"Silver Rights Entrepreneur," Operation HOPE founder and Love Leadership author spreads global message to more than 7000 attendees at City Harvest Church; The GSIF awards Bryant the SIP Fellow Award for his positive influence and impact on generations and communities around the globe

 

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(LOS ANGELES – October 27 2009)
– At the request of Singapore Member of Parliament, YGL (Young Global Leader) and
Global Social Innovators Forum (GSIF) Founder Penny Low, Operation HOPE (HOPE) Founder, Chairman and CEO John Hope Bryant, also a YGL, traveled to Singapore to share the five principles of Love Leadership and accept the prestigious Social Distinguished Fellow Award.

On the heels of Operation HOPE's successful education initiative launch of FIVE MILLION KIDS (5MK), Bryant, who also serves as Vice Chairman of the US President's Advisory Council on Financial Literacy, takes HOPE's "silver rights" movement to the Far East, joining over 300 delegates and speakers from around the world on October 1 – 3, to share his formula for a new kind of leadership – one based on love.

This year's GSIF "Collaborative Innovations: Investing in Team Earth," focused on exploring sound strategies in business, social entrepreneurship and innovation in the green to gold movement. Bryant played a key role in several plenary sessions, facilitated panels, lent his expertise on the importance of social investment and social entrepreneurship.

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Bryant, who received the
SIP Award and S. Rob Walton, chairman of Wal-Mart, who was acknowledged with SIP's Distinguished Fellow Award, were two of the forum's most prominent participants. Since 2008, the SIP Distinguished Fellow and SIP Fellow Awards have been awarded once a year at the GSIF Gala Dinner, honoring leaders in Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation worldwide. Last year, humanitarian and martial arts actor, Jet Lee became the first recipient.

The GSI Forum was created to educate, enhance, and empower citizens to become social innovators or change-makers and has grown in popularity. Support and participation for the event came from the world's youngest CEO, Suhas Gopinath, CEO of Globals, Inc. as well as Peter Seligmann, Chairman of Conservation International; Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Zainal Abidin; Minister for Community Development Youth and Sports, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan; Minister of Foreign Affairs George Yeo; Minister of State Mrs Yu-Foo Yee Shoon amongst others. Alvin Toffler, futurist and author of the influential tomes Future Shock and The Third Wave, led a conversation on global leadership.

While in Singapore, Bryant was invited to speak at Asia's second largest house of worship, City Harvest, and to discuss his new best seller, Love Leadership: THE New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World. Bryant spoke before more than 7,000 members of the church, also broadcast throughout Asia, which followed a 90-minute sold-out book signing at the SIP Forum itself.

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Warmly received, Bryant conducted several media interviews while in Singapore, including Prestige Magazine,
Human Resources Magazine, and News Asia, which is the largest provider of news in the region. He and Operation HOPE have already received several invitations to return and launch silver rights initiatives from Operation HOPE's Banking on Our Future, to 5MK.

Note: Also receiving the SIP Fellow Award were: Calvin Chin, Co-founder and CEO of Qifang, China; Suhas Gopinath, Founder and CEO of Globals Inc., India, Melissa Kwee, Chairperson of Halogen Foundation, Singapore; Peter Seligmann, Chairman of Conservation International, USA; Dea Sudarman, President of Alun Alun, Indonesia, Ting Choon Meng, Chairman/CEO of HealthSTATS International Pte Ltd, Singapore.

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About FIVE MILLION KIDS (5MK)

FIVE MILLION KIDS (5MK) is Operation HOPE's national "silver rights" initiative to break the cycle of the high school dropout epidemic by rebranding education in a "Making Smart Cool and Sexy" campaign. The project centers on giving students feasible options for financial independence through entrepreneurship training; providing accessible role models as a catalyst to making school relevant to students; and offering HOPE's financial literacy portfolios as a commitment to financial empowerment for parents and educators. In 5 years 5MK expects to reach, teach and touch 5 million students, their parents and teachers about how to get rich, legally through financial literacy; the language of money, free enterprise capitalism, and the dignity of ownership. Visit www.5MK.org for more information.

About Operation HOPE, Inc.

Operation HOPE is America's leading nonprofit social investment banking and financial literacy empowerment organization. With more than 400 private sector partners, 1500 nonprofit organizations and schools, and 100 government partners in 68 major U.S. cities as well as South Africa, HOPE has raised more than $500 million in its pursuit of educating, assisting and inspiring the next generation of global stakeholders. Through international initiatives and its three principal programs, Banking on Our Future (teaching school children about money), HOPE Coalition America (Mortgage HOPE Crisis Hotline, 1-888-388-HOPE, financial emergency preparedness and disaster relief), and Walk-In HOPE Centers (loans, bill pay, computer literacy, understanding banking principles), Operation HOPE has delivered services to more than one million low-wealth individuals and assumed the responsibility of piloting the Silver Rights Movement towards making free enterprise and capitalism relevant to all underserved communities. To learn more about HOPE, visit www.operationhope.org. or read our blog at www.operationhope.org/blog.

 

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