EVERFI

These venture- and private-equity-backed startups are tackling some of society’s biggest challenges—and having an impact that belies their size.

Impact 20-2020-EverFi

In 1994, Tom Davidson, then a 22-year-old student at Bowdoin College, ran for—and won—a seat in Maine’s state legislature. That may seem impressive for a mere college pupil; but in Davidson’s view, every one of us is a student always. It’s a philosophy that encouraged him to start EverFi, an education software startup, in 2008. The company provides instructional coursework to schools and workplaces, including through sponsorships by big organizations such as BeyondMeat, UBS, and the NFL. The lessons it teaches, which the company boasts have reached 41 million learners globally through 3,100 customers, range from financial literacy to mental wellbeing to corporate diversity training.<br />
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Recently, EverFi partnered with former LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner’s nonprofit, The Compassion Project. The two developed a social-emotional training course for schoolkids in grades two through four. It’s not clear what EverFi’s current valuation is—its last publicly disclosed funding round was in April 2017. But in the midst of a pandemic, the demand for remote learning options, and compassion, for that matter, could not be more clear. EverFi could be just what the doctor—or teacher, more aptly—ordered.

Impact 20

EVERFI is an international education technology company that provides online courses in financial wellness, mental health, workplace conduct, and more. The company serves its corporate customer base by facilitating social impact initiatives. Founded in 2008, EVERFI has reached millions of K–12 and adult learners worldwide with its digital educational content. Through a third-party-payer model, EVERFI provides K–12 schools in the U.S. with access to educational resources at no cost.

EVERFI Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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EVERFI Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings | Fortune

Ellen Patterson

Engage Gen Z today, lead the market tomorrow

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Ray Martinez

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Alicia Adamczyk

Millennials and Gen Z are skeptical of traditional financial advice. Here’s how to reach them

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Dylan Sloan

An obscure 47-year-old law designed to right the historic wrongs of redlining was the ‘original ESG framework,’ execs say. Just look at how Crown Heights and Bed-Stuy have changed

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Tom Davidson

CSR is a core business function. It’s time to treat it that way

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Francine Chew, VP and Head of Corporate Impact, The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America Ellen Patterson, President and General Manager, EVERFI from Blackbaud Moderator: Jane Thier, Reporter, Fortune 

Impact Initiative 2024: From Debt to Dollars - How Innovation Can Secure Gen Z's Financial Future

Photography by Rebecca Greenfield/Fortune

Conferences

Francine Chew, VP and Head of Corporate Impact, The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America Ellen Patterson, President and General Manager, EVERFI from Blackbaud, Jane Thier, Reporter, Fortune 

