What is SEED20?
Created by Social Venture Partners (SVP), the annual SEED20 program identifies, highlights and connects the community to our region’s most innovative ideas for tackling pressing social challenges. These innovations can be developed by:
- An individual or start up with a well-formed idea
- An emerging nonprofit
- A well-established nonprofit with a new program
Each year, over the course of two months, a class of twenty nonprofit participants receives training, coaching, feedback, and mentoring on how to succinctly and powerfully tell their story – who they are and why they matter. These efforts culminate in SEED20 OnStage, a high-energy event where ten members of the class compete to win cash awards by making three-minute pitches to a panel of judges and a community audience. SEED20 OnStage includes a celebration before and after the pitches where the audience can interact and connect with all twenty nonprofits to learn more about their mission and opportunities for support and engagement.
SEED20’s mission is to promote the power of social innovation.
- We believe in the power of social innovation to unleash breakthrough ideas that creatively attack tough social challenges.
- We connect innovative people and organizations to funders, to one another, and to the broader Charlotte region.
- We empower nonprofits with the skills and confidence to tell their stories in ways that inspire people to act.
- We educate the community about pressing social issues and organizations that are dedicated to addressing them.
Social Venture Partners is a nonprofit organization passionately attacking the issue of social and economic inequality in Charlotte through venture philanthropy. Our vision is that through SEED20, the Charlotte region will be a community that embraces our nonprofit entrepreneurs, providing them with a supportive environment to innovate. The SEED20 program, the OnStage event, and alumni activities are all coordinated by Social Venture Partners’ staff and volunteer members.