Dear Camelback Community,
When I’m home in Boston, I like to take long walks by the Charles River. It’s my time to reflect and re-energize. In certain moments, I can feel my ancestors walk alongside me. I can feel how they rose up to face the challenges of their day. How they pushed through. How they persisted. How they persevered. I feel their presence, and I know it’s the same for us. We can and we will keep building towards brighter futures.
I was reminded of this in the words of Sherrilyn Ifill at Howard University’s Opening Convocation, as she talked about how our ancestors planted seeds. Seeds of change. Seeds of opportunity. Seeds of justice. Leaders of the Reconstruction Era and Civil Rights Movement sowed those seeds, not knowing if they would see the fruits in their lifetimes. And today, we are the ones blessed to reap the harvest.
Yet as Ifill wisely reminds us, the harvest doesn’t last forever. Looking around at our world today, I feel it deeply, we’re being called to pick up the mantle from our ancestors. It’s our turn now to become the planters, the sowers, the builders. We must use the bounty of today’s harvest to plant new seeds for the generations to come.
At Camelback Ventures, we’re taking this call to action to heart as we build our blueprint for the next decade of entrepreneurship. We’re rewriting outdated financial models, confronting funding disparities, and dismantling the barriers that block under resourced entrepreneurs from thriving.
Our blueprint is one of long-term investments. The work that we do now creates the kind of future our grandchildren’s children deserve—one where everyone, regardless of their background, has a clear and accessible path to success.
I’ve seen how this work pays off. Personally, in my own path to Howard, knowing that my years there were in part because of paths my ancestors built. I see it professionally as we build ecosystems of authentic, nurturing support around our founders as they scale their ventures and transform industries.
The blueprint we’re building chooses vision over inequitable tradition. True change requires us to rethink who makes decisions, who has access to resources, and how we define success. It asks us to embrace discomfort in service of what’s right and just.
Most of all, our blueprint designs pathways to shared prosperity and generational wealth in communities that have been historically excluded. The innovators we back at Camelback aren’t just building companies—they’re pioneering inclusive solutions that uplift entire communities.
But the blueprint of social change needs all of us for it to move from plans to expedient reality. It needs believers and backers, encouragers and investors. It needs people like you who see the brighter future it represents and who will lend your time, your voice, your resources to help us build it, brick by brick.
That’s where you come in. I’m asking you to join us in drafting this blueprint. When you support our work, you are contributing directly to a stronger foundation now and a stronger future tomorrow. Please, if you can, give today.
Together, we can ensure our future is built in a way that our communities deserve. We can realize a more just future, but first, we must build it. I hope you’ll join us.
In community,
Shawna Young
Cameback Ventures CEO
This blog is the first in a new series from our CEO, sharing reflections and insights into our ecosystem and how we’re navigating today’s shifting landscape. Learn more about how Camelback has invested over $9 million into more than 200 under resourced entrepreneurs over the past decade and connect with Shawna on LinkedIn for more of her reflections.