Good afternoon. Good to see everyone. Uh The topic of Gen Z and uh their financial future is a really hot topic these days, particularly myself as the very oldest of the Gen Z. Uh cohort. Uh Francine and Ellen are wonderful people to have this conversation with, given their uh close involvement with corporate impact and social impact. Uh I'd like to start with Francine. Um based on your financial wellness research at Guardian. Tell us about the connection between financial stability and mental health, right? Thank you. Uh Guardian does this survey called Mind Body and Wallet. We've been doing it for quite a few years now and they are clear trends actually with Gen Z. Um they are the cohort and the generational cohort with the lowest mental health um, self reported mental health um data. They uh feel financially stressed and um that really bleeds into all facets of their lives, particularly causing anxiety, stress, et cetera. Ellen. You're a former educator. What kind of impact is financial literacy and education about financial literacy tangibly have on younger generations. Thank you for that question and thank you for having us up here. Um I was a second grade teacher and a school counselor. Uh, so these topic areas of mental wellness and learning and the ability to learn are really, really important. And at ever five, we're trying to tackle three main things for a better society, financial wellness, mental wellness and civic engagement and financial literacy. As, uh, we'll hear a little bit more from Francine, definitely lays the pathway for future success for students and we really see this as fundamental. Um You see about 26 states now mandating financial education, uh it to in order to graduate, these are unfunded mandates. And so we are really trying to build the platform and that education and get that out to a network of almost 30,000 schools across America. Um We have relationships we've built over the past 16 years with 750,000 teachers. Um and on a co curricular basis, we're getting financial education into that really important network of schools. Definitely. And uh the two of you both working at fi, which is a social impact firm and Guardian, which is life insurance firm. Um Francine and Ellen, you know, Fi and Guardian have had a partnership uh for the past two years seeking to materially improve the financial outlook for young people, particularly those from under resource backgrounds. Uh Francine, I'll turn to you first. Can you talk a bit about how that partnership is seeking to help? Sure. So about three years ago, I joined Guardian Um And part of my mandate was to really look at the kinds of investments that we make in community and to ensure that they were aligned appropriately with who we are as an organization. Guardian's purpose is to inspire well being. We do that through mind, body and wallet similar to the name of the survey. Um And that translates really to mental wellness, physical wellness, financial wellness was looking for partners that could really operate um across more than one of those pillars uh ever find in particular, could help us create a bespoke curriculum that helps to address mental wellness and also financial stability for young people. The two are so inextricably linked. And what's interesting is that as we've launched other partnerships um through our corporate impact team that really uh focus on different aspects of uh societal need. The mental wellness piece is so critical to really all the interventions. So whether it's physical wellness and mental wellness, then it feels differentiated and we, we aren't pushing for these initiatives to actually gain traction in our partnership with ever PFI. We found that the sponsored usage of the course ie the incidents when uh ever five staff talk to schools and share with them about the curriculum and then the teachers then adopt it. That's coming in at something like 40,000 students who have been using it in the first full year that it's been rolled out. The organic usage is more than double that um just teachers saying we don't really have a solution that really addresses the combination of these two things and we're not selling it, we're not um encouraging them. We're, we're, we're just offering it on the platform and there's such a need for the intersectionality between those two things that um teachers are just using it um on unprompted Ellen. I would love to speak about our partnership. I mean, um the beauty again of this is that we go into schools again. There are these unfunded mandates that are out there. So teachers need to have something, they need to have a curriculum that they can um offer to their students. And so we can use technology to get into the far corners of North America. So from the Mississippi Delta to rural Montana to large urban areas, these are all um pathways that we can get this mental wellness and, and financial education together in school and just to build on that a bit. Um It really was a bit of an education for me too as I looked at the landscape of financial education mandates across the US. Um not just school, not just states that have financial education mandates, but states that are in the process of legislating and um and requiring it, there are these laws that are requiring schools to teach financial education as a requirement for graduation, but there aren't the dollars or the courses or the resources that are put behind that and a partnership like ours can step in um into that gap and provide a course that then allows teachers to say, ah thank goodness, I didn't know how it was going to make this happen. And now here's this resource and it's good, which helps. Certainly we'll have a few conference workers going around with microphones. So shortly if anyone has questions, I'll be going around to take them. So start thinking. Um But in the meantime, can you each talk about the role that student debt in particular plays on financial wellness and on Gen Z's ability to get ahead. Would you like to start? Um But the corporate impact professional say young people are um they're, they're two, I think main drivers of financial instability um outside of inflation, one is uh student debt. Um um and companies are really working to address that in really innovative ways uh in prep in preparing for this panel, Ella and I wanted to make sure that we weren't just focusing on necessarily some of the challenges but the ways in which there is an increasing ecosystem of partners that are working to address that. But student debt, for instance, are preventing young people from saving for retirement. Um and not having even emergency savings, just money set aside to just manage anything that pops up is also a detriment to um financial stability. Um And there too, everyone from government, you know, secure 2.0 was a law that passed that allows even employers to offer emergency savings accounts and then match some of those um contributions. You have student debt. There's a similar process that's underway where um that's increasingly become an employer benefit. And there are mechanisms for lots of fintech also to step into the space. Um If you have young people who are working gig jobs because that too is an increasing trend among gen Z I think addressing uh student debt, we had a um and Francine was able to be at a conference that we were uh hosting a couple of uh weeks ago. And Doctor Corey C Miller spoke about Gen Z and um a little bit about their resiliency and how they're um looking to uh there. She, well, let me go back to her most formative piece of information that was from ages 14 to 24 have a profound effect on any child's life. And so if you think about uh in the intro, we heard the ages of, of Gen Z, they're right in that sweet spot. So we have an opportunity here to affect change to teach them more about debt and saving. And um what the other thing was that um Gen Z is very dependent on their parents for these conversations as well. So you think about the ecosystem of education and reaching that through technology into hard, hard to reach places today, we're in about 42% LM I communities So you get equal access to the education and then creating this ecosystem of career connected learning of mentorship of the ability to how to even open an account. These things are really important so that students can start to talk about and practice all of these good financial habits. You make a good point about the need for um particularly technologically savvy uh ways of reaching young people. Um How can tech implementations like the kind you're talking about make that education process easier, especially among the very tech savvy youth that we're talking about here. So, in the curriculum that um we co-signed with fi um the delivery mechanism is interesting. It's um it's, it's not flat content. There are lots of videos and interactive engagements and it's really based on uh uh a lot that we know about behavioral psychology. Um There's also a component of it that allows for conversation in the classroom. So there's, there are topics that we address um around how to spot financial abuse even, right? How to um have conversations that feel awkward, even with your parents about money. Um So going even beyond the fundamentals of um of budgeting and how to open accounts to the emotions that we have about money. Uh and how to recognize when those emotions can be a deterrent or can help us have positive behavioral change. Um Those are the kinds of uh that's the kind of content that you can deliver through technology by having videos and snippets and quizzes and, and um as much as we learn about what resonates and drives greater usage, we're integrating into the ways in which we teach and how students learn. We also recognize that sometimes the analog version also helps to reinforce the technology itself. And so there's a component that allows people to be able to speak to each other. And it's been clear to us that if one student is well off and another student is struggling financially or from families that are um they can be faced with this very same set of facts and make two very different decisions, both logical. So how can you get to a point where students understand that there are different actions that you can take that makes sense for who you are. Um strip away the shame. Um and um acknowledge that um um these are circumstances that they may face throughout the course of their lives. Um But technology is a tool to be able to showcase scenarios and then to actually talk through what those scenarios may mean for you? Fantastic. Are there any questions from the audience for our panelists? All right. Well, I'll close this out because we're coming up to the end of our time. I'm really curious in both of your perspectives. What is it about talking about financial well being and setting oneself up for success that remains such a hot button topic and just such a taboo topic for many, uh, parents. Uh, and for many need teenagers for everyone. Yeah. I mean, I would say it's not that taboo anymore. I think where the taboo comes in is when people feel insecure in their own knowledge. And it's why education for parents is equally as important as it is for the students themselves. So if you think about bringing, you know, learning into the schools where meeting people where they are and then the community surrounding students and facilitating conversation need to make sure that the people who are in there with the students, um, also have, have knowledge to share. Certainly. Um, I found that as we've gone on this journey with ever find the curriculum that, uh, everyone has a money story and it's people who you wouldn't expect, um, often times and I, I don't think I've ever introduced the topic of what we do with this curriculum and it hasn't become somewhat of a confessional. Right. I've learned a lot of things about a lot of people because the topic of money opens up windows into people's experiences in their lives. That's always fascinating to me. Um, I agree that it's becoming less taboo. Um, but strangers find it easier to open up than people who are familiar. Right. Um, it's probably that phenomenon where you, you tell people the truth on if you sit with them on the plane and you don't think you'll ever see them again. Um, but, um, Yeah, money. It's, it's, it's central and core to how we feel, um, about ourselves, how healthy our outlook is. Um, and I'm glad that it's getting more attention. I'm glad as well. Thank you both so much to our wonderful panelists. Thank you.

