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The Opus Prize is given annually to recognize unsung heroes of any faith tradition, anywhere in the world, solving today’s most persistent social problems. This $1 million faith-based humanitarian award and two $100,000 awards are collectively one of the world’s largest faith-based, humanitarian awards for social innovation.

Opus Prize winners combine an entrepreneurial spirit with an abiding faith to combat seemingly intractable global issues like poverty, illiteracy, hunger, disease and injustice. Opus Prize winners demonstrate that change is possible, empowering and inspiring all of us.

Previous Opus Prize winners' work has included establishing an innovative public health program for the poor in Brazil, addressing the overwhelming poverty of farm workers in central Florida and tackling youth illiteracy in India. With the Prize money, winners have gone on to replicate their successful programs and implement organizational plans.

Selecting an Opus Prize Winner
Annually, the Opus Prize Foundation partners with a university to organize and execute the confidential Opus Prize nomination and selection process. The university partner this year, St. Catherine University in St. Paul, Minn., selects at least a dozen anonymous spotters – people drawn from education, non-profit, humanitarian and religious communities – to identify potential Opus Prize candidates from anywhere in the world. The spotters submit nominees to the Opus Prize jury, which ultimately selects Opus Prize finalists. The final step is to visit the nominees in the field to evaluate their work first hand. For a full list of past partners, please visit the University Partners page.

Origins and Values
The Opus Prize Foundation is a private and independent nonprofit foundation. Established in 1994 by the founding chairman of earlier Opus Companies Opus Corporation, the Opus Prize Foundation is a self-sufficient foundation independent from The Opus Group®. The Prize identifies exceptional, yet unsung social innovators and highlights their unique entrepreneurial approaches, which gives power to the disenfranchised, opportunities to the poorest and inspires others to pursue lives of service.

Envisioned as a “cannon-shot” of recognition and support, the Opus Prize is designed to provide a single, significant infusion of resources to advance the winner’s work to a new level of impact, provide greater visibility and attract other supporters. The first Opus Prize was awarded in 2004.

Opus Prize winners embody the Foundation’s core values of entrepreneurship, transformational leadership, faith lived each day, service to others and respect for the dignity of the human person. Most significantly, Opus Prize winners exemplify the adage, “Give a person a fish; you have fed him for a day. Teach a person to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime.”