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MATT KELLEY AWARDED \u201cPOINTS OF LIGHT\u201d DISTINCTION BY PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH<\/b><\/p>\n
(Seattle, WA) Matt Kelley, The Mavin Foundation\u2019s 22-year-old founder, President and C.E.O., has been awarded a \u201cPoints of Light\u201d award by President George W. Bush for \u201c\u2026helping to solve serious social problems through volunteer service.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 1998, as a freshman at Wesleyan University, Matt founded MAVIN<\/i>, the only internationally acclaimed magazine celebrating multiracial and transracially adopted people. In 1999, he coordinated the 3rd Pan Collegiate Conference on the Mixed Race Experience and taught a course at Connecticut\u2019s Wesleyan University titled, “Racially Mixed in the U.S.A” the following year. For his innovative approach to race and diversity issues, he has been featured in over 200 newspaper, magazine and television features spanning four continents, including CNN, Newsweek<\/i>, The Los Angeles Times<\/i>, and USA Today<\/i>. Seattle<\/i> magazine named Matt one of \u201c9 to Watch In The Next Century,\u201d Teen People magazine named him a \u201cLocal Hero\u201d and he was named a \u201cRace Scholar\u201d by The TRIBES Project.<\/p>\n
Matt also serves as Vice President of the Association of MultiEthnic Americans (AMEA), and on the Board of Directors for the Central District Forum for Arts and Ideas, a Seattle-based not-for-profit celebrating African-American culture. He has donated thousands of volunteer hours to organizations like the Seattle-based, Childhaven, which serves underprivileged children who come from backgrounds of abuse and neglect, and the Seattle Art Museum\u2019s development initiative for communities of color.<\/p>\n
The Mavin Foundation is a 501-(c)(3) non-profit organization that is redefining diversity by celebrating mixed-race people and families. In 2000, nearly seven million Americans were able to check multiple races on their census forms for the first time. In cities like Seattle, WA, San Antonio, TX and Sacramento, CA, nearly one in six babies born is multiracial. Mavin is committed to creating exciting projects that raise awareness of this rapidly emerging community. Our innovative projects like MAVIN magazine are providing a unique forum to increase awareness of the changing face of our multicultural society.<\/p>\n