A conversation between Sophia Laettner Joubert (Outgoing Curator) and Al Hanson (Current Curator) discussing the Jacksonville Hub's impact journey from founding through 2025, showcasing achievements, ongoing projects, and future vision.
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Connect with us here:
Website: https://www.globalshapers.org/home
LinkedIn: Jacksonville Global Shapers Hub
Instagram: @globalshapersjax
Email: jacksonville.shapers@gmail.com
Mentioned Links:
Global Shapers Jax application
Demo: Forum’s Strategic Intelligence Map
Meeting Transcript:
@0:00 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
This meeting is being recorded. Okay, great. Hello, everyone. Welcome back. This is Shaping Forward, a podcast dedicated to community organizing and organized by the Jacksonville Global Shapers Hub.
I'm Sophia Laettner Joubert. I'm joined today by Alphaeus Hanson. And the purpose of this conversation today is for us as leaders in Jax Hub to discuss the impact that has been done to date through our hub, to highlight our hub for partners and potential new members and other collaborators in our community.
So we're going to go over our impact, reference our impact reports from the past four years and do a bit of intro talking about ourselves and our impact work and other collaborations and then looking to the future and the vision going forward.
for Jax hub's impact in Jacksonville, Florida. So thank you, Al, for joining me today for this conversation.
@1:08 - Alphaeus Hanson
Absolutely.
@1:09 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Thank you, And I'm going to start with, yeah, thank you, Al. Sorry about that, jumping in. I'm just going to start with a quick hook, a cold open for us on what Jaxhub has accomplished so far.
So we started in 2021, and from, you know, eight members with zero people impacted, now in 2025, we've trained 51 climate communicators in our Climate Conversations project.
We've had three major impact projects spanning climate consultancy and food security, and we've engaged over 50 young professionals in our organization.
So this is the story to date of Jacksonville Hub of the Global Shapers community, which is one of 500 hubs around the world.
And so I'll hand it over to you, Al, to talk about what is the Global Shapers community and what Jacksonville Hub does in that community.
@2:08 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yes, absolutely, Sophia. So thank you for the introduction. You pretty much hit the nail on the head about what the Global Shapers community is.
It's an initiative of the World Economic Forum. There are over 500 hubs around the world in over 150 countries around the world.
The Jacksonville Hub is one here in Northeast Florida. We're one of five in Florida, and we're one of eight nonprofits around the country, around the U.S.
And so the other Florida-based hubs are in Gainesville, Tampa, Miami, and Orlando, and, of course, Jacksonville. So that is kind of our neighborhood that we're operating in.
But within a broader neighborhood, we are joined by hubs across the north. America and Caribbean region to include Canada, United States, and, of course, the Caribbean island countries.
So that's kind of a review of the Global Shapers overall. Over 10,000 members, know, thousands of alumni increasing every day and every year.
And we do impact projects, lead trainings, push education, provide, you know, basic necessities at times, depending on the project, around the world.
So that's a bit about the Shapers overall. Yes.
@3:38 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
I love that. And what I love about the network, too, is you're tapping into a knowledge base in this huge network of cutting edge, like technology and climate technology and impact around the world.
And so the goal really is to connect people over the impact, you know, the eye shape impact areas and that.
Aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and then knowledge, share, scale, replicate. And so I love that about it.
And now I'll go into the journey, like the timeline of JAX Hub a bit. So in August 2020, we were approved by the Global Shapers community with Mayor Lenny Curry's support.
Our founding curator, Pascal Rathle, was, you know, instrumental in getting us founded as a hub. Then in January 2021, Pascal launched the first hub meeting with our first 18 shavers.
Then in the spring, we developed, of 2021, developed the charter and launched impact project accelerators internally from the hub.
This is like the buildup of impact time and identifying what kind of impact projects our members want to participate in.
Then in 2022, we participated in the Climate Reality Incubator, which It's a program under Climate Reality, which is a partner with the Global Shapers community, and we won a grant for our Climate Conversations project.
And in July 2022, there was a leadership transition. Danae Leake became our curator. I was our vice curator that year.
