The first three months of 2010 seemed to have flown by here at YV with many new exciting developments taking place across the country and globe.

We have been fortunate to have received grants from several new partners which have allowed us to expand our operations into new cities and countries. With help from the Peery Foundation, we are continuing to work on expanding our operations in the San Francisco Bay Area. In early March, we held our first community panel there and were able to launch seven new teams of young people enacting social change. To learn more about some of the fantastic teams we’re supporting in SF, you can find video footage and interviews here (http://oaklandlocal.com/article/young-oakland-social-entrepreneurs-win-1000-seed-capital-each).

We’re also working on establishing operations in Japan. YV is still in the preliminary stages of setting up an office there but by the end of this year we plan to have launched several teams within the country. We’re very thankful to have JPMorgan helping us with these efforts and we’re very excited to spread YV’s mission to a new country!

This summer we’re hoping to hold our third annual YV Summit. We’re still in the process of exploring locations and potential funding partners, but we expect to have those details worked out within the next few weeks. In past years, the summit has proven to be hugely successful at fostering fellowship and invigorating our most outstanding venturers.

In April, a group of more than 20 Serbian youth will come to the US to visit various YV offices over the course of two weeks. While they are here they will learn the essentials of starting their own social ventures and upon returning to their country they will be able to hit the ground running with their fresh new ideas and plans. We then hope to pair them up with venturers in the US who will then be able to visit Serbia and collaborate further with this group. We’ve been able to organize this new exciting initiative with the help of the American Councils for International Education.

As always, we value your support and value your insight. With the coming year we hope to continue supporting creative young minds that are determined to transform their communities and society at large. Please feel free to provide us with feedback on how we can better go about achieving this goal at any time.