Matt Ronen, the Founder & CEO of ServiceCorps, is a combat veteran, social entrepreneur, and founder of the service year movement. In 2013, Matt set out to launch the service year movement by establishing Service Year, the first American service year program. Service Year was later “acqui-merged” by a collective of organizations led by the Aspen Institute and Matt joined the newly minted Service Year Alliance Leadership Council with civic leaders such as Condoleezza Rice, Madeline Albright, and Wes Moore.

As the leader of ServiceCorps, Matt is helping to democratize national service in America by empowering new college graduates to serve in one year positions at nonprofit and public organizations while they defer their job offer from corporate sponsors and receive financial support for 100% of student loan payments during the year. To date, with partners Citi, GE, and Bloomberg, 28 Fellows have participated in ServiceCorps in New York and Boston. This year alone, GE’s 8 ServiceCorps Fellows will contribute 16,000 hours of service to the nonprofit sector—that’s 3.4% of GE’s overall hours of service across 325,000 employees!

Previously, Matt worked at Colgate-Palmolive, where he helped manage iconic brands used by consumers around the world. Earlier in his career, Matt worked with private equity, venture capital, and hedge fund firms at Gerson Lehrman Group.

Matt is a graduate of Colorado College (BA, Honors), where he was President of the Student Government and Campus Marketing Manager for Teach For America, and Cornell University (MBA), where he was a Teaching Assistant and Vice President of the Veterans Club. 

Matt was recognized as American Express 50 Under 40, Echoing Green Semifinalist, PresenTense Fellow, StartingBloc Fellow, PAVE Rising Star, 99U Fellow, Hive Global Leader, Social Venture Network Bridge Project Scholarship Recipient, Nexus Member, and a Transformative Action Institute Support Trained Teacher. Read Matt's story.

Fun fact about Matt: He loves Buffalo wings—the current favorites can be found at The Peanut in Kansas City and Dixie in Tel Aviv

Nonprofits Matt supports: Strength to Strength, The Alex Singer Project (book), Accountability Lab, Jane Goodall Institute, and many more