schools serving more than 26,000 students in under-resourced communities in 20 states and the District of Columbia.  Based on the profound success of the original KIPP Academies in Houston and the South Bronx of New York City, KIPP schools have been widely recognized for creating a new and exciting paradigm in public education, putting low income and minority students on the path to college.  Since their founding, the original KIPP Academies have sustained track records of high student achievement and have become the model for new, locally run KIPP schools operating in high-need communities nationwide.  KIPP’s vision is that, one day, all public schools will foster an environment where students will develop the academic skills, intellectual habits, and character traits necessary to maximize their potential in high school, college, and the world beyond.  To read more about KIPP, please visit http://www.kipp.org

Following that model of success, KIPP Tulsa opened as a contract school with Tulsa Public Schools in the fall of 2005 to serve the culturally diverse population of Tulsa.  The second class of eighth-grade students has recently been promoted to some of the top high schools in Tulsa.  To read more about KIPP Tulsa, please visit http://www.kipptulsa.org

Building on the success of KIPP Tulsa, and the KIPP network of schools nationally, KIPP Tulsa will convert from its current status as a contract school and officially become a charter school by Fall, 2011.  Driven by an active and committed Governance Board that is aggressively pursuing growth opportunities, KIPP Tulsa will look to create a network of high-performing KIPP schools in Tulsa which may include elementary, middle, and high schools. 

Location: Ipswich, MA

The mission of the Trustees of Reservations is to preserve, for public use and enjoyment, properties of exceptional scenic, historic, and ecological value in Massachusetts. The organization cares for over 100 properties that comprise more than 24,000 acres and monitor 285 Conservation Restrictions protecting another 16,700 acres.  In 1891, the Trustees of Reservations was founded by a small band of visionary volunteers.  Over the past ten years, the organization has evolved into a dynamic $20M operation with 180 year-round employees who are led by a volunteer governance structure and supported by over 45,000 member households.  A recent strategic planning process strengthened the core organizational goals and set an ambitious plan in motion to increase the organization’s impact and visibility through 2017.

Location: Boston, MA

BUILD, a social venture headquartered in Northern California with offices in the Bay Area, Washington, D.C. and Boston, is a four-year, entrepreneurship-focused college preparation program.  Our mission is to provide real-world entrepreneurial experience that empowers youth from under-resourced communities to excel in education, lead in their communities, and succeed professionally. By helping students develop and run their own small businesses, BUILD supplements traditional school with real-world business experiences and critical skill-building for the future. For more information about the organization, please visit our website at http://www.build.org.

Location: Cambridge, MA

New Profit is a nonprofit venture philanthropy fund that exists to help innovative social entrepreneurs and their organizations bring about widespread and transformative impact on critical social problems.  We work to fulfill this mission with two approaches: 1) providing multi-year financial and strategic support to help a portfolio of innovative social entrepreneurs and their organizations realize their full potential for social impact; and 2) helping to build an environment in which all innovative social entrepreneurs and their organizations may realize their full potential for social impact. 

With the support of individual investors and our signature partner, Monitor Group, New Profit works with social entrepreneur-led organizations tackling persistent social problems in education, workforce development, public health, and other areas.  New Profit also drives other initiatives to help scale social innovations, including the annual Gathering of Leaders, America Forward, and Urban Assets Initiative.  We believe that just as entrepreneurship and invention have driven our nation’s progress, so too can we harness America’s spirit of innovation, vision, and optimism to help solve our most pressing social problems.

Location: New Orleans, LA

Playworks is a national nonprofit that provides safe, healthy play and physical activity to low-income schools, helping create a positive environment for learning and teaching. Playworks maximizes the value of recess, making play a part of every day ultimately transforming the learning environment for hundreds of schools across the country. We put trained adults on the playground to introduce classic games that are disappearing from schoolyards, like kickball and four-square, as well as new games designed to build leadership and foster teamwork. When Playworks partners with a school, kids are more physically active and they return to class focused and ready learn so the whole school day goes better. Playworks’ track record of success across the country has attracted multi-million dollar investments from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, AmeriCorps and private philanthropists.