Naomi Stone
During her fellowship year Naomi developed the patent-pending Enso Circular Economy Marketplace where organizations can sell their waste to compatible industries, reducing pollution while promoting environmental and financial sustainability. She's changing the "zero-sum game" mentality that pro-environment means anti-business with an enhanced triple bottom line that promotes advances in sustainability with its opportunity for profit. The most ardent capitalists become the biggest drivers of success, not only for this marketplace but for the environment.
After graduating with a BS in environmental engineering from MIT, Naomi Stone wanted to bridge the gap between environmentalism and financial prosperity for her industrial clients. To effect real change she knew she needed to communicate with corporate stakeholders so she earned an MBA from Columbia Business School. For the past 19 years, Naomi has served as President and CEO of MugenKioku Corporation, helping companies mitigate pollution. Now she wants to make environmental stewards out of even the most capitalist of societies. This year, she is developing a platform to change global perception of a material’s limited life cycle, recognizing its intrinsic value even after the first…or second use.
Jalyn Gordon
During her fellowship year Jalyn developed a series of sabbatical offerings to transform Black Activists' obligation to time, urgency and perfection while intentionally creating space for them to have a complete thought. She imagines a world where Black Activists have the opportunity to escape the chaos of daily life and return to their natural state of calm, clarity and focus. Repair, healing & restoration - the necessary ingredients to sustain impact in community work.
Jalyn is a Community Builder, facilitator, strategist, reader, consultant, mama and Black millennial. She is the Founder of The Afrocentric Communiversity LLC, an African-centered consulting company for nonprofits and Community Builders. As a Mira Fellow, she will explore how passionate, civically engaged groups move from grassroots to “grasstop”.
Morgan Vien
During her fellowship year Morgan Vien developed the concept of stoke, and designed processes and experiences for individuals and communities to find their stoke, name the barriers in their way, and to begin making small changes toward a path of a more activated, engaged and stoked life. On this journey she has explored the ways our contributions to society might be more stoked-based rather than obligation-based and she has begun to imagine how the culture of school, work and the world changes when we have practices and systems that allow for everyone to live into their stoke and up to their potential. She has found that the powerful experience of being stoked is contagious and that one stoked human can inspire as many people as they can reach. When we contribute our unique brilliance and magic to the world, we give more, do better and light up the world around us. #staystoked
Morgan Vien is a leader, a learner, and a designer. She coaches and facilitates systems leaders toward deeper learning, equity, and change-making by using design thinking and activating the mindsets necessary for thoughtful, agile leadership. She works most closely with Envision Learning Partners, School Retool, the d.school at Stanford, and as Liberatory Design Faculty for the National Equity Project. Prior to this chapter, she was a Principal and a Founding Teacher in the Small Autonomous Schools Movement in Oakland, CA.
Morgan believes that a more fulfilling and liberated life for each of us is possible if we design a system that offers us the resources, mindsets, and opportunities to discover our stoke and contribute to our collective good. She will spend this year exploring how opportunities for meaningful contribution and collaborative problem- solving might allow us to be our most authentic selves and therefore a more thriving collective.
If you look closely enough you might see sparks of light coming from her workspace as she designs new futures and makes magic happen. #staystoked #unbox
Nita Evans
During her fellowship year Nita developed Kommit, a unique mentor-based community designed for Black athletes and their families that connects them with resources and mentors who provide support and guidance to ensure that when Black men enter college with a ball in one hand, they leave with a degree and viable career plan in the other; affirming their worth and value as more than an athlete in this world. Each year, thousands of young Black males gain access to college through the pathway of athletics. Yet, many miss out on valuable career prep opportunities and others never graduate. Nita imagines a world where every Black male can be and achieve anything in life.
Nita Evans has spent her career dedicated to issues of equity and access in higher education for students and families from marginalized communities. With a PhD in Sociology and twenty years of college teaching experience, Nita is the Chair of the Master of Arts in Social Impact program at Claremont Lincoln University. She is a race and sport scholar-activist who provides a bridge between the academy and the communities she serves. Nita has an ambitious vision for ensuring every Black male who enters college with a football in one hand leaves with a degree in the other. Addressing the longstanding graduation inequities in college sports, Nita is developing a turnaround plan rooted in social justice that prepares Black athletes for college and career as thinkers, leaders and innovators. Her goal is to create upward mobility and a cycle of success for Black men and their families.
Lin Shi
During her fellowship year Lin built a financial wellbeing community called the Money Health Collective. We cannot solve what we do not talk about -- as a society, we don't talk about money. She’s creating a safe, cathartic space for participants to share their personal money stories and to support one another on their journeys. The Collective is open and accessible to everyone; sessions are free, volunteer-run, and virtual. The goal of the Money Health Collective is to empower all of its participants, in order to build a community that collectively generates hope and raises societal wellbeing for all. Lin imagines a future where poverty and scarcity no longer exist.
Over the last decade, Lin has worked across sectors with the goal of raising the level of financial wellbeing for all. Through helping companies develop employee financial wellness programs and volunteering with nonprofits and government agencies on financial education and workforce development, she has seen how pervasive and debilitating financial stress can be across demographics.
Lin intends to test and build a novel financial coaching ecosystem that nurtures mutually empowering relationships amongst all its participants: financial coaches, coaching recipients, and sponsors. The goals of this ecosystem are to build a support system for coaching recipients, provide a living wage for financial coaches, and allow financial sponsors to see clear returns in their investment in communities.
Professionally, Lin is an actuary and consultant. She serves as a board member for several nonprofits helping the local community. She was selected as a Fulbright grantee and ambassador, and WEF Young Global Shaper.