Financial Literacy

EMPOWERMENT

Marginalized communities often lack access to tailored financial literacy programs that acknowledge and address their importantly unique needs.

When key factors such as systemic constraints, lived experience, and cultural practices are ignored, issues of poverty, restricted economic mobility, and vulnerability to predatory practices, are perpetuated.

POWR’s innovative and culturally responsive financial literacy education is a proven tool in helping to address the economic state of emergency for marginalized communities in America.

Join us in the fight to bring financial freedom and economic inclusion to those who need it most.

2024-26 Roadmap

Our roadmap outlines future initiatives aimed at enhancing our work

Milestones

This section highlights key moments in our journey.

*Timeline may not include all events to date. Please inquire for more information.

Our Model

Our model is built on four key aspects: a Theory of Change that guides our impact, Core Beliefs that shape our vision, Program Design that ensures effective implementation, and innovative Technology that enhances our reach, efficiency and outcomes.

Program Design

In order to give the Opportunity Equation the best chances to succeed, we knew we needed to create deeper engagement and more meaningful interactions in the online education experience.

By centering tailored and incentivized learning, interpersonal communication, and dynamic technology, POWR has created an effective culturally responsive education strategy that encapsulates 3 pedagogical pillars: Gamification, Storification, and Interaction.

Gamification of education refers to the integration of game elements and design principles into learning environments to increase engagement, motivation, and participation.

With financial literacy, where concepts can seem foreign, abstract or complex, gamifying can help to simplify and make them more manageable in addition to making them more exciting by placing them in dynamic contexts.

By using components such as points, badges, leaderboards, rewards, and challenges, learning with POWR is interactive, enjoyable, and effective, increasing participation and keeping people eager for more.

Storification acknowledges that people learn content more effectively when they can relate to it. When learners find information relatable to their lived experiences, they stay engaged longer and in deeper ways.

The bottom line is: No connection to the content = No engagement with the concepts.

Knowing this, POWR uses story to create and deliver information in ways that matter to the communities we serve because it is essential in making content relatable so people are best drawn to the core information.

Interaction within online communities can not only help foster inclusivity and cultural sensitivity, but can also bolster the sharing of accurate and useful information when it’s most needed.

Interaction allows community members to tap into real-world cultural knowledge, receive feedback, and amplify marginalized voices, leading to content that is more engaging, more respectful, and accurate to the cultures represented.

We use interactive content and social media elements to drive higher engagement by creating immersive and participatory experiences and communication channels, increasing the time community members engage with our material.

The Opportunity Equation

POWR’s Theory of Change is Essential Financial Learning coupled with Resources leads people to Opportunity.

We call this the Opportunity Equation: EFL+R=O

Driven by the Opportunity Equation, POWR creates, packages, and delivers culturally responsive financial information (Essential Financial Learning) in dynamic and rewarding ways (Resources) so the people we work with are inspired to engage and practice what they learn (Opportunity).

Technology

POWR utilizes online technology to provide a barrier-free and relevant entry point for underserved individuals to learn how to take control of securing their financial futures, which research shows works.

In order to facilitate our programming, POWR uses the Xage1 Interactive Management System platform and app to distribute curricula in a mobile setting, providing a unique gamified experience that contextualizes critical information and makes it convenient, fun and exciting to take advantage of. For more information visit the Xage1 website here.

Xage1's features are flexible and robust, creating a customizable online ecosystem that allows POWR to easily plug into online or traditional classroom offerings as either an exciting companion to existing offerings or a standalone program. In either use case, with Xage1, POWR delivers engaging, culturally responsive, and impactful financial literacy education to learners in groups of any size or individually.

POWR was instrumental in architecting the infrastructure of Xage1 to ensure its ability to help advance our mission by scaling the program and improving participant outcomes.

FOCUS

FinLit & Areas of Intersection

When a person is not empowered with the tools they need to navigate economic systems, stay financially stable, and pursue upward career mobility, there are many potential negative impacts across various aspects of life.

Things like workforce development, health and wellness, and civic engagement are important areas that can be affected by limited financial understanding. There is also a tangible and measurable burden on the rest of society.

Workforce Development

When a person cannot take advantage of opportunities to enter into or advance in employment, they are more susceptible to financial insecurity, potentially threatening the ability to meet their basic needs over time possibly resulting in complete disconnection.

According to a study by the Brookings Institution, prime-age male nonparticipation in the workforce could be costing the U.S. economy $280 billion annually in lost GDP. The economic toll is even higher when factoring in women and other age groups who are similarly disconnected from the workforce.

Health & Wellness

Financial stress can take a significant toll on mental and emotional well-being, particularly in marginalized communities where financial insecurity is more prevalent. Research study, “Financial Strain and Self-rated Health among Black Adults,” by Univ. of Houston, Univ. of Texas, and Portland State Univ. shows that greater financial strain was significantly associated with poorer self-rated health.

Civic Engagement

Predatory financial practices, scams, and fraud disproportionately affect BIPOC communities, exacerbating existing financial disparities and undermining efforts toward breaking cycles of poverty and systems of racial economic inequality.

