As America Celebrates 250 the Next Gen is Ready to Take the Reins
Images via Shuterstock licensed by Être
Let the fireworks begin.
America is turning 250 and the next generation is celebrating as only they know how - with courage, curiosity and a roaring desire to see what's next.
Much like the nation itself.
From it's inception - from the moment a small band of founders sought to secure life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for all who followed - America has asked what's next?
Exemplifying three extraordinary traits - courage, curiosity and unfettered creativity, this nation has spent the last 250 years declaring our independence, pushing westward and skyward and putting innovative technologies to work on the world's greatest problems.
And much has worked. As McKinsey & Company told us last week, "[t]he country is home to just 4 percent of the world's population yet generates 26 percent of global GDP. It has the headquarters of 59 of the world's 100 most valuable companies, 38 percent of the world's most highly cited scientists, and more than half of the world's notable AI models. No populous country with a population of over 10 million enjoys a higher per capita GDP."
The best part? Girls have been watching.
From the daughters of founders hearing mothers urge their fathers to "remember the ladies" to young suffragettes watching role models in action, from teen civil rights activists marching in mentors' footsteps to female NASA interns and the latest and youngest slate of AI experts (see more of them here and meet their role models here), girls have watched women ask the country what's next and then answer with decisive action.
How have girls been celebrating as Independence Day approaches?
By sending Letters to America (see them here) in time for National Youth Day, holding Next Gen Roundtables to encourage early civic debate and pitching entrepreneurial ideas through America Innovates.
Because if there is one thing the next generation understands, it's independence.
Don't forget, they attended zoom classes alone during COVID and held solo practice sessions for their sports.
They became instant caretakers for younger siblings when essential worker parents could no longer leave work.
They invented safety products alone in their basements during pandemics, launched solo non-profits during natural disasters, summoned their courage to speak 1:1 with icons and stood in solitary spotlights onstage to share big ideas with the world.
Indeed, even data from our latest research confirms that today's girls value independence in new ways and believe it gives them the ability to bring change.
They get independence and they are coming of age wrapped in its colors.
This weekend, as we place hands on hearts while anthems play, gaze at fireworks that light the sky and gather across a country that, while proudly a quarter of a century old remains young next to other nations, may we remember this:
We are a nation that asks what’s next.
Imperfection, baked neatly into our formation with the words in order to form a more perfect union, was our impetus. Courage, curiosity and creativity have been the catalysts that carried us. And role models so important that we etched them into stone made us want to (forgive me) rush more. Will girls' faces be on similar monuments in the nation's next age? I think so.
Courage, curiosity and a yearning for what’s next.
Three vital elements that have forged the last 250 years of history.
The same three qualities will fuel the next 250 years of discovery.
Looking forward more than ever,
Illana
ÊXTRAS: Three more ways the next gen will be celebrating this weekend you won't want to miss: Giving 4th spotlighting charities that matter, America's Soundtrack cataloging anthems and America's Time Capsule safeguarding moments and meories we will want to remember.
