Will Address Systemic Social Injustice and Economic Inequity through Free Digital Education for Nation’s K-12 Schools
WASHINGTON–EVERFI, Inc., the leading social impact education innovator, today announced a $100 million, three-year commitment to build new and expand current courses that address topic areas that lead to systemic social injustice and economic disparities across the country. The three-year initiative, which bolsters the company’s founding mission to close education gaps that lead to long-term inequalities, will focus on reaching students in the most at-risk, high-poverty areas of the U.S. EVERFI will offer courses in topic areas that address 12 of the most important critical life skills, in an effort to create an ecosystem of change. The Company’s large catalog of digital learning content on critical life skills is and will continue to be free to K-12 teachers and students nationwide.
“There is a missing layer in the education system today. The symphony of crises playing out across the world has cast a light on the lack of financial education, health care literacy, insurance literacy, emergency savings, and mental wellness instruction in America’s schools,” said Tom Davidson, Founder and CEO of EVERFI. “When students learn these critical life skills, they become highly-correlated competencies. When they are left unattended to, they become highly-correlated crises. This moment in time gives us a tremendous opportunity to empower students with this learning using innovation and technology. EVERFI and our partners are stepping in today to fill that gap.”
The Company will add new digital courses around 12 topic areas that pose the highest social risks, in an effort to drive meaningful and measurable societal change. As part of EVERFI’s Social Impact Index (Index), these topics include Academic Foundations; College and Career Readiness; Health care Literacy; Insurance Literacy; Retirement and Savings Literacy; Digital Wellness; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion; Financial Capability; Health and Mental Wellness; Next Gen Skills; Social Emotional Learning; Substance Misuse; Sustainability; Violence Prevention and Response; and Organizational Integrity. Each Index topic area provides an overview of the associated societal challenge and offers a five-year goal for EVERFI to measure impact, reach, and/or societal change. Courses within each Index topic will increase the learner’s knowledge of important subjects related to each topic, including understanding health care literacy, insurance literacy, building emergency savings and financial stability, establishing and maintaining credit, college access, understanding student loans, gaining a deeper knowledge of African American history, addressing mental health concerns, preventing prescription drug addiction, and many other areas.
Founded in 2008 with the mission of closing the educational divide that exists for children in low- to moderate-income communities, EVERFI works closely with the nation’s school districts to train teachers and provide free digital learning — all funded solely by private sector companies and organizations — to close the gaps that lead to social inequality. Since its founding, EVERFI digital learning has reached more than 41 million learners across the K-12, higher education, and adult markets with more than 250 digital education courses on social issues. EVERFI recognizes more than 3,100 strategic partners including some of the most recognized brands in the world, like Anti-Defamation League, Beyond Meat, Citizens, Fifth Third Bank, HSBC, LinkedIn, MassMutual, Mastercard, NFL, NHL, NHL Players’ Association, RISE, Truist, Truth Initiative, UBS, United Way Worldwide, and Zelle among many others that have joined them in fulfilling its mission of influencing social change through the power of education.
Advancing EVERFI’s existing business model of working with private entities to fund its online curriculum, the Company will partner with its family of renowned corporate supporters to finance the creation of new digital curricula and to provide teachers nationwide with professional development on these critical areas. This funding will also support the expansion of EVERFI’s proprietary digital platform, significant investments in research and development, impact analysis, along with increased reporting capabilities to school districts to measure and improve student results and knowledge gain in these critical areas.
“For more than 12 years EVERFI has cultivated powerful relationships with both educators, leading foundations, and private-sector partners aligned with our mission to equalize education on critical skills and we are grateful for their ongoing support,” said Davidson. “Now is the time for the private sector to unite with solutions that yield important societal change. EVERFI has the technical infrastructure and expertise to work in partnership with the nation’s school systems so that all students have equal access to learning that can provide them with an equal chance of success.”
To support the nation’s school systems, teachers, and families during this unprecedented time, EVERFI will continue its work reaching children in their home or hybrid learning environment with the goal of delivering more than 24 million total hours of critical life- skills learning to K-12 students over the next three years. Educational interventions for youth have shown substantive effects on social-emotional development, school progress, antisocial behavior, poverty, and crime.
“A great education is the path out of poverty for many of the students we serve and the foundation of opportunity for all of them,” said Austin Beutner, Superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District. “The EVERFI curriculum plays an important part in the learning our schools provide to students.”
School districts that leverage EVERFI’s Index courses at scale are eligible to receive the EVERFI Champion Seal in recognition of their commitment to students’ long-term success in life.
EVERFI’s Index provides a continuum of course offerings that aim to build foundational understanding at a young age and moves on to more sophisticated and complex concepts for older learners and adults. EVERFI also delivers education in higher education and workplace settings to help build healthy and thriving college campuses and places of work.
