604. 2025 Social Impact Trends That Matter: Fuel Young Generosity. (with Manuela Testolini)

Meet Manuela, the Founder and President of In A Perfect World. 🤝 She’s dedicated her life to empowering and activating the next generation of youth leaders and philanthropists. 🌎

In this episode, Manuela shares how to fuel young generosity by tapping into kids’ natural empathy and kindness, and how to partner with them to create their own "north star" for creating change within your mission. 🙌 After 20 years of work in this space, she shares her playbook for how to co-create programs and tailor your messaging to speak to their unique passions. 

Manuela also shares practical tools, like their Everyday Kindness series and Youth Ambassador program, to help young people take action and create change today. 💫

 Tune in for the playbook today. 🎧

💡Learn:

• How to authentically engage youth by listening to their voices and helping them find their own "north star" for creating change.
  
  
• Strategies for effective messaging and storytelling to connect young people to social issues.
  
  
• How to better integrate youth voice and agency into your work, such as finding internal champions and allowing kids to drive the solutions.
  
  

Episode Highlights

• Empathy and Generosity: Lessons from Children (2:51)
  
  
• The Power of Listening to Children (9:00)
  
  
• Storytelling as a Tool for Engagement (15:02)
  
  
• Confronting Social Issues in Education (20:39)
  
  
• Empowering the Next Generation (23:24)
  
  
• Programs for Change: Everyday Kindness and Dream Catchers (25:41)
  
  
• Hope for the Future: The Role of Young People (31:44)
  
  
• “Trust young people-we often dismiss them, but we should meet them where they are. Encourage them to be their authentic selves instead of shaping them into something else.”- Manuela Testolini’s One Good Thing (32:55)
  
  

Episode Shownotes: 

www.weareforgood.com/episode/604

Episode Transcript: https://otter.ai/u/eRZ0s4f9ViMSa7RNMHFls5LJDlY?utm_source=copy_url

About our Sponsor Jitasa

Jitasa specializes in bookkeeping, accounting, and CFO services exclusively for nonprofits. If you’re looking for a financial partner who truly understands your mission, check out Jitasa. For a limited time, if you tell them Jon and Becky from We Are For Good sent you, you’ll receive your first month of services for free. 

Chapters

• 0:05 Empowering Youth Through Service and Generosity
• 13:20 Empowering Young Activists Through Empathy
• 27:30 Fostering Meaningful Connections Through Service
• 30:23 Empowering Change Makers of Tomorrow
• 35:30 Making a Difference Through Connection

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:05

Rather than giving kids simply the tools to be leaders and the tools to create social impact, how do we take a step back and compel them into service? As we help them lean into their values, their strengths, what are their unique talents that they can bring to the table, then it's really about helping them find their North Star, versus ours.

Speaker 2: 0:27

Welcome to. We Are For Good's Social Impact Trends that Matter in 2025. In partnership with our friends at iDonate, we have hundreds of conversations each year, both on the podcast and offline, with incredible change makers around the world. In this limited series, we're lifting the eight trends that have cut through to us over the past year. These ideas and shifts hold the power to transform your mission from the inside out, and so, in these eight episodes, we're breaking down the trends, one at a time, and inviting a subject matter expert in to take us deeper and to put it into practice. All right, let's get started. Hey, becky, what's happening?

Speaker 3: 1:07

Oh my gosh, john, I am so excited to talk about this trend. I've waited like four years to talk about this trend. The day is here, I know.

Speaker 2: 1:11

You've, like, stacked the deck and you've been hinting that this is coming for a long time, so I'm really excited that the day is finally here. We're back, friends. If you're listening to the social impact trends that matter in 2025, I got to give a shout out to, I donate. Thank you for bringing this series to life, but, becky, do you want to tee this up? I mean, this is one that you were fighting for for years now and we're like we got to put a pin in this topic.

