T&C 2022 Philanthropy Issue: Evidence of Hope
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Steph & Ayesha Curry Are Playing the Long Game
Game changer. It’s a term often used to describe the best shooter to ever grace the NBA. But the real change is happening off the court, where this duo are determined to lift up the kids of their community, and beyond.
Fellow Warriors
Adrian Cheng
In 2020, at the age of 40, Hong Kong–born entrepreneur Adrian Cheng took the reins of his family’s vast real estate and retail empire. He also doubled down on his commitment to solving both longstanding and new, pandemic-related problems affecting his hometown. In August he launched the WEMP Foundation (an acronym for well-being, EQ, mental health, and parenting), which promotes programs that support children’s development. He also spearheaded New World Build for Good, a nonprofit social housing enterprise. In response to the pandemic, he helped launch Share for Good, an online platform that facilitates donations to needy families in Hong Kong. “Giving people hope and dreams is important.” Cheng tells T&C. “But we also look at social impact, at finding solutions, at making serious change, scaling the change, and then maximizing problem-solving toward a better quality of life for all.”
David Ambroz
Long before David Ambroz became an Amazon executive, before he was named an American Champion of Change by President Barack Obama in 2016, and before he earned a JD from UCLA School of Law, he was a child living on the streets of New York City with his siblings and mentally ill mother. The family was in and out of shelters, constantly short of food, and on one terrible winter night almost froze to death. Ambroz entered foster care at 12, enduring several traumatizing placements before managing to turn his life around (his brother and sister did as well), a saga he recounts in A Place Called Home: A Memoir, which was published in September. Ambroz has dedicated his life to advocating for a better system for families in need, through activism, corporate responsibility roles at Disney and now Amazon, and as the co-founder of FosterMore, a coalition of business and nonprofit groups working to support youth living in foster care.
Jennifer Garner is Stronger Than You Think She Is
The actress is the celebrity next door, our make-it-work, A-list best friend. And a quiet killer who picks up the phone and calls just about anyone, even Senator Joe Manchin, for the right cause. Who says nice girls finish last?
Fellow Warriors
YourMomCares
The lightbulb moment for the founders of YourMomCares, an organization that harnesses the influence of celebrity and the persuasive power of momdom, came eight years ago when First Lady Michelle Obama invited Sharon Feldstein (Jonah Hill and Beanie Feldstein’s mom), Patsy Noah (Adam Levine’s mom), and Terria Joseph (Alicia Keys’s mom) to make a PSA supporting the Affordable Care Act. Since then they have been joined by a host of other mothers, including Robin Paul (Chris Paul’s mom), Lori Woodley (Shailene Woodley’s mom), and Donna Jordan (Michael B. Jordan’s mom), who use their influence to help create new and fund existing programs that support children’s mental health. Ongoing projects include a pilot program with the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center to create an interactive mobile platform that helps kids learn coping skills. The group also supports the Children’s Health Fund, which provides mental wellness and social services.
Feeding America
Claire Babineaux-Fontenot, the CEO of Feeding America, has seen firsthand the devastating and lasting effects hunger can have on the lives of children. She is the granddaughter of Louisiana sharecroppers and daughter of parents who adopted or fostered more than 100 children, many of whom who arrived in their home malnourished. In 2018 she left a high-level corporate job at Walmart to join Feeding America, an organization that works with a network of 200 food banks and 60,000 food pantries to provide food to individuals and families experiencing food insecurity. During the pandemic Feeding America faced unprecedented demand, and Babineaux-Fontenot helped facilitate and steer major donations (Jeff Bezos donated $100 million in 2020) to serve millions of additional families. In September the organization published a report based on a survey of 36,000 people across 50 states that offered policy advice to the Biden administration.
What's Eating Questlove?
The Oscar-winning pop-culture polymath has found inspiration at the intersection of food and philanthropy.
Fellow Warriors
Ai-jen Poo
Earlier this year, when it was announced that ICM would begin representing Ai-jen Poo and her organization, the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA), you would have been forgiven for asking why the co-founder and president of a national labor movement would need a Hollywood agent. The answer is simple: Poo is one of her generation’s most accomplished and compelling advocates for the type of underrepresented populations who are all too frequently overlooked by legislators and support groups (e.g., individuals who work in private homes as cleaners, nannies, and health aides). She is also an in-demand author and speaker, a MacArthur fellow, a Ford Foundation trustee, and an advocate of and expert in long-term care and other issues. Did we mention that she knows how to work a room for a good cause? In 2018, at the height of the #MeToo movement, Meryl Streep brought her as a date to the Golden Globe Awards.
Ray Dalio
In 2011 Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates (he’s famous in corporate culture for “radical transparency”), and his wife Barbara made the Giving Pledge, promising to donate a majority of their fortune before they die. They wasted little time, expanding funding for Dalio Philanthropies (founded in 2003), which has allocated more than $6 billion to date to initiatives that support education, women entrepreneurs, ocean exploration, and health. In the latter category they have made particularly impactful contributions, notably allocating $50 million in 2020 to create the Dalio Center for Health Justice at New York–Presbyterian Hospital, where Dalio is a trustee. The goal of the center is “to understand and address the root causes of health inequities with the goal of setting a new standard of health justice for the communities we serve.” The couple announced their donation with a letter, noting that they “believe that access to equal quality healthcare and education are the most fundamental necessities of a just and well-running society.”
Evidence of Hope: America's Youth
If there has ever been any question whether youth and wisdom can coexist, these young activists and first-time voters put it to rest. So set aside your pessimism, your cynicism, your fatigue: The kids are all right, and they know what it takes to make a more perfect union.
Fellow Warriors
Ann Lee
Working with a celebrity partner, particularly someone as well known as Sean Penn, can be a challenge for non-Hollywood types, but not for Ann Lee, the CEO and co-founder of Community Organized Relief Effort (CORE). Lee, a humanitarian response expert with more than two decades of experience, can hold her own on any stage—or emergency staging area. Lee and Penn met in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake, and she joined his fledgling relief group, helping mobilize doctors and relief workers. Soon afterward they founded CORE, which evolved into an international crisis response NGO that has responded to disasters in Puerto Rico, Ukraine, and Pakistan. Getting help to people after something bad happens is just one goal. Lee has made it a priority to work with individuals—particularly women and young people—in disaster-prone areas like the South’s “hurricane belt” to prepare for future calamity so they can help others while helping themselves.
Ruth Jurgensen
Prep for Prep was founded in 1978 by a committed educator who was obsessed with finding ways to get economically disadvantaged but academically promising students of color from New York City’s public schools into—and through—its predominantly wealthy and white private schools. Forty-four years (and thousands of program alumni) later, Ruth Jurgensen, Prep for Prep’s CEO since 2020, is equally committed to this goal—albeit with some changes. Today the mission is “to develop future leaders by creating access for young people of color to first-rate educational, leadership development, and professional advancement opportunities.“ That means focusing on students’ whole life experience and constantly seeking their input to chart Prep for Prep’s future. Jurgensen is uniquely qualified for this role. As a star teacher and later a top administrator at independent schools in New York and Chicago, she made listening to—and learning from—students her personal lesson plan.
Changing of the Guard
They can already determine elections and wield social media for change. Soon these younger generations will also control trillions of dollars. But they don’t write checks like their grandparents did.
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