Joshua Venture was founded in 1998 by three leading American Jewish foundations and operated through 2005 as a start-up fellowship program that supported and trained emerging Jewish social entrepreneurs in order to enable them to transform their visions into action. Sixteen (16) young Jewish men and women in two cohorts of 8 received seed funding, and organizational and professional development support, and developed communities of practices over two years as Joshua Venture fellows. Joshua Venture also conferred legitimacy upon the fellows and their ventures, and expanded their neworks within the Jewish world.

 

Among the 16 alumni are Aaron Bisman of JDub Records, who launched musical phenoms Matisyahu and Balkan Beat Box; Amichai Lau-Lavie, the acclaimed creative talent behind Storahtelling; Ronit Avni of Just Vision which created multi-award winning film “Encounter Point”; and “Forward 50” Amy Tobin, founder of The Hub at the SF JCC. Eight (8) of the 15 organizations are listed in Slingshot ’06, a resource guide for Jewish Innovation: Ayecha, Heeb, JDub Records, Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation, Just Vision, El Centro de Estudios Judios, Storahtelling, Sharsheret. (Slingshot’s methodology involved twenty-five (25) foundation professionals applying four criteria to organizations under consideration: innovation, impact, strong leadership and organizational effectiveness. Slingshot’s intent is to help donors identify sound investments.)

 

CLI is one of the foundations taking part in the effort to re-launch Joshua Venture in the near future. Click here to read the Executive Summary of the re-launch business plan.