And in fall 2022, we were selected as one of 10 global hubs for a Scale360 Circular Economy program, which I participated in and found really helpful training in terms of understanding the circular economy, how circularity works, and that tech, which aligned well with my professional work at the time as I was working for a carbon 3D printing company.
So we love the professional development opportunities in this network as well. In 2023, we launched our Climate Conversations workshops.
Our first impact report was published, and now we annually publish our impact report. In July 2023, I became curator, and I launched our Social Impact Consultancy project.
We continued our climate conversations. I believe we've had... We had four events to date, which has been great. And then we began the process of developing our food security project, which is still in development, but that's been a great thing to research and keep developing.
And then 2023-24 is really when we saw more hub growth. We hosted our All Florida Hub Impact Retreat in May 2024 in Jacksonville, and that was great.
And then 2024 in July, Al took over as curator. I'm now outgoing curator. And the food security project is implementation is beginning.
And to date, we have, like I said earlier, engaged over 50 Jacksonville young professionals with multiple impact projects running concurrently.
@6:49 - Alphaeus Hanson
That's, so don't mean to cut you off there, Sophia. think that was awesome. I think that was a really good overview.
What I would say is, you know, everything that we've done has been Thank Fit into the three pillars of our mission, kind of amplifying community voices, providing multicultural, a multicultural platform for young leaders, and then, of course, enabling global decision-making solution building.
So part of this is internally looking, kind of providing those opportunities for shapers within the hub, and then it's also going out into the community and ensuring that people have information, that they have a space to voice their opinion.
Just last year, as part of the social impact consultancy project that you led, Sophia, we had a, you know, we did a watch party and a panel discussion for Earth Day in collaboration with Joni Roberts of Evolution University.
And so we brought out the community to discuss some of these relevant topics on energy transition in the region.
So those types of forums are things that... We realized that we have a bit of a strength in, and so it helps us continue to engage with the community and provide that space for them to be educated and voice their opinion.
@8:13 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Definitely. I love that. Thank you. And so, like we said, the purpose of this conversation is really to introduce ourselves, introduce the hub, expand the impact that we've done, and look forward to the future impact that we can create, expand our network, and connect with more organizations and individuals in Jacksonville who are looking to do impact work and collaborate, because I really see the Global Shapers hubs as connective tissue and networks which can, you know, connect people with new impact project ideas or the capacity to perform those projects.
I know many hubs have helped people, like, win grants, and that is something that I'm interested in. So I'll go into a brief introduction about myself, and then Al will introduce himself professionally.
But just so y'all know, I think we will share this with other people, but if you've listened to the other Shipping Forward podcast, it's typically me in the past who's hosted them.
I've been with the Jacksonville Global Shapers Hub since 2021. I was like one of the first who joined. A good friend of mine introduced me, and then I became friends with everyone in the hub.
I love them. And I was our first membership chair, our second vice curator, and our third curator. And I also work as a grant consultant and manager.
So I really enjoyed the professional development skills that I was able to practice in the Global Shapers community on like a lower stakes level of practicing project development or practicing a lot of design and outreach and emails, and that complemented well my professional work.
And then on the other hand, like market research or understanding circularity, I've just learned So much through this work that has complemented my understanding of the federal funding landscape.
And so I also love to volunteer my time as a grant writer consultant. I can help organizations who are seeking funding.
I offer like a 30-minute consultation and whatnot, especially if they're nonprofits with smaller budgets who are looking to get their first projects off the ground.
And so we have consulted also with partners on that sort of thing in our social impact consultancy work. And yeah, I think I've touched on everything, but that's me now.
I'm also a writer in my spare time.
@10:42 - Alphaeus Hanson
Awesome. Yeah, Sophia, I feel like I've heard you tell that story many times. And every time it's it's really inspiring to hear everything that you've been working on throughout your career and in thinking about that in context of when you were the curator.
Because I joined in August of 2023, after being introduced to the hub by Pascal, the founding curator. And I had come from a background of consulting, technology research, doing different things that I think gave me a really unique perspective, but it was one that I wanted to apply with more agency and then in a manner that could touch the community.
Closer, right? Be involved with the community closer and more practically. And so the Global Shaper community was an excellent opportunity to do that.
