/ By Jackie Brennan / We recently had a lot of fun mapping out a list of iconic landmarks within blocks of Hilton Chicago, where Upswell is happening this November. That gave us an opportunity to set the scene of the city’s downtown area, known as the Loop. It also gave us an opportunity to…
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/ By Tamieka Briscoe / We’ve carefully designed Upswell as an opportunity to elevate ideas that are taking place locally and put them in a national spotlight. As we head to Chicago for Upswell later this year, we have our eye on innovative projects taking place throughout the city. One organization doing such work in…
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/ By Tamieka Briscoe / It seems like just yesterday that we were rocking out on ukuleles and experiencing a whole new world with the help of virtual reality goggles. But it’s been nearly six months since we met in November 2018 for Upswell Los Angeles. We’ve caught up with some of our youngest, yet…
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From bodegas to board rooms, town halls to kitchen tables, the best ideas for improving society come from places as diverse as the communities we serve. And if we’re going to solve America’s toughest challenges, we need to unleash the full potential of everyone who identifies as a changemaker. In that spirit, we’ve redesigned the…
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/ By Tamieka Briscoe / For many working professionals, the weekend signifies the conclusion of a long work week and the much-anticipated beginning of well-earned leisure time. But for nonprofit and government employees enrolled in the Weekend MBA program at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, Fridays and Saturdays mean “business as usual.”…
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/ By Jackie Brennan / For an area that was almost entirely razed by a devastating fire in 1871, we have to give Downtown Chicago props: they have all kinds of fascinating historic landmarks. And many of them are within blocks of where Upswell Chicago is going to be happening this November 13-15. Core to…
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/ By Debra Rainey / Mihai Patru could not have imagined that the “seed” planted during a discussion with changemakers in Detroit would sprout into an incubator for budding social innovators and be featured during a workshop on empowering emerging grassroots entrepreneurs at Upswell LA! Patru is Senior Policy Fellow at University of California, Riverside…
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We wanted our inaugural Upswell to be an experience where people confronting community challenges and those with ideas for innovative approaches could (not so) randomly interact during a myriad of activities – and BOOM! – find themselves in social collisions that result not only in a solution for one community – but with some inspired…
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Linking vision and strategy, dreamers and doers, changemakers and problem solvers. That’s the key to solving the challenges that confront communities around the country – and one of the main goal of Upswell. It’s also the goal of the MacArthur Foundation’s new nonprofit affiliate, Lever for Change, intended to connect philanthropists and social change organizations.…
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Upswell community engagement is going to look a little different this year. Last year, we experimented with Upswell Labs, which were designed to get feedback and test new ideas leading up to Upswell LA. We engaged over 220 changemakers from Los Angeles, San Francisco, Detroit, and Chicago and learned a lot about what worked (and…
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