A Reflection from Our CEO, Kim Coupounas
Last week, more than a hundred people packed onto a Zoom call to celebrate the winners of Elevated Tracks 305, our songwriting competition in Miami. Kids, parents, teachers, professional musicians, community partners, community organizers, and people from all over South Florida and beyond. Gloria and Emilio Estefan were there too.
I was in tears for most of it. It should have felt like an awards ceremony. Instead it felt like something I don’t have a great word for. A community, maybe, but that sounds too small. A reminder? A relief?
Afterward, our top youth winner, Soleil River Nation, described it better than I could:
“I feel so overloaded with joy, especially getting to be in a room with such positive musicians, and just feeling the energy of everyone on that Zoom. Whether you lose or win, everybody was just so happy to be with a group of people who understand music. I always say that music is a language that not everyone speaks, but when they do, magic sparks, and it’s a beautiful thing. That’s what was happening in that room. I can’t stop smiling.”
Magic sparks. I keep coming back to that.
Here’s what I noticed about that room: I had no idea what anyone’s politics were. I don’t know who they voted for, what faith they practice, or what they think about any of the things that dominate the news. For that hour, none of it mattered. People were just genuinely happy for each other. And then I couldn’t stop wondering why that felt so rare.
Over the past year at Elevate Cities, I’ve had the privilege of meeting extraordinary people who are quietly making their communities stronger. As I sat with Soleil’s words that night, I realized I wasn’t thinking about our work anymore. I was thinking about how rare it has become to see people from every walk of life gathered around something that reminds them of what they share instead of what divides them.
Our nation turns 250 this year. Across the country, cities and states are marking the occasion in all kinds of ways, celebrating achievements, honoring milestones, and remembering the people and events that shaped us. Much of the conversation is understandably focused on looking back, trying to answer the question, “Who have we been?”
I’ve found myself wondering something different.
What kind of ancestors do we want to be?
My own family makes that question complicated and personal.
Some of my ancestors fought in every American war. Some were recent immigrants – people who came here for economic opportunity, or to escape religious persecution, or both. Some were early colonists. And some were slaveowners.
That last sentence is hard to write. But leaving it out feels like exactly the kind of erasure that keeps us from understanding anything clearly. My family’s story contains courage and injustice, sacrifice and complicity, hope and real harm done to real people.
I’ve come to realize I don’t have to choose between pride and honesty. I think loving your family, or your country, means telling the whole story.
America’s story is the same way. It’s bigger and more complicated than the version we usually tell. It didn’t begin in 1776, and it was nowhere near finished then either. It includes Indigenous peoples who cared for this land for thousands of years before colonization. It includes people who were enslaved and who kept demanding that this country live up to its own stated ideals. It includes waves of immigrants who came believing something better might be possible. It includes all the ordinary people who never made the history books but who kept showing up for their communities anyway.
America’s 250th feels like an opportunity to hold all of that and look at it in the full light of day. Not to make anyone feel bad, but because we can’t build our next chapter on an incomplete story. A story that includes everyone is ultimately a stronger one.
So why does any of this matter?
Because I don’t think America’s story is simply something we’re meant to admire or critique. Every generation inherits an unfinished country and faces the same question: What will we do with what we’ve inherited?
If that’s true, then the health of our democracy depends on whether we continue showing up for one another.
And that’s where I worry: not because we disagree. Democracy has always involved disagreement. I worry because too many of us have stopped believing our participation matters.
I don’t think that’s primarily a political problem. I think it’s a human one.
And yet, here’s what I’ve seen happen when people actually show up for one another: Strangers become collaborators. Young people discover they have something to say. Community organizers, and everyday people leave believing their city is worth investing in. Trust builds, slowly but surely.
I’ve come to believe that belonging doesn’t happen after you build a healthy democracy. It’s what makes one possible. We’ve been waiting to agree before we connect, but I think we have it backwards. Trust comes first, and trust grows because people show up for one another.
That’s why I care so much about joy…about music and art and celebrations and shared meals and all the things that can feel like they don’t matter. A city where people celebrate together is better equipped to solve hard things together.
Everywhere I go, I meet people who are extraordinary. I meet community organizers and nonprofit leaders who have been showing up for decades trying to solve really hard problems in their communities. I meet young people discovering their voices through art, music, and service. I meet parents coaching teams, feeding neighbors, and quietly building things that nobody asked them to build. These are the people who are, without much fanfare, keeping the fabric of their communities from coming apart.
They remind me that the future of this country isn’t waiting to be built. It’s already being built every day by people whose names we’ll never know.
Maybe that’s what America’s 250th is actually asking of us: not to celebrate what we’ve been, though that matters. Not to relitigate what went wrong, though that matters too. But to make a real choice about what comes next. To commit to creating a better America, where everyone has a place, where no one is left behind, and where every child can see themselves in the American story. That’s the America I want to help build.
If you’re ready for more unity and less isolation, get involved with us here at Elevate Cities. A year into our journey, we are eager to connect with artists, community organizers, social impact leaders, and anyone ready for more joy, belonging, and practical civic engagement. Get in touch with us here. We can’t wait to hear from you.