I kind of mentioned I was in consulting. I was doing technology research at a think tank. And right now I am working in venture capital, doing a fellowship with Transform Venture Capital, an early stage deep tech venture capital fund.
And so that process of due diligence. We even have an impact focus. So that overlaps with what we do here in the Global Shapers in the Jacksonville Hub.
And so it has been a learning experience like no other, especially after I took on the presidency or the curatorship in July of 2024.
So that has been, all of that has been extremely a growing, it's been a growing experience. It's been an opportunity to grow and learn.
And that kind of leads me into how I want to see the hub continue to grow after I exit curatorship.
I think really what it's about is it's getting people in the hub who have a vision, who have a drive to create the vision, and then creating a pipeline to facilitate the continuation of that.
That's something I worked hard on during my curatorship and something I believe the next curatorship will continue to work on and be able to sustain.
Even more so than what we've done during my curatorship. So I'm excited about the future of the Jacksonville Hub.
And I think once we get that entrenched pipeline, talent pipeline, everything else is going to blossom even more than it already has.
@13:18 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Definitely. I'm with you there. I'll just say briefly, I was really motivated to join because I had spent some time living abroad and I really enjoyed that this community has that global aspect and people who are globally minded and impact oriented.
And then I also love community service. So it combines those nice things that you get to socialize and network and do impact.
And then you also get to learn from your peers and tap into this global network. I love that about it.
I'm going to go now briefly into in more detail, like the impact that we've done and the partners that we've worked with, because I want to thank them publicly and.
And then we'll wrap up with talking about the vision for the future. And really, this is just to level set with everyone, like anyone we've worked with in the past, any past partners or potential future partners, any young people or students who might be interested in joining our hub, you're welcome to reach out to us.
And so we want to provide this resource for further context on what we do and who we are. And so just briefly, again, our founding years, I really consider 2020 to 2023, where we established our hub identity and purpose, and we launched the Climate Conversations project.
So we had three iterations of that up until my term. And then there was one event during your term, right, Al?
@14:44 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yeah, there was one in September of last year, yes.
@14:49 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Great. So that Climate Conversations project was funded through the grant from Climate Reality Project. And that was really helpful for our hub to, and like the treasurers, to manage money.
Budget, event planning. And we partnered with NOKI, which stands for the, I should have the whole thing here. It's like the National Oceanic.
@15:10 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yeah, it's like the National Network of Oceanic and Climate. I forget exactly what it is, but it was Lauren Watkins who helped us out with that, Dr.
Lauren Watkins. Yes, just, and she's also with Impact.
@15:26 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
She was also with Impact by Design. Yes. I'm sorry I didn't have the full acronym here, but I found it.
National Network for Ocean and Climate Change Interpretation. So it's all about training people to understand what has changed and understand the data and be able to, the purpose of climate conversations is how do you have a conversation about climate change with someone who doesn't believe in climate change or rejects climate change.
And so we come together based on behavioral psychology and other ways that we can just establish trust and talk with each other.
They're on a respectful tone, even if you have differences of opinion. And the impact metrics from that work, from those climate conversations events, showed that people left with an increased sense of confidence about the future and about climate conversations and how they would have these sorts of conversations and a decreased sense of climate anxiety.
So we found that very helpful. And then also during those years in 2023 was when I participated in the Circular Economy Initiative, and that was a time where we really built our network.
We started attending the UNF Environmental Symposium, and I got to meet with a lot of great climate and environment organizations in Jacksonville.
So that's where we are best networked, I believe, like best connected. And we also want to connect and get to know other sectors in Jacksonville.
So that was a great initiative and a great year-long program that we took part in. And then then in a minute.
Thank From 2023 to 2025, I consider more of our growth period. We're looking to grow our number of shapers in the hub and expand our organizational capacity so that we can be running even more, like, multiple impact projects at once in different committees and also have a social once a month and service opportunities once or twice a month.
And throughout my engagement, we've gone to, like, food closets or food pantries. We've donated a lot. We've done some beach and river cleanups.
And we've gone to events. We've gone to the art walk to meet people and recruit people. We've been on panels.
