The Amplifiers program equips local leaders and creatives to become passionate, trusted messengers for civic engagement around clean energy in U.S. cities. During the three-month program, fellows learn from experts, build community, and make engaging content and plans for action to mobilize their networks. The special sauce: creators and community leaders come together in person in a unique, fun, high-energy setting intentionally designed to foster connection and long-term engagement. Amplifiers is co-created by national nonprofits Generation180 and Rewiring America.
We piloted the program in Atlanta, Georgia in Spring 2025, and the specific goals of Amplifiers: Atlanta were to:
By blending storytelling, community organizing, and policy education, Amplifiers aimed to transform clean energy from an abstract issue into a shared local opportunity.
Amplifiers is a unique approach to building community and fostering hyperlocal civic engagement that lasts well beyond the initial training. Informed by behavior change science and communications best practices, the Amplifiers: Atlanta program successfully created an environment where participants not only learned new information, but developed an emotional connection to the material through compelling storytelling – and formed new connections through community-building, fun, team bonding exercises (led by a comedian). Bringing community leaders and content creators together ignited new collaborations and infused on-the-ground efforts with fresh voices and new energy. The Amplifiers: Atlanta fellows continue to meet independently as a group, connecting online and in real life 9 months later.
The Amplifiers training was designed to put less emphasis on academics, facts, and the data of the climate change problem, and more emphasis on the solution of community – turning to your neighbor to inspire individual action.
Generation180 and Rewiring America partnered closely with Climate Power Georgia and the City of Atlanta, Mayor’s Office of Sustainability, to ensure the program reinforced – not duplicated – existing local efforts.
The program launched with a two-day, in-person convening in April 2025 that brought together 29 participants of 2 types: content creators (including filmmakers, comedians, and influencers) and community leaders (educators, veterans, students, parents, and advocates). This mix was deliberate. Creators brought online reach and cultural fluency, while community leaders brought trusted relationships and on-the-ground organizing experience.
Fellows participated in engaging discussions about local clean energy issues, electrification solutions, and civic engagement, along with a communications training and a collaborative “writers’ room” designed to help creators sharpen ideas.
To remove barriers to participation, all participants were paid stipends and received ongoing coaching and distribution support after the convening. This helped ensure that the work didn’t end when the workshop did. Creators committed to producing original videos with clear calls to action, while community leaders developed action plans ranging from hosting EV driveway parties to organizing educational events and attending Georgia public utility regulatory hearings.
One of the biggest challenges was overcoming skepticism and fatigue around climate messaging. Amplifiers addressed this by avoiding jargon, centering humor and storytelling, and explicitly connecting clean energy to concerns like affordability, health, racial justice, and community pride.
What makes Amplifiers unique is its fusion of creativity and civic power. It is not a one-off campaign or influencer activation, but a long-term investment in people–designed to build trust, local leadership, and repeatable impact. Another challenge: making the topic of clean energy relevant to people’s daily lives. We approached this by providing real-life examples of how shifting away from fossil fuels toward clean energy has reduced pollution, improved public health, and saved people money on home electricity costs.
Amplifiers: Atlanta exceeded its core objectives. Within months of the convening, creators produced a dozen videos that reached more than 1.3 million views and generated over 54,000 engagements, dramatically expanding the reach of locally grounded clean energy narratives.
Equally important, the program spurred real-world action. Participants had approximately 500 conversations about clean energy with their networks, hosted a clean energy jobs summit, EV driveway parties, a clean-energy home tour, and other local events.
Amplifiers also contributed to increased civic participation: Participants attended and spoke at Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) meetings, mobilized public comments, made sure their neighbors and friends were registered to vote and knew about the candidates on the ballot, attended voter mobilization trainings, and lent critical volunteer energy during a key election cycle, helping support the election of two PSC seats aligned with clean energy priorities.
Participants reported feeling greater confidence discussing clean energy, stronger community connections, and a deeper sense of shared purpose, on feedback surveys.
These outcomes confirmed the program’s core hypothesis: trusted local messengers, when supported and connected, can drive both cultural and civic change. We consider Amplifiers: Atlanta a success because it delivered reach, engagement, and action – while proving a scalable model for building durable clean energy leadership in communities where it matters most.