Speaker 3: 1:32

Yeah, I just think that, as we look at impact work, the qualities that we are looking for in our donors and our believers are those who have deep connection to what they do. They model incredible empathy. They are service oriented, like generosity is rooted in what and how we want them to show up, and who models that best? It's the kids. It's literally the kids that model this more inherently than adults, and kids who are rooted in empathy and generosity hold on to those rooted beliefs, like beyond childhood, and they absolutely embrace, john, so many of these values that we have rooted in. We Are For Good, that everyone matters, that they love being in community with each other, that everyone matters, that they love being in community with each other. They model kindness and acceptance and civility and grace and integrity, and they hold us to it, and I love that about kids when they call us out. But something magical really happens when we put those values into practice on a regular basis. So we are having a much bigger conversation about how is it the responsibility of all of us to fuel young generosity? And before I introduce our incomparable guests, I want to share a quote that I found that I just love so much, and it's by Carol Wiseman and she said children have a unique ability to remind us that generosity is not measured by wealth but by the heart's willingness to give, and that is what we're going to dive into today with our incredible guest, and she is a repeat guest and we absolutely love her. We are excited to have Manuela Testolini she is the founder of In a Perfect World back with us on the podcast and for 20 years, in a Perfect World back with us on the podcast, and for 20 years, manuela has really worked to build these effective, solutions-oriented approaches to empower the next generation, and so, under her leadership, in a Perfect World is created and supported programs that provide education, mentoring, artistic expression to children who are really underserved or at-risk youth around the world, and we're talking about places like Malawi and Senegal and Haiti and Nepal and Nicaragua, among so many others, while also having a footprint here in the United States and LA and DC and beyond. So, in addition to Interperfect's world work of building schools, they're providing grants to inner city classrooms in need, helping to facilitate all this youth-driven momentum, and she's created this really cool, unique youth ambassador program, where she trains young people to be the philanthropist and community leaders that we want integrated into our work. So we've brought in the powerhouse.

Speaker 3: 4:22

Manuela, welcome back to the podcast. We're so excited you're here. Thank you, so happy to see you guys. Thanks for coming back. We have missed you. Yes, I mean, I miss you guys too, I know, and I want to just lay some space to say you're in LA. We are just sending so much love to you and our LA friends. Just as you navigate what's happening all around you and I just watch you as your children are leaning in and you're talking about hard things and I just think it's beautiful. So I just want you to feel that love from us. But from those listeners who may be meeting you for the first time, can you share a little bit more about the work you're doing at In a Perfect World and how you're centering kids and youth at the very heart of it?

Speaker 1: 5:07

Well, I mean, you teed me up so nicely with that introduction but, as you mentioned, I've been doing this work for a long time and it's evolved over time because the needs and the interests of kids have changed. But really our origin story is about this one little kid that I met 20 years ago who had a desire that was not being met. And I would be working in these shelters and different places and meeting tons of kids and I started to ask them this question in a perfect world, because I wanted to hear from them and I realized we were hearing so much from the adults about the needs of the communities and the facilities I was at, but we weren't hearing from the kids so much. And so this is really where this was born. And you know, the kids at the time would tell me the usual things where they wanted, you know, toys, a Game Boy. Back in the day, they want to be Disneyland, you know. But one little boy said, in his perfect world, all he wanted was a blue crayon. And I thought, okay, well, I need him to think bigger, I want him to understand like I can help him make something happen, get something that he wants. And he really kept focusing on this blue crayon and what I found out when I tracked down his mom. They were living in a domestic violence situation and she and her son had left in the middle of the night and she grabbed the things that she thought were most important to him, so the Tonka truck and the teddy bear and his box of crayons, and she left behind the blue crayon, one that you know. She believed that they were now safe and away from the trouble they were in and that all his problems were solved. And this little boy was holding this, in that he had a void. And the problem with all of this is that no one had ever asked, and so I thought like, wow, this could have been solved a long time ago.

Speaker 1: 7:03

A kid's perfect world is not so out of reach if it is just about a blue crayon in that sense, and so it really propelled me towards this. Like, how do we just engage kids in solutions? So, whether they're in a shelter, whether at school, they're in a family, wherever they are, like, how do we leverage youth voice? We leverage youth voice and, as I continue to ask that question, first of all, it can be challenging to get to draw out kids to talk about things that might be challenging like that. So I approached it from a place of art and I thought, if I can give them artistic avenues to express to me what they would like to see change in their world. And so, for a kid, their world could be their home life, it could be their school, it could be their community, it could be the broader world.

Speaker 1: 7:47

I started to draw these things out through simple things like let's make a change the world banner, or let's create wish boxes and then see what the kids put in there, because then it opens an opportunity for dialogue. Big void. That wasn't happening. This is 20 years ago, where old school, parenting, teaching, all that was just like we're going to talk at you and we're going to tell you what's happening, versus including them. And the more I did that, the more profound the messaging came back to me.

