The last 12 months have been marked by tremendous growth for Amplify 4 Good. After working with both companies and communities relative to social impact, we’ve evolved into two distinct organizations: Amplify 4 Good (focuses on companies) and Goodie Nation (focuses on under-served communities). They’re part of my efforts to have a positive impact on 1 billion people by the year 2039.

At Goodie Nation, we’ve designed a six month process comprised of ideation sessions for adults and youth, hackathons and marketing labs as well as special events for entrepreneurs to produce open source

tools or tech social enterprises to help under-served communities. With the help of awesome partners in Q2, we started Processes in Charlotte (reducing waste to create healthier communities) and Memphis (connecting ex-offenders to jobs). And now, spurred by a grant from Google, we’re set to spend Q3 + Q4 in Atlanta focused on the area of gentrification financial inclusion. Specifically, connecting those affected by gentrification to nearby emerging economic opportunities.

Officially called Goodie Innovation [Econ Dev]: Atlanta x (Q3 + Q4 2016), the goal is to produce ten (10) tech or tech-enabled social enterprises focused on some aspect of this area. Using Atlanta as a pilot city over the next 6 months, the objective is for each of them to create tools that can be used in cities all over the country.

And since this is such a massive and important issue, we’re bringing our entire slate of programming to the table:
+Founders’ Therapy (2): small group support event for high-performance capacity entrepreneurs from underrepresented groups
+Discovery Panels (2): events to create awareness about the challenge to the public
+Goodie Ideation (2): culturally-relevant design thinking lab for moonshot idea generation. Version for professionals & college students
+Goodie Hack (1): hackathon to develop the best ideas from Goodie Ideation into prototypes
+Goodie Marketing (1): creative lab to produce branding, communication, and grwoth hack strategies for the prototypes
+Hack Mob (1+): hip-hop influenced innovation labs for youth from underrepresented groups

It all kicks off on Friday, July 15th as we produce a special Hack Mob for Level Playing Field’s SMASH Academy at Morehouse College. The rising 9th graders will be tasked with generating the first set of moonshot ideas to solve an aspect of the challenge. We’re looking for volunteers as well as entrepreneurs to serve as coaches.

To get involved with the Gentrification Financial Inclusion Process and/or to help with Hack Mob @ SMASH Academy, visit http://goodiex.org/innovationatlfall2016
Stay tuned for more details!