Future of Finance, presented in partnership with EVERFI from Blackbaud and Ripple, is bringing together the brightest minds in lending, crypto, and banking. It’s where industry leaders like BlackRock, Coinbase, and Morgan Stanley gather and reveal groundbreaking insights, spark high-energy discussions, and create powerful connections.

From AI to crypto: Here’s everything you missed from Fortune’s Future of Finance conference

Future of Finance, presented in partnership with EVERFI from Blackbaud and Ripple, is bringing together the brightest minds in lending, crypto, and banking. 

Good morning, everyone and welcome to the Future of Finance. The Future of Finance is a one day conference we're hosting, bringing together some of the top minds in industries, from lending to crypto to banking, to talk about where money is headed. We had a packed house here. It's really, you know, encouraging to me as a co chair to see the room full, people engage people talking the pace of change as we say will never be as slow as it is today, right? Everything is just getting faster, especially A I, you've got to have a good quality data and also can fetch those data much more easily. There is no better partner in the world than fortune, no more trusted brand in the world than fortune. In terms of bringing together the most powerful, most forward leaning leaders in the world of finance as well as attacking and really talking about some of the most substantive and pressing issues in this world. We needed to convene the world's most forward leaning leaders because you've never seen a time that has more dynamism than this moment, more change than this moment where technology is changing the landscape you know, you feel like you're over regulated. We're actually trying to pull this further into the regulatory perimeter and to have kind of a greater regulatory framework and greater regulatory clarity. This year, the discussion topics are on the I everybody's talking about it, how it impacts them, how we think it's going to impact them, how it's going to change the environment, the economy, our lives, the financial markets, the way we invest, believe it or not, put those back. We thought, you know, I want to release Blackrock. They launched Bitcoin ETF and we're learning now who owns those etfs. It's like pension funds, state government, the government of Wisconsin now owns Bitcoin. That shows how far we've come first. I will say we are very eager for there to be federal legislation on Cryptocurrency and on stable coins. We're all here gathered today to learn best practices. But this time next year, things may have changed totally. So it's good to keep upskilling and, and learning and staying on top of what's going on in the industry. We're not, we're not hiring based on experience. We're hiring based on a skill set. Best engineers in the world won't want to work here if we don't give them these tools because they're available in the industry and it makes them better for and strength is its power of curation. Our reporters and editors know the right people who trust us, trust our journalism to bring them together put on a truly a list event next year, it's gonna be bigger, it's gonna be better. And once again, it will have the key players, the biggest names from finance, from technology, from fintech, from crypto, all in the same room with attendees who also all many of them executives themselves and for very high level discussion, new ideas and even new friendships. I encourage everyone to attend.

