Issa Rae Wants to Take Snap’s New Creator Class to the Next Level

Issa Rae started out as an “awkward black girl” on YouTubeand now that she has become a huge celebrity, she is reinvesting her success into the creative industry.

Her creator-focused company Ensemble has collaborated with Snapchat‘s accelerator 523 to provide her fourth-year class of 15 makers with mentorship and a direct line to brand deals with Ensemble’s partners, including Pepsi, Chili’sAnd Popeyes.

523 launched in 2021 and has incubated 58 creators and content companies to date. Graduates include people like Mia Finneywho used funds from the program to improve her production quality and now has 6.5 million followers on TikTokand companies such as Swish culturesthat the NBAcaught the attention of ‘s while in 523 and eventually partnered with the competition for a Snapchat show, NBA presents Swish Cultures weekly.

Until now, 523 has focused on content companies for two years and Black creators for one year. This year, Snapchat expanded the program to include creators from all underrepresented communities. The 15 creators it selected as participants (full list below) will spend the next 12 months getting “resources, education, 1:1 mentorship and more to fuel and monetize their content creation efforts on Snapchat,” according to Snap.

And much of that fuel will come from Ensemble, which Rae founded earlier this year to connect creators and brands for “deeper relationships” that go beyond the usual influencer-sponsor connection.

Rae started out as a creator in the early days of YouTube, an era when the content world was very different than it is today. Yet she still knows what it means to be a creator and what creators need. That’s probably why it’s a huge benefit to the participants that her company is a part of this program.

Co-founder and chairman of the ensemble Ian Schafer wrote on LinkedIn that the company is “proud to be Snap’s exclusive partner in supporting this year’s crop of storytellers while providing brand partners with incredible opportunities to collaborate.”

He said the collaboration has already started, but did not yet provide details about its exact content.

Here’s the full list of 523’s 2024-class makers: