Uniting for Entrepreneurship(U4EM) was a non-partisan program that brought together immigrants and non-immigrants across ideological, racial, generational, and geographic lines of difference to advance entrepreneurship in Baltimore Metro (County and City), Prince George's County + Montgomery County, and Talbot County. U4EM kicked off in Baltimore in April 2023 and ended in November 2023.
U4EM Program Goals:
Build relationships between immigrant and non-immigrant communities across ideological, racial, generational, and geographic differences
Strengthen individual dialogue and collaboration skills
Take action to support local businesses and entrepreneurs
Raise awareness of the positive economic contributions of immigrants.
Program Results
Uniters' intellectual humility incresed significantly over the life of the program: in the baseline survey, 47% agreed with the statement “My perspectives may be wrong," whereas 80% agreed at the end of the program.
Uniters’feelings towards different races/ethnicities became even more positive: in the baseline survey, 47% indicated their feelings were very positive, whereas in the endline survey 60% indicated they had very positive feelings.
Uniters’community involvement increased substantially over the lifetime of the program: 80% at baseline were at least somewhat involved; 100% were at least somewhat involved at endline.
Program Leadership U4EM was led by a team of six people who live and/or work in Maryland. The program was implemented in collaboration with three local partner organizations:
Chesapeake Multicultural Resource Center empowers people from different cultures to become successful and engaged members of our community.
Kingdom Vision Consulting supports entrepreneurs of color with formulating and employing financial strategies.
Pro Bono Resource Center provides civil legal assistance for free to low-income families.
Maryland Uniters show off their talent in the videos below by singing songs they created about the ABCs of Constructive Dialogue.
Entrepreneurship Projects with Community Partners Uniters worked on teams, each with a community partner, to implement an entrepreneurship project that (1) addressed a problem identified by the group, and (2) advanced a goal of the partner organization. Thanks to generous sponsorship from AT&T, a budget of $5,000 supported each of the three projects.
Below were possible starting points for projects that each Uniters team designed with their community partner: ● Chesapeake Multicultural Resource Center: support immigrant entrepreneurs in Talbot County to grow their businesses. ● Kingdom Vision Consulting: help minority entrepreneurs and non-profti organizations find business capital from reliable lenders. ● Pro Bono Resource Center: expand pro bono civil legal assistance services to low-income families in Baltimore Metro (County and City).
U4EM Core Team
We are the team leading U4EM from start to finish. We can't wait to connect with you! Get to know us a bit below.
Uniting for Entrepreneurship in Maryland is generously supported by...