Speaker 1: 8:18

There was a little boy who was in another shelter who, when he was making his Change the World banner, started to draw a house, and I made the silly assumption that he was drawing what he would want, which is a house for himself. And he corrected me when he stood up and said that his Change the World banner said I would like to buy homes for all the people that don't have them. And when I asked him, little Jalen who's nine or 10 years old, why did you think about how to help somebody else get a home when you yourself don't have a home? And he said very simply, like I already know how it feels, what you know, to not have a home and I wouldn't want any other kid to feel that way. And so there I am in my face of tears again, because I thought, like kids are kind of wise and full of empathy that we're not tapping into. And so because a kid who's in a certain you don't have to be in a position of power or wealth to the to your point earlier to give. And so he and his giving is really heart driven, empathy driven, because he has experienced it himself.

Speaker 1: 9:25

So I explained to Jalen you know we can't buy homes for everyone, but what can we do? What would have made you feel better when you came to this shelter? And he said I would have liked to somebody to give me a note you know, welcome note, maybe some art supplies and a stuffy. And so he, we created Jalen's welcome welcome bags. So every kid that came to the shelter from then on would get this in receipt before you know. Upon getting there, you know that somebody else knows your name, you know that someone has thought about you, so you're not just being shuffled around in your circumstances but you really feel welcome and it it really was so impactful to me that a kid in that circumstance would think broader like that. So that's propelled our mission all these years to really listen to the kids and see what is compelling them to act and be of service.

Speaker 2: 10:13

And well, I mean your stories gut us, I mean as parents. I just think the dignity that you have for children to say that what you have to say, what you see in the world, deeply matters. And I'm going to stop long enough to listen Like we need more of that, you know, and I think that you've been doing this for so long. It's. It's fun on the other side to to look back and be like what has been possible, because you were brave enough to ask, without wanting to teach or lead or take the next step, and so we were speaking.

Speaker 2: 10:46

I was talking to somebody this last week and they said you know, don't miss the chance to really listen and learn from the child. And I feel like that's what you're saying too. We're not empowering young generosity alone. We have so much to gain from just their wisdom, and I just hear that in your story and I love that you've centered this. And so my first question for you is just how do you know missions authentically do this? How do we invite kids, young people, into our philanthropy and social work, social impact work, in just an authentic way that allows them to have their voice? What are some ideas?

Speaker 1: 11:17

Yeah, I think really meeting kids where they are is a big deal, because we can go, we can create a program and go impose this sort of idea of a program on all sets of kids, but it's going to resonate differently. And so I'd like to say we co-create programming. So we ask kids you know what are the things you want to learn about, you know what are the things you're seeing in your community that you'd like to impact. But even taking a step back from that when I talked about empathy earlier, I really feel like that's the driving force. So, if we can, rather than giving kids simply the tools to be leaders and the tools to create social impact, how do we take a step back and compel them into service? Right? So, because there are tons of service, well-meaning, service oriented organizations where kids rack up a certain number of hours or they get this and it's like, but what is the underlying driving force behind it? So for me and for our programming, we start with diving into who the kids are.

Speaker 1: 12:18

Who are you as a person? Because you're going to bring your unique impact to everything, your unique opinions, your views, based on who you are. I mean, I grew up in such a different environment than I'm in. I grew up in Toronto, which is very multicultural. I spent my summers in a third world country. All of that informs who I am and how I look at the world. And it's the same thing with the kids we work with. They come from all walks of life and they all have different stories to bring to the table. And I think, as we help them lean into their values, their strengths, what are their unique talents that they can bring to the table, then it's really about helping them find their North Star versus ours. Let's help you, guide you towards that. And I always say I'm 100% a guide on the side and not a sage on the stage like 100%, because I'm not here to tell you what the problems are in the world and how you should help and you know how many hours you should spend on it and this is what you should do. I'm really here to say, like guys, what do you? What is really on your heart? What do you see in your community?

Speaker 1: 13:20

When the fires happened here in LA, the teens called me to say this is what we want to do. This is how we're going to roll this out. We're want to do. This is how we're going to roll this out. We're going to do a drive for the, for the products, we're going to do a fundraiser, et cetera, et cetera. And now the discussion is who do we want to help, like what? Where do we find people versus? Okay, we're going to do this, you know, for me directing. So I think that's really where we want to lean in, because it's really about empathetic leadership versus just leadership and just service and just generosity. It's about really cultivating that, because if you can compel kids, you don't have to push them Like they're driving everything, because it's really in them, it's what they want to be doing.