Tom Davidson, Founder and CEO, EVERFI from Blackbaud, David Nason, Senior Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, TIAA; President, TIAA Wealth Management, Vanessa Okwuraiwe, Principal, Edward Jones Moderator: Diane Brady, FORTUNE

Future of Finance 2024: Preparing the Next Generation for Financial Success

Tom Davidson, EVERFI from Blackbaud, David Nason, TIAA; President, TIAA Wealth Management, Vanessa Okwuraiwe, Edward Jones, Diane Brady, FORTUNE

Hello, Tom. David Vanessa. Good to see you. II, I know I've been a start but I do like lightning rounds. I think it's good just to get the juices flowing since we're talking about, you know, preparing the next generation. I'm gonna start with you, Tom, what do you think we're spending too much time or money on when it comes to this space? And hi, thanks for joining us. Great. Hello, it's really great to be here, I would say and this will sound counter to like what I spend every single day of my life doing. But, um, I think we've talked too much about financial education and financial wellness. There's just an enormous amount of terrible advice kind of coming through the system now and new channels that there hasn't been before. There's also incredibly strong new ways to reach people, but we've done a lot of talking and I think it's the opportunity now to actually come behind that and build the infrastructure, particularly for young people to allow them to automate getting into the game of financial services. Do you disagree? I actually agree. And I'll kind of double down and say generic advertising about this is the biggest mistake. What, what really needs to happen in my view for financial education is it needs to be short, relatable and understandable and not at this very high macro level that people can understand and make it real for them. Well, no one has mentioned meme stocks yet. So if you're thinking about, so if you ask me about what's been overhyped at the moment, meals, definitely. But, but I would agree that, you know, we have spent a lot of time talking about financial education. Um But really we need to make sure we start to activate and use technology as an enabler rather than this. Um You know, I go bad for want of the best of phrase. So let me get to that second part, then let's go from the 30,000 ft down, you know, when you think about some of the more intriguing tools, um or, you know, maybe tactics out there, um You mentioned let's start doing what's rising on your radar in terms of what's actually making a difference. Yeah, I think that um you're seeing still the very early innings of um what what I would call is unlocking mechanisms. Um If you think about reward systems and things built into actual learning that allow you to actually activate an account of 529 a long term saving program for a child or families or others, um That's something that we feel very strongly about that there's lots of avenues, but the schools are the most structured um literal physical plant that we have in order to make this happen. So we've focused for 16 years on actually going into schools and going um literally going where uh all of the wonderful learning and there's infrastructure and support. And so we feel very strongly that that's not the only place, but that's a place and that um the co the country in particular needs to like triple down on that idea of enablement for young people in schools, in classrooms and use that as a venue. So I'm not gonna give you the perspective. Ti A is a company that is driven and mission driven to help people prepare for retirement. So I'll give you the employer's perspective, what's working, things like auto enrollment, things like making it easy for people to see opt out, not opt in, opt out, not opt in incentivize employers to provide the tax breaks that are available to their employers, teaching them what those things are. These are very easy things. Retirement policy is I think one of the three issues left in America that's bipartisan. So policy actually helps with this type of thing. So policy direction in the right way to help people save more and making it easier for employers to do this and then letting assets flow easily from different employers as people move around a lot more, these things really work. So an 18 year old, the beauty of compound investment and they'll put all their money in there. I do think that's very powerful. Have it for you, Vanessa. Well, so Edward Jones, we've been around for a long time. We've been around for over 100 years. But when almost every community in the United States, one but one count I might need to invest on the, we'll get there, we'll, we'll get there. But we know that we have this massive footprint that we can definitely leverage. And so what we've been trying to do is to make sure that we can get into schools. So of course, we have a financial education program. We partnered with F I in 2020 to make sure that we can get um into especially high needs schools. So we're in over 50% of high needs schools, over 6000 high schools and making a difference. We did say that by the end of 2025 our goal was to, to, to reach at least 1 million learners and we're over 900,000. So we're making progress. Thank you very much. We're, we're making progress in partnership with our, you know, um our, our great um company um fi but there's still a lot of work to do and just making sure that we can to have financial information in a smart and digestible way that's really appealing to young people because they want it, you know, one of the things that's interesting the last few years you think about, um what would seem to be innocuous, you know, um financial inclusion, um economic, you know, justice and addressing, especially for marginalized communities. This has become more difficult and I'm curious about whether the um or how the backlash against DE I and the like, how is that impacting if at all this space, is it just a conversation? Well, I would say broadly, you know, it's interesting, we do a lot of other things besides financial education. What's, what's interesting about this one? Is this, first of all, the politics, I was, I'm like a washed up politician. I was a state legislator for long time. And so I'm like kind of a state legislator at 22. I was, yeah, very lot of wisdom there, a lot of wisdom there at 22 all I had learned. Um the um but the uh you know, what's fascinating about this one is we focus on, you know, mental health, suicide prevention, we focus on bullying, like we focus on a lot of yours. Those are incredibly difficult things to um inculcate into the culture of a