Less Talking, More Doing.

High Impact & Mission-Driven Ventures & Initiatives

Inclusive and Equitable Community, Economic, & Entrepreneurial Development

The Institute’s mission is to consolidate and leverage the combined reach and resources of our global network of partners in order to accelerate the growth of Inclusive and Equitable Community, Economic, & Entrepreneurial Development (CEED) ventures and initiatives that are working to have a positive impact.

The Institute works with high-impact and mission-driven entrepreneurs, social enterprises, non-profit organizations, university initiatives, philanthropic ventures, and public/private/foundation partnerships that are having a positive environmental, economic, and/or community impact.

The Institute also works to empower underserved and historically disenfranchised communities by providing pro-bono business development services, financial literacy support, & startup technical assistance to entrepreneurs, small businesses, social enterprises, and community non-profits in collaboration with university partners.

Positive Community Impact

Do only good everyday

The Institute has a network of over 100,000 individual entrepreneurs, social enterprises, philanthropic ventures, and collaborating institutions world-wide that have collaborated in various capacities with the Institute via programming, direct service, community initiatives, university research, lectures, workshops, coaching, entrepreneurial development consulting, business plan support, startup technical assistance, and the Institute’s financial technology platform.

The Institute’s inclusive and equitable financial technology platform was highlighted as a Forbes Editors’ Pick for economic development and “leveling the playing field for small business," at the White House for economic impact and job creation, by the #1 ranked S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University for having a “multibillion-dollar economic impact,” in the Business and Management Review for socially responsible “FinTech Innovation," at the New York Stock Exchange in comparison to Amazon for small business finance, and by News Radio WCBS New York City Small Business Spotlight for making “economics and finance interesting, fun, and understandable” and for “offering entrepreneurs an array of funding options so they can avoid predatory lenders.”

The Institute announced the national expansion of SourceFunding.org in 2016 as the nation's first Community, Economic, & Entrepreneurial Development (CEED) venture specifically focused on helping entrepreneurs, businesses, and community organizations avoid predatory online lenders by providing access to the entire network of 14,000+ low-cost and trusted community banks, credit unions, & community development financial institutions.

As of 2020, the Institute’s financial technology platform had grown to over 100,000 user accounts — consisting of individual entrepreneurs, small businesses, philanthropic ventures, collaborating institutions — and now provides access to the largest funding network of its kind in the United States.

Institute Ecosystem:

The Institute’s Community, Economic, & Entrepreneurial Development (CEED) ecosystem consists of a diverse array of organizations and partner institutions, involved in varying capacities, all sharing a firm commitment to developing mutually beneficial outcomes and solving complex community challenges.

What is Social Entrepreneurship?

Social entrepreneurship, also known as high impact and mission-driven entrepreneurship, is described as being “at the crossroads between profit-based growth and not-for-profit ideals of changing the world for the better.”

The field of social entrepreneurship is experiencing rapid growth and attracting a great deal of attention because of its underlying belief in driving sustainable solutions and transformational outcomes in communities. It is this imperative to solve society’s complex challenges that makes social entrepreneurship unique from traditional entrepreneurship. To learn more about social entrepreneurship, see coverage in the Harvard Business Review, on NPR and in The Economist.

Accelerating Growth

The Institute works with organizations at every stage of development.

Empowering Underserved Communities

a hand-up, not a hand-out.

The Institute works to consolidate and provide equal access to Community, Economic, & Entrepreneurial Development (CEED) resources in order to accelerate positive impact in underserved communities throughout the United States.

Scholarship in Action

University & Community College Partnerships

We believe people learn best by doing. That’s why we work with our university and community college partners to create and provide world-class experiential learning opportunitites for graduate and undergraduate students.

Over 500 graduate and undergraduate students have engaged with the Institute via internships for credit, extracurricular engagements, lectures, and in-class experiential learning opportunities, and semester-long engagements with nine university courses.

Thanks to the generous support of university partners, the Institute arose from a national social entrepreneurship initiative launched by founder W. Michael Short at the June 2014 Clinton Global Initiative Community Investing Working Group in Denver, Colorado. It was later announced with university partners at the October 2014 National Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities Conference at the CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia, that the social entrepreneurship initiative was expanding to include the creation of a new university- and foundation-backed social enterprise institute. These efforts were highlighted in “What’s Working: Small Business” by the Huffington Post. The Institute was officially founded in 2015 at Le Moyne College’s Madden School of Business Center of Excellence for Global Engagement & Impact. Partners at Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, and Whitman School of Management were “instrumental” in the Institute’s launch.

With growing support from a network of university and community college partners, the Institute expanded further in 2016-2017 with the opening of a New York City-based headquarters and a field office at Medgar Evers College, City University of New York. The Institute partners on a number of Community, Economic, & Entrepreneurial Development (CEED) ventures like the International Innovators Initiative (IN2NYC) with NYC’s Economic Development Corporation, which is working to ensure the economic competitiveness of NYC by recruiting the world’s most promising entrepreneurs to relocate to the United States.