Speaker 3: 15:07

Okay, my leg hair is going to grow like two inches during this conversation because I keep getting goosebumps. I am so just nodding like a bobblehead over here because I have had so much of a similar reaction just testing this with my own kids. And I think what you're saying about handing this agency over is one of the most powerful tools that we can all just apply, and it's got to start with this humility and this understanding that we all have something to learn from each other. We've done a lot of content on Gen Z and you've been working with Gen Z, but you're also working with Gen Alpha and I mean, think about these kids.

Speaker 3: 15:49

We've been talking about this and I say kids like with air quotes, because I want to recognize that Gen Z is like in their late 20s. You all are like adults now fully into adulthood but also they have been connected digitally pretty much since they were born, like my daughter is 14. The iPad came out the year she was born. I mean there is just a different way that they know how to connect, the way that they find their people. So I want to know, when you empower, when you ask these questions, what kind of messaging have you found that resonates the most with younger generation. When it comes to advocacy getting activated, whether it's empowering them to start their own fundraising, what are those messages that really stick?

Speaker 1: 16:34

Yeah, I would say storytelling and really giving them something tangible. So you know, if we're teaching about climate change, let's say, if I talk to kids, I mean I would start to sound like Charlie Brown teacher almost immediately, right, right?

Speaker 3: 16:52

That's me talking to mine.

Speaker 1: 16:54

It's like the earth's on fire. I mean, it is so out of reach for them. If I talk about something like how is climate change impacting their home, their school, their community, and drill it down so it's super, super specific, it becomes something that's more tangible for them to solve, because everything else just feels like, oh my gosh, it's like too far gone. How do we even make a dent? The idea is, if they can think about it either how it's impacting them directly or it's impacting they can see the big cause through the eyes of another child. So that's the other thing. So when we talk about immigration and welcoming newcomers, et cetera, we don't talk about it as a big. You know, there are millions of people that come here from all different places.

Speaker 1: 17:43

We talk about Alfredo, who crossed the border and what was his journey like and what might it have been like to be the new kid in school who didn't speak the language and to be away from his family, and what do you think you would pack in your backpack if you could only take things in your backpack Like.

Speaker 1: 17:57

That drills it down so much. And so it goes back to empathy, because they're like okay, I can connect, I can put myself in those shoes and I can say, okay, if that was me, what would I want, how would I want to be served. And so it gives the kids again this like super specific touch point to say I understand what this would be like, I understand how I can help and how I would want to be helped in this situation. And then it again compels them to act, because if you talk about it in too big of terms it just gets lost. And so I think between you know, as I said, drilling it down to what, how it impacts them directly or how it could impact them in the future directly, Um and just stories, the stories of other kids, is really important.

Speaker 2: 18:38

So wise, and it's like this tracks as we get older too. It's like tell me the story, tell me how this matters, cause I see my kids eyes glaze over when I start pontificating and trying to make it a real big teachable moment. Yes, a hundred 100%.

Speaker 1: 18:51

And I think also, you know when I was talking earlier about you know, immediate impact, because if what they're doing seems so far down the road, like the results are not tangible necessarily, or they're just so far down the road, it's really hard.

Speaker 1: 19:06

So, you know, early on in my career, I don't want to say I felt hopeless, but I felt like my career. I don't want to say I felt hopeless, but I felt like, oh my gosh, there's just so much to do. I was in Mumbai, I was in a slum in Mumbai, I was helping with some education program and I went to check on a girl who didn't show up for school and when I went I hadn't seen her in her environment. I had seen her in this classroom and so she didn't show up for a couple of days in a row. I went to the slum to look for her and when I got there I was so overwhelmed by the number of social issues in one place. So, like you know domestic violence, alcoholism, malnutrition, sanitation I'm like what on earth? Like what's the plan? What is the plan? This is like too much. But then, when I leaned into, okay, well, I'm here because this is education, we're breaking the cycle. First of all, we're going to break the cycle. We're going to educate this next group of this next generation to be well-educated. They're going to be dialed in, they're going to be ready to serve, et cetera. That helps to make a difference, because it's not about me solving these big issues, it's about me cultivating this next sort of army of people to do that.