school. The conversations, kitchen table, conversations. This, you know, financial literacy is actually like the easiest put that we take and it's actually something in a world that's very complicated. This is actually one of the easier ones from an infrastructure perspective. You can either we have it in, you know, we have, these massive institutions have the ability to do it. We've got incredible hearts and minds that wanna do it. And this is just to focus on in the next 10 years. Can you do what Jones has done and, and, and go and do something on a massive scale for kids in areas that there isn't any money for? And are you willing to step up and do that? That's a big idea. But it's a, it's an attainable idea. And so that's what gets me excited is this is actually something that can. So there's momentum behind. Have you noticed any difference with the, with regards to, to sort of the um the political environment and such? Not really, I, I think to your point, people do align on the need for financial wellness. That's a goal that we have financial wellness for as many people as we can reach. So I think that's something that is bipartisan and people agree, we haven't really seen any push back. I would agree with that. The only thing I would say is that the stats are challenging for minority populations that need to be addressed if you think about. So our, our research has suggested that 40% of Americans are not ready for retirement, that number is 50 or higher for minority population. So the, the the issue is more profound, but I think you're exactly right, which is, it's bipartisan and everyone kind of aligns. You're more worried about those older generations. Some of all time helps all these types of issues and an older generation has less time and there's a food fight on all of these things. You, you know, you have to be prepared for the fact that some people don't want the private sector in schools. You have the fact that you've got lots of different constituencies around a school around young people. You've got different ways, you know, media that are coming at them. So it's, it's a little bit of a complicated surround sound, but again, doable. Yeah, I want to ask a little bit about the the role of the employer. And let's talk maybe whether it's millennials, Gen Z, this is a generation that's perceived to be coming from a deficit coming into the workplace. You know, they feel they can't afford housing. So the idea that their paycheck can then stretch into savings um maybe seems less attainable. If what is your message to employers? Are you working with them? In terms of you mentioned opt in, is there anything else? Uh opt in is a big one? We are absolutely working with their employers. There's a couple of things we do opt in auto escalation are two things. Number one is providing financial education at the employers that we service. So we will basically create curated programs for kind of high touch people that really understand it. We'll also do Spanish language classes for people in the cafeteria for other people who work at higher education institutions. So you have to, you have to go where people are. You have to understand those types of things. I would say. One other thing I think is important because there's a lot of skepticism around Gen Z and millennials. I'm less worried about them because of two things. One they've got time, time is your best friend for these types of things. And two, I like the fact that they're skeptical and they push back. I like the fact that they went through a very tumultuous period in COVID. Understand what risk looks like. Understand what it's like to come back from risk. I've got a lot of faith that this learning, this population is going to do well on this issue. They're not going to be as reckless as us. I don't know. I think that's, that's, you know, Vanessa, one of the things I want to ask about is this Ed? Wow. Um You know, uh what do you do differently? You know, what do you think moves the needle? How did you approach this space? Making things smarter and more digestible for, for young people? So, one of the things that we did, we, we do a lot of research all the time. It would loans and we partnered with a couple of companies to just really understand, do the, do the next gen or gen next, whatever we choose to call that big group between 18 and 34. Do they actually think in very short term, um, lenses, is that, is that the case? And so we did delve in a, a lot deeper to understand. Well, what's their situation? We found that one in 10 of them still have, still have student debts. Um, only a third have health insurance and, and half, um, don't have any life insurance, which you wouldn't expect, you know, if you're less than 34 for the most part. So once we understood what maybe some of the issues were, we decided to create this new platform that is really just a digital focus, you know, you don't have to come in person to get that education and, and do it nice and short. And so we did it in a way that acknowledges that this generation especially has high anxiety and we decided to just make these, you know, snappy little videos that really speaks to. Well, what does it mean? I use that as a parallel. I you Yes, more youtube videos very short. Um And it speaks to budgeting savings, compounded interest, all these things that we think are still important. I know value systems are changing, but there's still certain things that are universal and will apply whatever age you are. So we've got really good feedback that this is helping. And the other thing we found is that we can't underestimate the importance of our parents and guardians. Um in terms of immersion. So Children learn their first languages at home. Financial education should be treated as a language. And when, when people are immersed at the, the, the home front, you find that they develop better habits when it comes to financial services. So combine that lens to, to be able to create this new digital platform that is really snappy and is getting a really good feedback. We, we launched it last August. We've had over 500,000 engagements and, and, and people seem to be happy with what um what messages they're hearing, you know, you know, I like and it pivots to what you actually said earlier. You have to treat people as like the whole person. We talk about anxiety. How much do you think about that in terms of the programs you're developing? Because you now you have this expert teeth and mental health in other areas. Does that apply to how you approach financial education? Sure. Yeah, I think um I think they've made, made