Lack of financial literacy can leave people without the skills and knowledge to not only make informed decisions about money, but also to participate in activities that promote understanding the economic impact of public policies and related government accountability measures that affect them.

SCOPE

The People We Serve

Financial literacy is a global issue that affects long-term economic stability, ability to build wealth, and overall well-being, potentially perpetuating cycles of poverty, limiting economic mobility, and reinforcing systemic inequalities.

POWR’s financial literacy work is focused on leaning in with the people who need it most with an asset-based approach, using culturally responsive content and mobile technology to meet communities where they are.

Initial Target Audience

In the US, where the program was launched, the impact of financial illiteracy on BIPOC young people is significant.

With that in mind, we initiated our efforts by targeting BIPOC youth and young adults who we know are presently the most vulnerable to predatory financial practices and systemic barriers to generational wealth building.

We are planning to roll out additional adult- and career-specific programming in 2025.

Youth
Programs

Kesha Hughes

GAWI (The Grace and Wisdom Institute) "POWR has been a great tool for our teens to engage in financial literacy. The need for more life skills education is crucial and they have found a way to engage in an exciting way that is mindful of their pupil/customer. We appreciate the desire to speak the language of youth in order to truly engage and educate."

Kesha Hughes

1/1

Fueled by strong partnerships, this program has thus far reached nine youth service providers including one government-operated youth center, two statewide social service organizations, one regional resource network, and five community-based after school programs.

Our partners do a range of important work across the fields of foster care, probation youth employment, leadership and positive youth development, academic support and mentorship for low-income individuals, health and wellness, and media and technology training.

Because our program is flexible and can be tailored as either a companion or stand alone offering, we are able to meet the needs of various agencies and assist their staff in achieving the overall client outcomes they are working toward, with financial literacy as a key springboard.

We are currently onboarding schools and national apprenticeship programs to grow the user base 10x in 2025.

If you are interested in how this program can help the youth communities you serve or care about, please Contact Us. We are eager to connect and help where we can.

Impact and Outcomes to Date:

Over $20,000 in youth incentives distributed

90% of participants report learning relevant financial topics

85% experience improved financial competencies

85% have changed money habits and attitudes

85% developed new financial goals

85% feel more confident and secure about their financial futures

Adult Program

Coming soon!

Workforce Development
Program

Coming soon!

Your Donations
Give POWR to People

When you support our work, you join the fight to level the economic playing field in America by ensuring that impactful financial literacy education quickly and effectively gets into the hands of those who need it most.

The majority of every dollar given goes straight to our programming. Our infrastructure is intentionally designed so your donations are maximized and can have the most direct impact on helping change people’s lives. The remaining portion of your cash gift goes to core operating expenses including salaries, outreach/marketing, and technology maintenance.

POWR also gladly accepts in-kind gifts of all types as part of our rewards system. Giving in this area helps us incentivize users for learning. Easily shippable items such as gift cards, new tech devices, and other small real goods are welcome.

By being a donor, you:

Every contribution made helps POWR continue to uplift vulnerable populations toward financial independence, wellness, and informed civic participation.

- Ensure our program remains free for youth

- Support our ability to employ young people

- Drive the expansion of our education content

- Keep our incentive inventory full with rewards

- Give us the ability to serve more people, faster

Who We Are

POWR, which stands for Perspective Optimized for World Readiness, is the brainchild of longtime friends Dax Brooks and Jabari Gray.

Having worked as business partners on several previous ventures, Dax and Jabari conceived of POWR in 2019 after several months of deep, probing conversations around the core theme of legacy and what it means to leave the world with something truly valuable when everything is all said and done.

Deciding they wanted a way to share how their respective life journeys primed them for fulfillment through attributes like empathy, curiosity, critical thinking, cultural pride, global perspective and self efficacy, they boiled these ingredients down to Perspective Optimized for World Readiness: POWR.

They then distilled the concept further, noting that fulfillment is led by opportunity, which is in turn often linked to financial security. That said, they determined a person also needs the ability to see themselves on the road to financial security in order to obtain it and pursue more opportunities.

In other words, while money in and of itself may not make a person happy, it can help create the space for people to live more fulfilling lives. But in order to find and maximize money, a person must first understand how the economy works and their relationship to it.

And so, POWR's journey to help people from similar backgrounds and beginnings through financial literacy began.

Board Members

POWR is proudly helmed and advised by a diverse array of distinguished nonprofit and private industry leaders who currently donate their time and money to propel the work, each arriving from a unique vantage point in the fight to reduce economic and racial disparities.

Dax Brooks
Founder & Board Chair

Shama Z. Davis
Board Vice Chair

Jabari Gray
Founder, Board Secretary & Treasurer

Advisory Committee

POWR's Advisory Committee is a network of people with varied professional and lived experiences. This fabric creates a deeply collaborative and values-driven connection between people of different backgrounds who share the overarching goal of helping others improve their financial knowhow as a means to better pursue fulfillment in all aspects of life.