Speaker 1: 20:18

And I think you know, when kids see that they have a tangible result and other kids are inspired by their work, it's just so much better. I mean, my kids are much more inspired by the other kids that they see around them doing amazing things. So even when we talk about Black History Month or we talk about leaders and icons and civic leaders, we talked about them as children we're like. But what was Martin Luther King's origin story? How did he become that? And who are the activists now? The Malalas, the Greta Thunberg's, like all these people? Because otherwise it's too far out of reach and it doesn't give them a sense of possibility that their little impact which is not little when it's multiplied and rippled can have a bigger effect on the larger problem.

Speaker 2: 21:06

So dang good and just going to cue up the little people big dream series. There's been a lot of those reading in my house that takes you through the childhood. So many of the change makers yeah, I mean, would you talk about some of your resources and programs? I mean y'all within a perfect world are just like a lighthouse to this greater sector and to us as parents too and those that are working with young people. How do you you know what are tools that people can leverage? How can they lean into them and kind of point us to all the things?

Speaker 1: 21:35

We have an everyday kindness series, which I love because it's an easy, one-off entry point for parents, for educators, for youth group leaders. It's something that we launched in response to the pandemic, when everybody's like what are we doing? And there was was a lot of hopelessness and everybody was isolated and at home. So we created these like what is something that is manageable for parents or educators to be able to accomplish and really leaning into again empathy, gratitude, awareness and just getting kids involved. So that's free and accessible on our website at any time. You can go and download those and we're constantly adding new things there. But then we have our longer term programs. We have our Dream Catchers program, which is for the elementary set, where they're learning about these giant causes again through the eyes and lens of one kid's story, and then we use art still to kind of cultivate their awareness but also to give them an opportunity within that same lesson to be of service. So, like your kids, becky, who are interested in animals, if we're learning about doing a lesson about compassion for animals, we're going to make no-sew blankets for the pets at the shelter and in that lesson, because this is going to be like you're going to learn about it, but we're not going to burden you with like, oh my gosh, all these animals need homes. We're going to say here's how you can be of service immediately. So that's very important and it's, it's my, I love it.

Speaker 1: 22:57

And then, as the kids get older, they can be in the ambassador program, which starts to lean into even more so, which is something we dove into during, again during the pandemic, when we realized these kids wanted to serve but they really needed to just fortify themselves. And so our first series is called Inspire what Makes Me Me? And it's about them leaning into who they are, where they come from, who's their support squad, what are their strengths and talents, and really just having them lean into the awesomeness that is them. And then it starts to weave into okay, and then what are the issues in my communities, what is my family facing, what are the things I want to tackle? And then it starts to build their leadership skills.

Speaker 1: 23:34

And I think that, again, the unique part of this is that we're sort of, you know, we're guiding them on this path so that they can come forward with their own unique version of social impact versus okay. The culmination is you must do these things, you must do a beach cleanup, you must do whatever, but to really guide them towards something that is meaningful and unique and resonates with them personally. So those programs you know we'd love to partner with schools, with youth groups, find us please, because we're always taking on new partners and we're. It's so fun, it's really fun to see what the kids come up with. I mean, like I get the pictures and the videos or I go pop into a program and and kids have really amazing things to say and just great perspectives on all of it.

Speaker 3: 24:21

Okay, I'm going to tell you one thing I observe about you and love about you, and two, one thing I think you're so good at one your whole body, face and everything changes when you talk about this.

Speaker 3: 24:31

My friend, like you, can tell that this is not just your zone of genius, it is your legacy, your conviction. Your children over the last three to four years, integrate into this work that you've been doing like a decade before they even arrived has been so soul-filling. But I also want to compliment you because you ask different questions, you listen differently. You are, I think, you're coming at this in a way that is so intuitive for the kids and less intuitive for the adults, and that is why it is working. And so for those people who may be listening saying, okay, I really want to integrate this into my life, or maybe I really want to get my nonprofit integrated with kids and their voices and their actions, like, what counsel would you give them on where to start? Whether they're a parent, whether a nonprofit professional, they could be an auntie, whatever it is, what do you think?

Speaker 1: 25:36

I do think there is something you know, just tagging on what you said there about how we talk to the kids, because one of the most simple things I use and this is my mom had on now is when my kids come to me with something I start with. Are you looking for solutions or support? Because it is my default, as I'm a straight up Virgo, to be like I'm going to fix this. Whatever you just said, it's fixed.