the point earlier about, um you know, all of this is moving to thinking about the student individually. Um unless, you know, the concept of classroom didn't change all that much for a couple of 100 years and 40 seats and a and a chalkboard. And um it's, it's now changing pretty dramatically and I think that's a positive thing because what it ultimately does allows you to within reason, take a lot of individual factors about that student's life. And I think that's been the biggest thing that we've learned, you walk into any classroom that is uh 40 very different humans showing up in very different ways. Um And, uh and any technology ultimately has to be able to track that over time. Um And that's, you know, that's really where we are in this moment. There's incredible things going on that make me very, very optimistic about that potential. This is like both, it's, these are national issues. It's hyper local. I'm going to ask each of you, what advice do you have in terms of how we can create better infrastructure around this? Of course, you mentioned the schools, you were a former lawmaker. I mean, um whether it's on the regulation side or the employer side, give us um something you would change. What would you prioritize to really move the needle? You were higher ranking than I was. Yeah, you higher ranking. We'll start with you. I would make, I like, I'm gonna go from the employer's lens again. I would make money portable. I would make financial education a part of a employee wellness program and I would make an employee wellness program mandatory for all employees over 100 people. Uh We already have the infrastructure. I think the educational institutions, the employers and of course, lobbying the government, we've got financial education in at least 33 states. They're not necessarily all mandated, but they're either recommended or required required. So that's the uh people are heading in the right direction. We just need more alignment across business in order to drive um policy in on the government side. So do you wanna add anything? I would just say um I think the concept of the public sector doing their part of implementing actually a very good required and multi step, not a one and done, you know, a lot of times including us, we tend to um you know, do something senior year during senior week or something, you know, have multi year from second grade on. Um and then on the private sector side, I think every financial institution should actually step up to open accounts and create the long term infrastructure that's portable and can travel with a young person and start that from kindergarten and rock and roll on that. That's a good tactic. My tactic was not giving them any money after 16. That works, that works very well. So I don't think it hasn't yet before we get any tactic or, or that stuck with you in terms of that you would adopt. Um Again, we are in the audience as parents, employers employees, et cetera. What advice? I think the portability and opening those accounts really is very powerful. Is there anything else you would have? I would say I want to do two things. Number one, when I say man, where I said mandatory by the companies doing it, not the government because it's gotta be true to myself here. But what you said is so important. I think parents, I think parents are underrated. I think parents can make these issues very la relatable, very relevant and very, uh tangible to people relatable and tangible is everything for financial education. So, I think parents and guardians are undervalued in terms of their necessity to be a part of this. Yeah. And, and David, I'll double down on that. So we, we find, found that in, in this research study that we did recently, we found that um, 18 to 34 year olds would rather go to their parents. So almost 70% of them would go to their parents for financial advice. So you would think that in the social media world, everyone is gravitating to social media, especially for financial guidance. But we're finding that maybe they can get their financial information and everything else, but when it comes to guidance, they're going to parents. So for me, what I do, I'm trying to start early with my kids. They're eight and 10 years old. Um not, not all your pocket money can be used for LEGO, it's not gonna happen, you know. So how do you take a small portion of that and put it into your bank account and just start those habits really early? So that's something again that we built into our um financial education, not just for the young people, but for the parents across the board. I love that. So I'm gonna give you each a chance to give some final thoughts takeaways. I'm gonna start with you. I think that this is, um, there's gonna be a really, really great next five years where t a lot of the work that the people in this room, uh, you should see yourself deeply in the middle of this conversation. Like every company that was up here today actually has a really important role in this and it sounds a little cheesy. But um you have the ability to weaponize your, you know, your employees and get people out in classrooms. And most importantly, figure out a way that your infrastructure can get baked into a long term infrastructure for kids and you're gonna change its tombstone stuff. You'll, you will change the trajectory of the country. If you do that. I I would say two quick things. The first is that I would like people to understand that we do have a preparedness crisis in this country that people are not saving enough and people are living longer and it's getting worse. So encourage people to save as much as they can as early as they can and understand that. And two, I run a wealth management business here in the wealth management business. People think that financial advice is just for the wealthy. It's not, it needs to be democratized. People need to feel comfortable asking questions about these types of issues and taking that fear away is massively important. Um Yes, um I will double down again on the importance we have as employers. We, we have over 52,000 employees and the influence we can have over all those people is immense. So I think we need to put our own oxygen masks on first, make sure that all our employees have the very financial information and then you create champions who take it out to the rest of the community. So I'd say double down on putting our own ox oxygen mask on first treat our own people, right? And then we can make a bigger impact. I love that. So David Vanessa, thank you very much. Please join me in making our gathering. Thank you. Thank you.

