Georgia runs the TWIGS program at the Baltimore School for the Arts. She has grown the program from a small after school dance program serving 50 students to a city-wide after school arts program that includes instrumental and vocal music, theatre, stage production, and the visual arts and serves 650 students from 140 elementary and middle schools in Baltimore.

Lisa is Director of Adelante Familia, which is a bilingual English/Spanish program created in collaboration with St. Michael Catholic Church. Her program provides bilingual and culturally sensitive services to support the Southeast Baltimore community which serves a high concentration of Spanish-speaking immigrants.

Aisling is the founder of the CLEAR Project—or the Community Leadership Education for Asylees and Refugees.  She is a nurse and a former Peace Corps member who is using a community fellowship from the Open Society Institute to train refugees who recently resettled in Baltimore to teach other refugees about things like health insurance, 911, free clinics, disease prevention, hygiene, prenatal care, etc. 

Allan is currently Co-Director of Sandtown Habitat for Humanity and former Director of New Song Urban Ministries.  Susan is the Executive Director of New Song Academy.  They have worked for nearly 20 years improving the housing, education, health care, and workforce development for the residents of the Sandtown neighborhood.  They have been working tirelessly to make the community a better place and currently have plans to build another 150 homes and move beyond the neighborhood’s 15 block core.

With a leap of faith, Kristina Berdan requested a leave of absence this school year from her regular teaching job at Baltimore City’s Stadium School, in order to devote 100% of her efforts to supporting a student-led project she helped instigate in 2001. The Youth Dreamers, determined to create a neighborhood youth center, over several years managed to gain nonprofit status and raise sufficient funds and friends to purchase and renovate a building. Throughout this inspiring odyssey, Kristina Berdan has served as a steady adult presence, encouraging, advising and cheering on her students.

Since 1982, The Community School has quietly provided an alternative education for students in and around the Remington community who have left the public school system for a variety of reasons. The school prepares students for GED, college or work. Tom Culotta has been involved since 1982, now leading the school and celebrating the success of each individual student who graduates and joins the community as a confident young adult.

Mike Subelsky perceived a gap in Baltimore’s cultural scene and set out to promote improvisational theater by posting flyers and organizing a small troupe of players. Today, many of those have gone on to become directors and teachers themselves, and multiple troupes perform regularly around the region.

Paul is a volunteer with Operation ReachOut Southwest, an organization of neighborhoods united around important community issues.  Paul has been a volunteer with OROSW and worked in his Southwest Baltimore neighborhood for more than 50 years. Paul is 80 years old and continues to give up his time and energy to improve his community and life for all its citizens.

Sandra is Executive Director of the Franciscan Youth Center in East Baltimore. She has spent over twenty-five years administering youth development programs in Baltimore and rural Africa. She designed and implemented effective and high quality after school and summer programs for middle and high school students that have contributed to best practices in after school programming for the State of Maryland.

Agnes Molloy’s program, which operates out of the Medfield Elementary School, reaches kids in the neighborhood that have no other option for after school and off-hours care. Her Woodberry home is a satellite to the center and her community-minded spirit reaches far and wide.  Ag, as the neighborhood kids know her fondly, has been a resident of Woodberry for much of her adult life. She is a well-known fixture to the Hampden/Woodberry/Medfield area and she offers generous and heartfelt care to the community’s children in need.

The Baltimore Urban Debate League’s mission is to enrich the academic experience of students from Baltimore City's public high schools through participation in team policy debate. Pam has been the Executive Director since the League’s inception 6 years ago, and has grown the organization considerably across the city. The skills developed through debate directly and positively impact the self-perceptions of kids involved.