Speaker 3: 25:59

No hurts, yes, let me know. So my kids are used to saying like you know.

Speaker 1: 26:03

So I had to check myself a long time ago because I can, I could do it in the nonprofit space with our programming, because I'm one step removed from the kids. But with it, with my own kids, I'm like, oh, I'm just going to knock this out. But I had to realize like I have to apply all of this to my own children. And so, leaning in and asking if kids are looking for solutions or support, and then asking them for their ideas, first, I mean just be quiet and listen. I mean it's such a challenge, um, but I I tell the kids that we work with all the time. It's really hard to deprogram the adults because we were conditioned a certain way. So, forgive us, but the whole mission is to program you guys so that you don't have to be deprogrammed later. And so, as people are looking to start, a couple of things I would say too is that don't reinvent the wheel.

Speaker 1: 26:49

There are tons of awesome organizations out there to partner with, to seek counsel from. We are really we pride ourselves on being a convener of awesome other organizations, so find us and we will help connect you as well. I also think that it's important to find your cheerleader, so, whether it's a teacher who understands this work, who leans into something like this, a teacher who understands this work, who leans into something like this, where they are, whether it's social, emotional learning or service, where they can understand how the two intersect, is really important. But really finding that cheerleader and advocate within a system is important, because it can be challenging to change the status quo. I'll just give you a quick example. I was at my daughter's, so now I have my own focus group at home, right Because I have a 13-year-old, so I have both age ranges and they'll give you their opinion very bluntly Interesting.

Speaker 1: 27:42

So two things happened. One is we were talking about doing a youth summit to support the kids who are survivors of the fires in Altadena here, and so I said to her we were having I'm having a zoom call with my people and my daughter sitting up to the side studying for a history test, and then we just finally said, like what do you think? What are what topics would you want at the youth summit? And she comes onto the screen and she says I actually would like to hear from other young people who didn't grow up with the support that I have to do my projects, because I want to know how people do it when they don't have their people. I'm like, oh, this is building your squad. How do you build your squad? Right? So I'm like this is good, but I thought like, oh, I literally have my focus group here. That's helpful.

Speaker 1: 28:25

The other thing, though like we were at a project recently organized outside of Interperfect World. A project recently organized outside of Interperfect World, lucia and I actually both of my girls and I were volunteering, and it was to serve families whose children are terminally ill. This was just this past weekend. We're there, we have this awesome, we have this. I'm feeling like a super deep connection to this whole cause and everything, and I've educated my girls, you know. Before we went like this is what we're doing. But then, as soon as it was over, it was almost like somebody flipped a switch. They just said, okay, everybody record your service hours and everybody gets you know credit for this. And I thought, oh, are we not doing a debrief? Are we not doing a how?

Speaker 3: 29:02

do you guys feel about this? Welcome to the transaction, not the transformation. Yes, Can I just say it took all of me and like I'm like.

Speaker 1: 29:09

This is not my project. This is not my project.

Speaker 2: 29:12

Do you want support or do you want solutions?

Speaker 1: 29:17

Totally I was like uh-oh, but my kids looked at me as soon as this person started speaking. My kids looked at me because they knew what I was thinking and they're like, please don't say anything, mom, because you're going to embarrass us, but I will be writing a nice supportive letter about like this is, you know, might be something to deepen the experience for the kids because those it did not resonate with those kids. It resonated with my kids but it didn't with those. And I think, as people are moving into this space, to look beyond transactions to your point and look to solid connections and it's more about quality over quantity and just like how do you meaningfully create these connections and moments of service?

Speaker 2: 29:55

Brilliant, not just about these little credit hours, I mean yeah, you're bringing us back to this, my friend. Okay, I have a question for you. I'm like what brings you hope? I mean you get to be around amazing young people what gives you hope for the future of generosity? And when you look out and you see kind of the role that young people are playing today and kind of how they're moving through this world right now, what's on the horizon?

Speaker 1: 30:24

You know, I have said you know we talk about Generation Alpha, like the glass generation, which they call them because it's all screens. Talk about generation alpha, like the glass generation which they call them because it's all screens.

