Maritza Alarcon is possibly the happiest Millennial Train rider ever. Currently focused on writing, Alarcon’s MTP project was all about developing her book, I Am Happiest, a field guide to happiness.
Alarcon has been featured on BuzzFeed as one of “21 Amazing Role Models for Ambitious Twentysomethings” and was honored at Carnegie Hall for Glamour Magazine’s “20 Amazing Young Women” ceremony.
Former soldier and Bronze Star Veteran Maceo Keeling boarded the Millennial Train as a means to collaborate with his peers and learn their collective needs.
Keeling founded Citizens of Culture, a media platform that seeks to inspire young people to take an active role in shaping the future and changing the world. The site encourages contributions from poetry to social commentary, and there is a non-fiction book club offshoot that culminates in real-time Twitter chats in which users can critically analyze and discuss the reads.
Maceo believes we all have an obligation to better ourselves and society through art and entrepreneurship. His overall goal is to determine, by any means necessary, how to engage millennials in a nationwide dialogue with one another.
Kalimah Priforce is Headmaster and CEO of Qeyno Labs, which seeks to harness the interests of high-potential, low-opportunity youth in areas of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM).
Priforce’s Qeyno Labs is a leading provider in youth hackathons and seeks to empower youth of low-opportunity environments by providing access to technology and education. His Millennial Trains project was to launching a new form of Hackathon—The Gathering of Nations Hackathon that focuses on Native youth on and off reservation communities.
Priforce has been recognized by the White House as a Champion of Change and started the “My Brother’s Keeper” Hackathon that strongly aligned with President Obama’s call-to-action for organizations and communities to work together to improve the lives of men of color.
After eight years in the Marine Corps, Lydia Davey is taking a hard look at post traumatic growth and finding a way to build resilience in U.S. Veterans.
With more than 10 years of experience in strategic communications, Davey founded Clear PR as a means to connect small businesses with PR and marketing talent across the nation. Lydia’s Millennial Trains project focused on collecting data from trauma-affected communities to create a course on resilience at the University of California. Lydia has a B.A. in Communications from Indiana University, and seeks to take what she’s learned on the Millennial Train to benefit military and Veteran communities.
Raised in the United States as an undocumented immigrant, Marzena Zukowska noticed how few opportunities she was afforded. NBCUniversal’s Open Possibilities program invested in her, knowing she would be a powerful voice for social change within the immigration sector.
Zukowska’s Millennial Trains project focused on the first ever Opportunity Pipeline Fellowship that will support the next generation of social innovators who stand to solve the major immigration challenges facing the U.S. Zukowska currently works as the Media Manager for Ashoka’s Changemakers, a program that utilizes Ashoka’s network of social entrepreneurs to bring accelerated change to social issues around the world.
Saja Al-Quzweeni is a recent U.S. Department of State Fulbright Foreign Student graduate who studied at University of Wisconsin, Green Bay. She is originally from Iraq and hopes to take her Master’s degree in Environmental Science and Policy, and put it to good use back home in Baghdad.
Al-Quzweeni left Iraq and came to America to go to school and eventually board the Millennial Train because she needed a change and she wanted to learn about her generation and what motivates them. Her Millennial Trains project was an examination of best practices in agriculture which will culminate in a model of urban farming that could be utilized in several different settings.
As a child, you heard your parents talk about how your generation would take over one day, or that “our children are our future.” It couldn’t be more true that each passing generation contributes more to humanity than the last. With all of the innovations in technology, medicine, and culture in the last 20 years, imagine what the next 20 will be like. That’s where millennials come in.
The Millennial Trains Project (MTP) is a non-profit organization that brings together tomorrow’s thought leaders in a rolling think tank to further their ideas and think about the legacy they want to leave behind. With a little help from the U.S. Department of State Fulbright Program and Comcast/NBCUniversal, participants are taken on a journey of discovery led by mentors and local leaders in culture and business.
Photos courtesy Millennial Trains Project
Remember the award-winning Xfinity Innovation Think Tank at last year’s COIN Summit? Picture that but full of twenty-five millennials, traveling at 100 mph, and stopping at six cities between Los Angeles and Washington D.C. on the way.
That’s essentially what the Millenial Trains Project is. This week, the train is headed on a ten day cross-country trip to facilitate ideas of community building and social impact in LA, Austin, San Antonio, New Orleans, Atlanta, and DC. The goal of the non-profit is to introduce young innovators, change-makers, entrepreneurs, visionaries, and thought leaders to each other and into new American frontiers.
The Project’s website states that “we use trains to explore opportunities and challenges across America. We come from all walks of life. We are friends. We are problem solvers. We travel because we love learning. Together, we have fun and do our best to create things that benefit, serve, and inspire others.”
We’re inspired—and we’re also on the train. That’s right. Innovators Peak has left the station and will be following this innovation-express from coast to coast and keeping you updated with the hottest topics along the way.
In a digital age where everything can easily be found with the click of a button, this type of face to face human interaction and collaborative exploration is somewhat unprecedented for millennials. This is why we are extremely excited to be bring these developments back home to Colorado.
Stay tuned for more soon!
By Joseph Afton