New York Social Entrepreneur Gets 2008 Purpose Prize for Innovation,
Extraordinary Social Contribution in Encore Career, After Age 60
 

Mark Goldsmith’s mission: Drastically reduce recidivism rate of 18- to 24-year-olds on Riker’s Island.

SAN FRANCISCO (December 4, 2008) — Civic Ventures, a national think tank on boomers, work and social purpose, announced that Mark Goldsmith is one of the 15 winners of its 2008 Purpose Prize, a three-year, $9 million program for people over 60 who are taking on society’s biggest challenges. The Purpose Prize, now in its third year, is the nation’s only large-scale investment in social innovators in the second half of life.

Mark Goldsmith of Getting Out and Staying Out will receive $100,000 for his work to reduce recidivism via Getting Out and Staying Out, a non-profit organization he founded in 2004 that has helped more than 400 young men get out and stay out of prison. The Prize consists of six $100,000 awards and nine $10,000 awards.

"This is the most gratifying event of my career," said Goldsmith. "Everything I learned running businesses over 35 years went into the practical program that makes Getting Out and Staying Out successful. We’re just getting started. There is a lot of work to do."

"In tough economic times, we need more creative solutions to long-standing social problems," said Marc Freedman, co-founder of The Purpose Prize and author of Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life. "It's reassuring to note that as America ages, we have creativity in greater abundance. Purpose Prize winners such as Mark Goldsmith show that experience and innovation can go hand in hand, that inventiveness is not the sole province of the young."

Getting Out and Staying Out helps men 18-24 build meaningful lives in the mainstream through a rigorous program that begins inside Horizon Academy, the voluntary high school of Riker’s Island prison. Once accepted into the program, participants get one-to-one mentoring on the fundamentals of living a successful life that leaves the street corner behind, access to resources and role models, and primers in the fundamentals of showing up on a daily basis. At the GOSO storefront office on East 116^th Street in Manhattan, participants get ongoing one-to-one and group mentoring in how to get a job, how to keep a job, how to advance, and how to contribute to the community in a positive way.

GOSO has worked with more than 800 men. Of the more than 400 who have gotten out, 85% have stayed out—vs. the Riker’s Island average of 33%. Most GOSO participants are either working or pursuing college degrees; many are doing both simultaneously.

Summaries of all winners, as well as videos and photographs, are online at www.purposeprize.org.