Milwaukee organizations form civic accelerator

A new civic accelerator will connect emerging talent with professional development opportunities to help Milwaukee’s business improvement districts in neighborhoods across the city.

The civic accelerator, Co:lab, is a collaboration between three Milwaukee organizations that work to attract and develop talent in the city: NEWaukee, The Commons and Startup Milwaukee.

Concordia University is sponsoring the program.

“We have this cohort of people who are interested in getting involved but don’t know where to go,” NEWaukee President Angela Damiani said. “There’s a gap. It made sense to create a formal space to give back and create something tangible.”

Co:lab takes The Commons’ curriculum built for college students and adopts it for the social network of NEWaukee and entrepreneurs from Startup Milwaukee.

The first Co:lab cohort will start in January and culminate in the spring with a demo day. Around 25 people will be in the initial cohort, split into five teams that will be assigned to work with BIDs.

The cohort will participate in a series of workshops that takes them through the innovation process to see the needs of their assigned community, define a problem, create new solutions, prototype, test and sell it. Co:lab anticipates running two cohorts each year.

“You’ll have a chance to go through and get to know 25 people and get involved in a community organization that’s eager to have bright fresh new ideas ideated and materialized for the betterment of the community,” Damiani said.

Participation will require a fee, which the organizers of Co:lab will use to facilitate the program. Co:lab is working to establish partnerships with employers to sponsor participants from their company because of the professional development provided in the workshops.

“It could lead to more of a culture of not being afraid of tackling our challenges in unique and creative ways,” said Michael Hostad, a co-founder of The Commons. “There are really bright people here. We’re trying to collectively bring together brainpower and make Milwaukee better.”

One of the main ideas behind Co:lab is to ensure that the momentum building downtown is felt throughout the city.

“A lot of growth and development is happening and we want to make sure all neighborhoods are included,” said Matt Cordio. “We want to give neighborhoods resources and see investment in developing parts of Milwaukee.”

More information can be found on the program’s website, colabmke.com.