Global Partners

New York City Global Partners, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization housed in the New York City Mayor's Office for International Affairs. As a leading international city, New York engages in partnerships with cities around the world on a variety of issues. Global Partners serves as a unique tool to showcase the innovations being implemented in New York, while creating opportunities to learn from other global cities and driving innovation around modern urban challenges.

NYC Global Partners' signature program is Global Partners Junior ("GPJ"). Created in 2003, GPJ is an online exchange program that annually connects nearly 1,000 underserved NYC students ages 9-13 to 2,000 peers in cities around the world. Through this program, New York City youth are empowered to see themselves as ambassadors to over 50 international cities. Participants collaborate to brainstorm solutions for making lasting changes in their communities and begin to see themselves as global citizens making a local impact.

Through the Innovation Exchange global cities can access the latest innovations in city policies and programs from around the world, including some 140 reports from 36 international cities. Global Partners is now working to build on these efforts to develop a program around immigrant inclusion, an issue of particular salience to NYC and an issue of global importance given migration trends around the world in partnership with the NYC Mayor's Office for Immigrant Affairs.

Global Partners grew out of the Sister City Program of the City of New York, Inc., which was incorporated in 1984 in order to better support the City of New York's steadily growing number of partnerships with a handful of cities around the world ("sister cities"). Under Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, the organization was then restructured and renamed New York City Global Partners, Inc., with a shift in focus from city-to-city exchange to cities convening around particular urban challenges and initiatives important to New York City.

For more information about New York City Global Partners, please visit www.nyc.gov/globalpartners.