Two residents of Northwest Minnesota are among eight individuals throughout Minnesota who have been chosen as Fellows for the two-year Initiators Fellowship, which assists social entrepreneurs in fast-tracking their ideas, growing their social and professional networks, and further developing their business and community leadership skills.
The two Fellows for Northwest Minnesota are:
- Daniel Barrientez Jr., of Bemidji. Daniel will build felon-friendly employment opportunities as he develops a food truck business, creating jobs for former felons. Daniel, himself, struggled to find employment due to his record after he was released from incarceration in 2010. Faced with many roadblocks — from employment to housing — he ultimately earned a degree in the culinary arts.
- Brenna Rollie, of Fosston. Brenna will develop wellness and community-building opportunities with her yoga business by providing classes, events, and camps, with an emphasis on healing and culture. Her dream is to create a community where all residents live in harmony with the land, water, and each other.
The eight Fellows selected for the 2022-2023 cohort represent 53 counties and six sovereign tribal nations in Central, Northwest, Southwest and West Central Minnesota. They will receive an annual $30,000 stipend during the two-year program, which also includes comprehensive programming, executive-level mentoring and leadership training, ongoing education, and support from dedicated staff members to advance their mission-driven business or nonprofit endeavors.
The Initiators Fellowship is new to Northwest Minnesota. It originated with the Little Falls-based Initiative Foundation in 2017 and its first cohort of four Fellows graduated in December 2019. This December, seven Fellows will graduate from the 2020-2021 cohort.
The Initiators Fellowship expanded to include the Northwest Minnesota Foundation for this next cohort, offering the fellowship opportunity to social entrepreneurs throughout NMF’s 12-county service area and two native nations, Red Lake and White Earth.
Visit this site for a map displaying all of the 2022-2021 Fellows’ locations and question-and-answer responses about their social enterprise ventures.
MEET ALL 8 FELLOWS!
From a community journalist with a goal to surface community-centered challenges and solutions to a grocery store owner creating food access, the field of eight fellows for the 2022-2023 Initiators Fellowship cohort has exciting ideas to positively impact their communities.
You can learn more about their ideas, through the short video posted at the bottom of this page.
You may also visit fellows.greaterminnesota.net for a map of all 8 Fellows’ locations and question-and-answer responses about their social enterprise ventures