We've volunteered as our, you know, using our professional skills and volunteered our time. And so we're always looking for more ways to engage in Jacksonville and join those service opportunities, especially as they come up, you know, hands-on or...
Minds on, whatever works. We want to do that and bring that opportunity to the Jacksonville Global Shapers and our network.
And so this growth period has really been like leadership, good training, you know, building up the skills of our hubs and the know-how and knowledge sharing of the past, all the context, the charters are reviewed every year and we make sure that everything is accurate and up to date and ensuring continuity in terms of developing leadership and training people.
You know, who will take over the hub? Each July, there's a transition. There's a leadership transition. And climate conversations also expanded during that time.
We've scaled from our initial success to 51 people trained, which is great. The grant money has all been used or dispersed, which is great.
And now we're developing this food security project with our incoming impact officer, who's very, um, passionate about this issue.
And we're- And You can partner with foodrecovery.org, so that's someone to look into and connect with if you guys aren't aware of foodrecovery.org, and our goal is to rescue 500 pounds of food by 2025.
So we're working on that project and looking also potentially at grant funding to support it. But also in 2024, like I mentioned, hub leadership and collaboration was a big deal.
We hosted the All Florida Hubs Impact Retreat in May 2024 in Jacksonville, in Jack's Beach. Actually, it was really nice.
We were at the Marriott Hotel, Jack's Beach, and we brought together shapers from Gainesville, Tampa, Miami, Orlando, and our Jacksonville hubs.
And we facilitated Crosthub Impact Project collaboration. Actually, I'll have you mention next, like at that meeting was when we first talked about little libraries, little free libraries with Orlando.
And since now, Jax has installed one, which is great. And the purpose of the Florida Interact Retreat is to get all of us together and see if there's cross-hub initiatives that we can share across Florida, how we can support each other, and it strengthens our Florida Global Shapers network.
And yes, that's everything I have. So you can jump into your current leadership.
@20:23 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yeah, yeah. And I would say Sophia was so hardworking and is also so humble, but she put together most of the retreat last year, really did a lot of heavy lifting to pull that together.
I want to give a shout out to Vaughn as well, who helped out a lot with the Climate Conversations project, and it wouldn't have been able to come together without the University of North Florida's Institute for Environmental Research and Education, IRI.
Ruby Cox there was amazing in bringing... Students, Aaron Largo Wright, Dr. Aaron Largo Wright, who is the director of the program, helped out a lot as well.
And then for that, the last one we did, I want to say in September, One Jax was also very instrumental in that.
So it's really an entire community effort. All of this impact, all of this work that we do really wouldn't be able to come together without those partners, like Sophia mentioned.
So I really appreciate your work, Sophia, and appreciate all the partners as well and all of our current and previous shapers.
And so that's really what I want to build on, right? That's what I wanted to build on, build the partnerships.
We were able to secure grants for civic and voter engagement. Again, a lot of the networking and relationship building that Sophia did set the groundwork for us to be able to
To obtain that grant and continue that work into this year. So this is about, again, we're helping the community access information, access spaces that are going to expand the footprint of their civic responsibility and civic, basically their overall rights and what they can do as a citizen.
But again, this is a product of the work that we've done in the past, the partnerships. And I think that those partnerships are the base and the groundwork for kind of how I wanted to transition the hub from where we were to start my curatorship to where we're going to be after.
I think we have a very solid partners that we can speak to as far as the work that we've done and the work that we're doing.
To be able to establish a pipeline of talent that can continue the work that we're doing and expand it.
Sophia mentioned the food recovery project, the food rescue and recovery project. That's a very aspirational project that I do believe that we're going to materialize and actualize.
And so the more people we can get into the hub, the more impact we're going to be able to have and the further we'll be able to go and catalyze these ideas.
So that's my vision because that's part of the reason I joined the hub was to take these ideas and these visions and these talents and skills that people have and figure out a way to crystallize them into tangible progress that you can see in the community.
So that's what that's what this has been about these past. It's 10 months now, so we will see how it continues, but like I said before, I'm highly optimistic.
@24:08 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Me too. Thank you so much, Al, and thank you for your leadership. And it's very, very appreciated. I'm so glad that you joined and stepped into leadership, and I'm so grateful for all of our members and all of our partners.