Tom Davidson, Founder and Chief Executive Officer, EVERFI from Blackbaud Interviewer: Alan Murray,  FORTUNE

Impact Initiative 2023: Technology For Social Good

Now it's something of an understatement to say that A I has become a buzzy topic for business leaders. As many of them look to innovate and push boundaries with the goal of achieving new successes. But what about those leaders who also want to use their resources to help solve some of society's most complex issues. How can they leverage technology to help them do this to discuss this? Please welcome to the stage, Tom Davidson, founder and CEO of Ever five from Blackboard and Fortune Ceo Alan Murray. So Tom, we've been talking a lot about diversity here over the last 24 hours. I think you and I are like nail dressing very different. You have hair. Yeah, I mean, they're, they're so we apologize. Well, give us, give us a brief interlude. I want to talk about technology because when we were in this room together a year ago, most of us, I can't speak for you. I know I had never heard the word generative. A I, I didn't know what it was. I didn't know what it meant. And when you think now about how it has changed our whole perception of the potential of technology to affect our lives. It's a reminder of just how fast technology is changing. Technology is neither inherently good nor inherently bad. But can you talk a little bit about how you see technology changing the efforts on the issues that we've been talking about for the last 24 hours. So I think uh specific to this group, um like everywhere else, you're going to see such a wide range of applications towards this. So in the areas that we're seeing internally, allowing companies at the highest level to story tell in a way that they never have before. So think about you're a very large corporation, you're operating over multiple continents, you're operating over multiple towns and you know, these are areas now where you need to be a storyteller in Hazard Kentucky, you need to be a storyteller in New York City. What A I and generative A I is can allow you to do is pull that data from hundreds of different touch points, interactions, learning uh situations in schools and communities, everything you're gonna be able to understand and compare company to company town to town, what you're doing in local education, how your team is engaging, number of hours spent everything and tell that story in real time when you're in front of a member of Congress, you regulator. So get a little more specific, tell us how you're incorporating that in your products. So one of the things that we're doing is um we talked a little bit of about this with a number of folks. All of this is living in government relations. It's living in coms, it's living in foundations, it's living over in the Exec suite. And what this is for the first time it's allowing us to do is pull all of that data into one place. Using A I to tell that story to compare state to state town to town division division company to company. And that's going to be something that's going to be live and it's going to happen really fast and that will help, it will help to impact. There's some other areas where you think technology can help advance this. It's really exciting and what companies are doing, for example, in education right now, I mean, you know, the status of K 12 education in this country and the need for corporate engagement in that is like never before the coming out of COVID. You're seeing test test scores declining, lack of counselors, you're seeing teachers burning out, you're seeing students show up in truancy levels at their highest levels in years. And so we really feel like this need for technology to come in and allow teachers and others. The time to get students back on track is like never before. And you're seeing that accelerate at a level that we have not seen in the 16 years that I've been doing this and it's really hitting kids in high poverty areas at a level that, um, that, you know, is, is very different from anyone else right now. And are they able to take advantage of it? I mean, do they, the resources they need the knowledge they need to make the most of it? You know, we're in an endless process of trying to wire schools and get broadband into schools and others. But it's one of the great successes. One of the great bipartisan successes is the wiring of schools and libraries, the provision of computers and allowing kids to get online has been just a fantastic success in the last, you know, 25 30 years. And uh we now allow the highway has been built and we can build things on top of that. I'd love, I know there are a bunch of people in this group who are focused on using technology to address some of the issues we've been talking about. We had a great presentation from, I'd love to hear from for, from uh some others, you know, raise your hand. Uh If you have something to I is Justin in the audience from IBM. Yeah. Can I put you on the spot? Ok. So hi everyone just, you know, Nixon Chief Impact Officer at IBM. Um And you know, we're, we're very focused on how we um provide skills, especially to low skilled individuals, entry level. Um you know, people as well. And one of the things that we did just two years ago in 21 is to make a commitment to skill, 30 million people by 2030. But what we're doing right now around A I and generative A I is how do we make sure we don't have the divide that we had? Especially when like new technologies like the internet, broadband, etcetera affected those underrepresented groups, underrepresented communities. So how do we make sure even something as simple as prompt? Engineering, how do you write the right, you know, create the right prompt. How do you understand how to make decisions around products and solutions? So under stand in ethical A I is important, it's very important to bring awareness to that as well. So very focused on how do we make sure we're bringing those skills to these very specific communities to make sure they're not being left behind? And honestly, this is a business imperative, but it's really about the bottom line as well. We want to make sure people are skilled to work not just for IBM, but for our clients and it's support society at large. So it's a huge effort of ours. Yeah, keep the microphone for a second because I have a question for both of you. I think it's pretty generally agreed among economists that the technology revolution we've seen over the last two decades has exacerbated inequality in advanced societies. You know, it's, it's given more power and more riches to the people who understand how, how to use it and widen the gap. There have been a couple of studies, Eric Brien did one. There have been a couple of others that suggest that this latest wave of generative A I may actually be the opposite. It may empower the the lower, less educated people, more than the most educated people. I wonder if either of you have any evidence of that being the case. So we we don't have evidence yet of that. But I know that I've seen examples of language, right? Language