The 2025 New Haven Civic Innovation Prize Awards Four Student and Community-Led Ventures

On April 3rd-4th, 2025, Startup Yale—a university-wide collaboration among partners including the Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale (Tsai CITY), Dwight Hall, the Yale Center for Business and the Environment, and InnovateHealth Yale—celebrated its tenth annual conference, honoring entrepreneurial and community-driven ventures at Yale and across New Haven. The New Haven Civic Innovation Prize, administered by Dwight Hall and led by Director of Community Outreach and Engagement Johnny Scafidi ’01, launched the conference’s awards ceremonies with its pitch-off on April 3rd.

The New Haven Civic Innovation Prize awards up to $25,000 to student-led or community-led efforts or projects that benefit the city of New Haven. Previous winners include The Key Bookstore, an interactive bookstore that promotes Afrocentricity and environmentalism, and Huneebee Project, which trains youth who have been involved with the foster care system or child protective services to nurture beehives and gardens, as well as teach others about their work.

In 2025, there were four finalists for the Prize: Black Obsidian Healing, which fosters community and healing among Black men in New Haven; ShellVive, which repurposes discarded oyster shells into water filtration materials; Wealth Beacon Group Foundation, which combines affordable housing programs with mental health, education, and financial literacy support; and Enrich Health, which is establishing maternity health and wellness centers focused on reducing health disparities nationwide.

For Amir and Yvette Glenn, founders of Wealth Beacon Group Foundation, applying for the Civic Innovation Prize was a tremendous opportunity. “We saw the Civic Innovation Prize as a chance to elevate our mission while connecting with others committed to driving impact,” Amir explained. “This support allows us to accelerate our Housing with a Purpose campaign and continue expanding SHINE Academy, our free program that equips residents with financial literacy and life skills. The Prize also helps us grow partnerships and increase our visibility as we continue building infrastructure to serve more families.”

In their mission to create pathways from homelessness to home ownership, the Wealth Beacon Group Foundation has already helped six families—including fifteen children—move from shelters to permanent housing in the Greater New Haven area. With help from the Prize, they aim to expand this work.

The Civic Innovation Prize also supports Yale students and affiliates seeking to effect positive change during their time in New Haven. Through their start-up ShellVive, Daniel Yang ’26 M.B.A., Frank Cheng ’26 M.B.A., and Aidan Meese ’25 Ph.D. hope to provide safe and drinkable water. “We are new residents of New Haven and as students, temporary residents,” they explained. “But we want to be a part of the community even in our short time here and create a positive impact, so we thought the Civic Innovation Prize was a great way to demonstrate our commitment to the community.”

As part of the Prize’s programming during Startup Yale, each organization gave a live pitch to a panel of judges, explaining their mission and what they would plan to do with the awarded funding. Dr. Monique Rainford of Enrich Health thoroughly enjoyed the pitch presentation. “I found the live pitch enjoyable, energizing, and rewarding—it gave me the opportunity to connect with fellow finalists and a broader audience and to share our vision for transforming maternal health,” she explained.

After the pitches, a panel of judges including Arthur Thomas ’19 M.Div., Genevieve Walker, Luis Chavez-Brumel, and Emily Zhang ’25 (former Senior Co-Coordinator on Dwight Hall’s Student Executive Committee) awarded first, second, third, and fourth place prizes to the finalists.

Enrich Health won first place and $15,000 in support of its mission. ShellVive won second place and $7,000, Wealth Beacon Group Foundation won third place and $3,000, and Black Obsidian Healing won the Audience Choice Award and a prize of $2,000.

All the finalists emphasized the benefits of applying for the Prize and the key organizational goals the funding will support. “We were really grateful for the opportunity to participate in this competition and sincerely appreciated that the New Haven Civic Innovation Prize welcomed community-led ventures to participate in this process,” Dr. Rainford concluded.

The New Haven Civic Innovation Prize is a key program within the Advance pillar of Dwight Hall’s Engage, Grow, and Advance program delivery model, fostering innovative solutions to promote lasting change in the New Haven community and around the world.