Speaker 1: 30:32

We think about those screens as a way as disconnecting them right. We think about it as disconnecting them from each other, from true connection, from all the things that we value, and I had to really shift my focus on that to have the kids lean into how do you use these things as tools versus those things using you? And what gives me hope is that they are deeply connected. They're deeply because they are more informed. I mean they are almost too informed. I mean when we were kids we didn't, we weren't hearing about. I was hearing about the middle East cause. I have family there, but the general population was not, unless you were a a kid watching the 11 o'clock news. So we are bombarded with so much and it can be a catch-22, but I do think what gives me hope is that kids are seeing enough and they see that there is a way to mobilize around that. And they see that there is a way to mobilize around that there's a way to use the connection of social media and just being on the phones and all of that to propel causes forward. And I think it gives us also a unique opportunity that you know serving doesn't look the same as it did years ago, exactly. But I also think really one key is that because we lean into who kids are first, we understand that being a change maker means something completely different to all kids you know I have.

Speaker 1: 32:02

There are kids who, like Lucia we were somewhere recently, she's 13. I don't know why they even gave her her lemonade and a plastic cup. But they gave it to her with a plastic cup and a paper straw and she looked at it and she's like, well, what's the point of that? Why are you giving me? Why are you? This is like virtues, like what, what does even happen here? It's like performative. They're giving me the straw, but she's the kid that will sit down and write about it. She'll write the restaurant manager and say, like, what are you doing? And she'll want to educate them. Not all kids would do that, but you know. So if it's like, what are you the kid that's going to write? Are you the activist? Are you the advocate? Are you the philanthropist? Are you the volunteer? Are you the mentor? Are you who are you? And so I think helping with us, you know us understanding that all kids and change makers themselves come in all different shapes and sizes, gives me so much hope because they're going to attack it from all different aspects.

Speaker 3: 32:57

And it just undermines this belief that everyone has something to give. And I think what you've just said there was really beautiful, because, in my mind, kids understand currency far more than adults, and I'm going to put a bold and an underline under people in the nonprofit space. Kids understand currency. What we have been programmed to believe is that our currency and our value is tethered to what someone can financially give to us, and what kids are awakening is like I have agency and currency everywhere. I have my voice, I have my circle of influence, I have who I'm connected to, I have what I know because, to your point again, it's being modeled at my house.

Speaker 3: 33:43

I mean, I think there's a difference when your mom is saying things like well, this is the impact of plastic on our city and on our world and we should look for this and let's clean it up and let's make a conscious effort not to grab it, and so I just think what you're saying is really helping us expand our thinking about the opportunities that are here to be lifted, and I can assure you that restaurant owner, if he got that letter, wouldn't just toss it. It's like, oh no, this kid took a moment to tell me I'm actually going to think about it here for a hot minute, and it'll be that much more impactful that it came from a kid, right Exactly. I think they'll pause because it means something deeper. So this has just been such a rich conversation and I want you to round it out with a one good thing what's, what's coming up for?

Speaker 1: 34:36

you to leave with our audience. I mean, I think in the context of this discussion, it's really about just trust the young people. I know we write them off a lot, we're like they're on their phones or whatever it is. Just trust them but also meet them where they're at so that they are. So we're asking them to come as their full selves and we're going to help them be their full selves rather than telling them they should look and be something else.

Speaker 2: 35:02

What a way to round this out, and I mean those listening are going to want to find you connect with. In a perfect world, where do y'all hang out online? What's the best way for people to connect into what y'all are doing?

Speaker 1: 35:13

our website is iapworg you can find us there which you'll also see those everyday kindness lessons on there that are free to download. We also have a change maker quiz for you to take shortly, so that'll be really fun. So you can figure out what your change maker archetype is. I love it. It's going to be so fun. And then we're on Instagram at perfectworldfdn, which you can find us there. We'd love to see you, but you can find us. I'm on LinkedIn also.

Speaker 3: 35:40

And if you feel compelled by this, I'm going to throw this out there. If you make a gift in a perfect world, I hope you understand that that is like a double gift. It's going to fund the movement, it's going to allow this work to expand, so find a way to plug in. I hope this has made you all think differently about how we can integrate kids and stay tuned, because we have so much more coming on this later this year, because we really want to help you feel empowered and people like Manuela are going to be here to help you a warrior up and be ready for this moment. So thank you, my friend, for the way you show up in this world and thank you for the way you listen. Thank you, guys.