United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County is now accepting applications for the 2018-2019 cohort for Partnership MKE.

Partnership MKE is a new United Way initiative which helps create a blueprint on how to address and solve biases within our local community. Its goal is to break down barriers and destroy bias by pairing community leaders across lines of race, age, religion, sexual orientation, and culture.

Built on the legacy of The Milwaukee Mosaic Project (2000 – 2010), Partnership MKE will continue to pair community and business leaders across our numerous social divides and guide them through a one-year process of relationship, understanding, and trust building.

“Helping people from different backgrounds get to know one another has the potential to build social capital, and will have larger social and economic benefits for the Milwaukee community at large,” said Joel Peterson, manager of diversity development and community engagement, United Way of Greater Milwaukee & Waukesha County.

The new Partnership MKE is designed with two levels of interaction, creating a holistic approach to driving personal and social change:

• Identify, encourage and train more than 600 Mosaic Project alumni to re-establish their social capital within racial and ethnic diversity in Greater Milwaukee and Waukesha County

• Create a new cohort of partners to participate in a curriculum-based experience (from YWCA of SE Wisconsin and Anti-Defamation League of Chicago) that integrates social networks and focuses on community outcomes.

Milwaukee Mosaic Project alumni such as Charles Brown, deputy director and director of youth programs at Journey House; Danae Davis, executive director of Milwaukee Succeeds; Mark Sabljak, corporate & community engagement director at Milwaukee Film; and Shary Tran, director of diversity and inclusion at Froedtert & the Medical College of Wisconsin all have signed on to promote and help support the work of the new initiative.

To learn more about Partnership MKE and apply to be part of the 2018-2019 cohort visit, https://www.unitedwaygmwc.org/PartnershipMKE.