So now we're just going to take a minute to thank all of our partners and collaborators by name. And if I forget anyone, please just know that we are very grateful and we love working with you.
We love working with all of our partners in the past, and we'd love to reconnect anytime. Just reach out whenever you like.
So what comes at the top of my list is our climate and environmental partners, which we've worked with a lot in the past, such as the St.
John's Riverkeeper. Thank you so much. The Jacksonville Climate Coalition. Thank you so much. The Jacksonville Environmental Protection Board. Thank you so much.
The First Coast Resilience Collaborative Economic Resilience Committee. Thank you so much. I believe they're connected with the Northeast Florida Regional Council, which is our economic development district in Jacksonville.
I love those organizations and the people there. Also, the North Florida Green Chamber of Commerce was instrumental. Thank you so much to them.
Our Climate Reality Project grant funder and our, you know, friends in the Global Shapers community there. Thank you. And thank you to Evolution University.
And thank you to UNF Institute of Environmental Research and Education, as Al mentioned. And then community organizations, OneJAX, Jacksonville Civic Council, Feeding Northeast Florida, and the UNF Interfaith Center.
Thank you guys so much for all the great events and things we've been to. Thank And the regional and planning bodies such as Northeast Florida Regional Council, Economic Development District.
Thank you for your work. And the North Florida Transportation Planning Organization. Thank you. Thank you for talking with me.
Technical and Training Partners, the National Network for Ocean and Climate Change Interpretation and Impact by Design. Thank you so much.
The World Economic Forum Scale 360 Program. Thank you for that training. Project Specific Partners, FoodRecovery.org and other partners. Thank you so much.
And then our Cross Hub collaborators, all of the Florida Hubs, Miami, Orlando, Tampa, and Gainesville. Thank you guys so much.
And I know we have, I believe, you know, some time remaining. So, Al, I'd love for you to talk about current needs, opportunities, and close out with our, like, call to action.
@26:38 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yes, for sure. For sure. Let me also give a shout out to the Lugano Hub, Eileen. That's our partner, our Twin City Hub.
And then 904 Forward as well. They helped us quite a bit with the grants. Rihanna Scyster was amazing. And she started the Jacksonville Policy Engagement.
Group, which was an excellent initiative that we plugged in a little bit with as well. What I see going forward and what I see in the future for the Jacksonville Hub is I think there's a lot of potential to take projects and ideas that were started in universities and take them and really create an incubator for students to be able to graduate from college and continue the work that they're doing, partner with organizations, utilize the global network that Global Shapers has, and the resources such as strategic intelligence, which, again, Sophia, you put together a training, I think it was last year or two years ago, that was very informative.
We had a premium membership, right, which was outstanding. So there's a number of opportunities within the Global Shapers for, you know, for...
Current students for young professionals who are looking to amplify the work that they're doing, build skills, exercise the skills that they already have.
And I think that's the main kind of ask or main focus here is how do we get young professionals who are looking to really make the world a better place, improve themselves, grow as a person?
How do we get them in this organization and contributing with kind of the goals in mind and the objectives in mind?
That is the biggest kind of focus that I'm on, you know, my biggest focus. And I see my role as curator as setting up the next curatorship with the resources and the groundwork and the environment to advance not only their objectives, but to also continue the work that we've done in the past.
It's to build the hub and to continue growing as an organization.
@29:07 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Definitely. I love that. And so I encourage anyone listening to this, please share it with young professionals in your network who you think would benefit from joining our hub in Jacksonville or other cities around the world, because you can look up, there's so many hubs, 500 hubs around the world.
Any major city, you'll probably be in a Global Shapers community city. And the opportunity is open for young professionals ages 18 to 27.
That is not our limitation. It's the World Economic Forum Global Shapers community limitation. So this is for young professionals, social impact, also socializing and networking.
And like we said, practicing your skills. It's a very think tank, at least our hub is, pretty much like kind of operates as a think tank, as a social impact consultancy.
It's flexible. We want engaged, dedicated people. And if you say you want to practice your finance skills, you volunteer to be the treasurer and you will get trained by the former treasurer.