barriers and how A I can help people who may not be fluent in a certain language and that helps them, right? It empowers them, it helps them in their, their job as well. Um I think also like we talked about lower skilled individuals who need to understand how to create the right prompts. How does that help them in their current job? So it's really around how do we make sure that they understand how to be successful in the position that they have today? Because if you're not up skilled, re skilled and it includes a gene A I component, you, you may be at risk, right? I think there was a recent study that 40% of executives um said that, you know, there will be, I think 40% of jobs will need some sort of A I skilling over the next three years. So this is not like 10 years of this is over the next three years. So I think it's, it's really urgent that we bring those skills. Yeah. And I, I, by the way, I love the quote. I don't know who first said it. So I don't know who to credit it to, to say you don't have to worry about being replaced by A I, you have to worry about being replaced by somebody who understands how to use A I Yeah. Well, and also this is the thing about A I right now and any resource like this for teachers or kids thinking specifically about kids in schools, it's taken us on the positive side. This thing is going to leash a tremendous amount of energy and excitement and optimism in classrooms and skills, skill betting on the downside of this. You always have to come back to the fact that I would say it's taken us 400 years to so perfectly disadvantage kids in high poverty areas in this country. And it's devastating when you see the effects of that compounding effect of 400 years. I love your comment because this can't be one more area where at some point this computing power, at some point, the energy that it takes to drive, this is going to have a cost and what you learn as a, you know, as a former state legislator, you sit in these arcane conversations around school funding formulas and the way they work. What you realize is that's also a multi 100 year process of fully disadvantaging kids in high poverty areas. And so what I say it in this room is this group of people in this room. We have a unique responsibility to actually step into the gap of financing these types of things. Because if you're waiting for uh uh the Clarksdale school district in Mississippi or larger schools across the country to step in and finance these things for kids. You will wind up in the same place that you've wound up for multiple hundreds of years in this country with the haves and the have nots and the kids who had it four years before everyone else. And when that happens, you see this with reading and everything else, you can never catch up. This is the sales pitch part of your presentation, but that's ok. It's not a sales pitch for me. Yeah, but that's ok because you, you're helping uh these companies, there are lots of options by the way that are, you know, not just us and others who are trying to do this work in schools, but it is a round game. Make the case why this group, uh the the case, it's a version of what Justin was saying, why this group needs to get involved in this issue in the education issue. It's, it's very simple. Uh This is the biggest whiplash business of all time. Um You have governors and others and state superintendents, you know, the average life of a superintendent in the United States about two years. Um Governors will last four years, eight years. If they're lucky, it takes a long time for policy to get embedded in the work. And what happens is schools say, oh, great. We have a, you know, financial education program or mental health program. It's been funded by the state, the district others and in a year it's gone. And so the whiplash and the, and what teachers do is they say, I just, I don't know if I want to do this because I just don't know if it's gonna be here next month or next year or in the next bi annual budget cycle. So what I think about corporations, this is always strange to say, but in many ways, you are the thing that teachers and schools can count on the most, you're the most dependable source of revenue over multiple years that can help and they can actually look and see. And it's one of the few areas where you can look and see and guide and judge that as whether it's working or not and do comparative analytics school to school all funded by the corporate sector. And I say that is a good bleeding heart, you know, liberal Democrat is a big teacher union guy. So I, I believe that in my bones and, and I, and I believe IBM has done that, but who else is Caroline Golan in the room? Uh uh No who, who else wants to talk about uh exam show in the room? Yes. Can I put you on the spot? I love, I love putting people on the spot. Well, um I can give you examples that are a little bit different from immediate impact to education in um in, in the United States. I think technology plays a huge role in democratizing access, creating connections in a way that truly transforms lives and societies. And I'll give you the example of a platform that we call U which is uh from generation, unlimited UNICEF public private partnership forum that we do in India. And the goal is to transform the lives of hundreds of millions of people with the recognition that transformation is not un dimensional. It's not about giving digital skills or access to computers or uh mental health support. It is all of them and it's more, it's about social, you know, um support to them. It's about creating sponsorships, mentorships. So the platform is entirely enabled by technology and increasingly A I to make it more effective, more accessible, more leverage and it brings, brings together many public uh private sector players, many some of them are in the room today here, uh nonprofits, educational institutions, all of these to create a seamless access from education, skill development all the way to employability and support beyond that entirely enabled by technology, the technology because if the technology didn't exist, everybody is doing their bit and intervention here, an intervention there, but it's not transformative, so many great examples, you know, from biodiversity to creating more access and so on. Big believer. Um That's the example I would like to share you, you're an optimist. I absolutely am a believer. Uh anybody else have a quick example reaction to that. Oh I think that there's people should be incredibly optimistic about the tools that are getting put in place. The challenge for it is always a distribution issue of, of, of where it goes, how fast it gets it. That's always that. But it, but, but if you take a look, 10 years out, if we were to have this conversation 10 years from now, will we have seen significant improvements? Oh, I think you will. I, I think you absolutely will. Yeah. Good. Well, thank you. Thank you for your support for the impact initiative. Thank you for being here and uh the rest of you. Right.

EVERFI

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