Our New Series

Spark Conversations

Introducing: Our New Spark Conversation Series

Sparks from important insights designed to ignite change

The Motley Fool Foundation, in its partnership with Ashoka, presents the Spark Conversation Series. This new five-part series showcases social innovators – the Foolish Rule Breakers – and the creative ways they’re helping Americans move from financially coping to financially healthy.

Episode 1:

A Housing Revolution

Our first Spark Conversation focuses on one of the important drivers of Financial Freedom – Housing. David Gardner talks with Stacey Epperson, a social entrepreneur and founder of Next Step Network, about how manufactured homes can put homeownership within reach for millions of Americans. Learn what’s already working that should be amplified and how all of us can help support these Rule Breakers and innovators.

Episode 2:

Beyond Coal: Building a Clean Energy Workforce in Appalachia

This episode is about how one chance encounter sparked an idea that led to a movement that’s revolutionizing workforce development in a post-industrial economy. Coalfield Development is an organization that’s rebuilding the Appalachian economy from the ground up, through innovative workforce development on a personal, community, and economic level.

Episode 3:

Moving from Financially Invisible to Financially Free

Access to affordable credit and opportunities to build personal and community wealth can be out of reach for those who are financially invisible. Learn how two social innovators are changing the financial landscape and moving communities from being financially invisible to financially free. In Episode 3, we’re talking with José Quiñonez, CEO of Mission Asset Fund – an organization that works to make hardworking, yet financially invisible families visible, including immigrant families – and Alison Lingane, co-founder of Project Equity, a national leader in harnessing the power of employee ownership and empowering vibrant local economies.

Episode 4:

Making Medicines Affordable

Access to affordable healthcare is an important building block of Financial Freedom. Yet, in America, access to lifesaving medicines and vaccines remains hugely inequitable. How can we improve the system? What can we change about patents and drug development, in particular, to reduce costs and increase health outcomes?

Join us as we explore these questions in episode 4 of our Spark Conversation Series: “Making Medicines Affordable.” Hear from social entrepreneur and co-founder of I-MAK, Priti Krishtel, about how specific changes today can benefit generations to come

Episode 5:

Forgotten children: Factors that affect college succes

This episode highlights the work that social entrepreneur Alex Bernadotte is doing through her organization, Beyond 12, and gets to the heart of social mobility and financial opportunity. Beyond 12 creates a powerful feedback loop between K-12 schools and post-secondary institutions so that high schools can better match their priorities and teaching practices to the skills students need to succeed in college and beyond, influencing the national conversation about educational equity and student success.

“It is possible to look at a child in this country and predict with alarming accuracy where that child will end up in terms of their educational and economic outcomes based solely on their race, their ZIP code, and their parent’s level of education,” says Bernadotte.