How We Drive Change
We work across three interconnected areas to meet urgent needs, strengthen our social safety net, and shift the systems that shape people’s lives. Each strategy reinforces the others — because bold change takes both immediate action and long-term vision.
We work alongside marginalized communities to design and launch solutions that meet urgent needs while advancing dignity and agency.
We partner with values-aligned organizations to sharpen strategy, increase their impact, and bring community-driven ideas to life.
We advance community-led efforts to shift policies and narratives— helping build the collective power it takes to create systems rooted in equity and justice.
What began as motivation to earn money evolved into something deeper: a cycle of success.
What We Learned About Cash, Care, and Community Trust
In 2022, we co-created a Cash Plus Care pilot with high school students and their families in East Palo Alto — one of the first in the country to provide guaranteed income directly to youth under 18. The idea was straight forward: meet urgent needs through regular cash transfers; show students the kind of trust and dignity they hadn’t always received from systems meant to support them — by giving them a voice in designing the program itself; and surround them with academic, mentorship, and case management support to help them thrive. What happened next surprised even us. Students didn’t just stay afloat, they started to soar. What began as motivation to earn money evolved into something deeper: a cycle of success, where academic gains, confidence, and purpose reinforced each other — and families felt the difference too. Cash was the spark. But it was trust, consistency, and care that made it transformational. We partnered with an independent evaluator to understand what made the difference — and what this model means for the future of safety net programs that center dignity, agency, and long-term impact.
Read the full evaluation