And it's a great way to practice in those skills. And it's also a great way to get to know your city better and have your, you know, feet on the ground and be engaged.
So we love that about it. Like we mentioned, an access to global, a global network of changemakers, leadership development opportunities, and training from cutting edge thought leaders and experts in the global shapers community.
So the application process is you could visit our website and submit your application online. If you can't find it, you can comment, reach out to us anytime.
I will definitely share the link in this post. And you can also connect with us. We're on Instagram at global shapers, Jax, and we're also on LinkedIn, global shapers Jax hub.
And our email is jacksonville.shapers at gmail.com. Do you have any parting words out?
@30:57 - Alphaeus Hanson
The only parting words I have is that any. Anything that you want to do, anything that you want to achieve, I really believe is possible through the Global Shapers.
Anybody that you want to meet, if you remember Davos being able to go to Davos or the annual meeting of new champions, through the Global Shapers, really, I believe anything is possible.
And I'm not just saying that. I've seen absolutely amazing things happen within this community. So I highly recommend anybody who's thinking about it, reach out to us and we can provide you more information.
Or if you'd like to join, we can certainly expedite that process as well.
@31:38 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Definitely. I love that. Since we do have a few minutes left, I would love to hear about your experience at those conferences.
That can be a source of inspiration for people because also I should mention a benefit is that when you rise up in leadership in the hubs, you have the opportunity to travel.
Like I went to Geneva, Switzerland, for the annual curator summit in 2024. And Al, you went. Sorry, I went in 2023 and you went in 2024.
And so talk about that experience. I mean, it was great to meet so many people, but then you've also gone to other summits where you've had to apply and tell us about that.
@32:15 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yeah, yeah. The main flagship summit I went to at the main flagship conference was the annual meeting, World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Davos.
And that was in January in Davos, Switzerland. Truly all inspiring to see professionals at that level operate in a professional environment, in a work environment.
Most of what I learned was practical, practical kind of skill sets and insights that I applied to my own, in my own kind of setting to just, again, grow and advance personally.
But I think that if you are looking to advance any of the work that you're doing, that's a very good platform to do that.
I think that it's... One of the few conferences at that level that carve out a space for youth. that's, you know, I really want to thank the World Economic Forum team, Global Shapers team back in Geneva, who works hard every year to put that together.
So that's outstanding. We even have shapers who can speak on panels. So in the past, we've had shapers speak on panels with the CEO of Microsoft, right?
So that's what I mean by anything is possible. And when you're in those settings, and it's very much, it's easier to connect with those people and advance, you know, you have an opportunity to advance the initiatives that you're working on.
So, again, it was outstanding. I met a lot of amazing people, increased my network a lot. And so I'm looking forward to future opportunities and possibly what other Global Shapers are going to be able to do with those types of opportunities for sure.
Thank
@34:00 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Oh, I'm not sure if you cut off there for a second.
@34:03 - Alphaeus Hanson
Yeah. No, that's all I had.
@34:10 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Amazing. I think there was a part where my internet connection cut out, but I'll see it. I love what you said about the opportunity.
And also, I just want to reiterate to people, these conferences are difficult to get to. And World Economic Forum is serious about putting young professionals into leadership positions or into opportunities to speak with leaders.
And so really highlighting young professionals, no matter how young they are, 18 to 27, you know, because they reserve these spots.
They reserve like 50 spaces for global shapers to attend these meetings. And I attended the climate reality training in Houston, Texas, which had 50 slots for shapers.
So you apply, you get in. It's a great opportunity. Without that incentive, there might not be that many young people, you know, at those meetings, but through this network.
you. You have access to these conferences and meetings that are really discussing, like we said, cutting edge, impactful work and shaping the future together.
And that really is the goal. So I appreciate this conversation. I'm so glad to share this with people. Thank you so much, Al, for helping me cover everything that we've gone through and our vision for the future. And we're just going to keep going onwards and upwards.
@35:25 - Alphaeus Hanson
Absolutely. Sophia, thank you for your work. And really, I really appreciate you having me on the podcast.
@35:34 - Sophia Laettner Joubert
Thank you. Yeah, thank you so much. See you later.
@35:38 - Alphaeus Hanson
See you.
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