Teachers in affluent schools spend $600 of their own money every year on classroom supplies. In high-poverty schools, teachers spend double that. Something's fundamentally broken in how we fund education—and Jessica Thorne spent 14 years learning exactly where those cracks are.

After working across school districts, state legislatures, and education policy, she joined DonorsChoose as Vice President of Government Partnerships. The platform has channeled $1.8 billion to teachers over 25 years, and now Jessica's working to make it permanent government infrastructure—embedding DonorsChoose into state education budgets in Utah, Hawaii, Nevada, and Delaware, proving that mission-driven organizations can become essential, not optional.

"Teachers are the future of this country and they are taking care of our children every day and they bear this massive responsibility. I think the least we can do is let them kind of guide the way." - Jessica Thorne

🚀 Key Takeaways:

Transparency builds trust faster than polish: DonorsChoose shows every item, every price, every donor—making the platform trustworthy enough for government partnerships worth millions.

Speed and accuracy matter more than scale: Getting supplies to teachers in 2 weeks versus 18 months made DonorsChoose irreplaceable to states managing COVID relief funds.

Grassroots beats top-down every time: Letting teachers define their own needs creates better outcomes than one-size-fits-all government programs dictating what classrooms should have.

Government partnerships require proof, not promises: Utah, Hawaii, Nevada, and Delaware built DonorsChoose into permanent state budgets because the platform delivered measurable, fast results.

Fighting for funding never stops, even at $150M: Success doesn't end the hustle—donor attention shifts, priorities change, and mission-driven organizations must constantly innovate to sustain impact.

⏳ Chapters:

00:00 Introduction to Jessica Thorne and DonorsChoose

01:36 How personal school experiences shaped her mission

05:18 What equity means in education and why it matters

09:12 Breaking into government funding and policy work

15:34 Moving from schools to policy and legislation

19:37 How DonorsChoose works and why teachers trust it

24:42 Why DonorsChoose exists when government could do this work

27:28 Government partnerships during COVID-19 crisis

33:24 Building trust through transparency and operational excellence

46:25 Reaching 90% of US schools and raising $150M annually

55:32 Using platform data to inform state education policy

1:02:26 Lessons on grassroots funding versus top-down mandates

🔗 Connect with Jessica Thorne

Website: https://www.donorschoose.org

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessica-thorne

🔗Resources Mentioned

Support a teacher or get funded: Visit https://www.donorschoose.org to get involved

DonorsChoose on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/donorschoose/

🎙️ About SowGood to GrowGood: Hosted by John Kane Gonzales, entrepreneur and innovator. We explore how change-makers and innovators are building sustainable systems for a better future, turning ideas into scalable impact.

Social entrepreneurs spend years building solutions that could transform communities, only to hear the same answer from venture capitalists: no.

The frustration is real. The question is constant. Why don't VCs invest in social enterprises?

Dr. Luis Martinez has a unique answer because he's lived on both sides. As director of Trinity University's Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, he helped launch 65+ student ventures that raised $60 million in external funding. Now, as Senior Venture Associate at Capital Factory, he works with one of Texas's most active early-stage investors managing 750+ portfolio companies including eight unicorns. In this episode, host John Kane Gonzales gets Luis to pull back the curtain on the hard realities of venture capital, why impact alone isn't enough, and what it actually takes to build a social enterprise that can scale.

"Being a startup founder is impossibly hard. Being a startup founder that is also driven by social impact? Congratulations, you're on advanced mode." - Dr. Luis Martinez

🚀 Key Takeaways:

VCs Aren't Giving You Money, They're Investing for Returns: Venture capitalists promise their investors superior returns (10-20x) in 7-10 years—impact alone isn't enough, it has to come with velocity and scale in a compressed timeline.

Social Impact VCs Exist, But They're Rare: There are funds with social enterprise as their thesis, but performance hasn't always matched traditional VC returns, and some investors handle impact through philanthropy instead of expecting investment returns.

The Three Levels of Fit: Problem-solution fit (does your solution work?), value proposition-customer fit (will someone pay for it?), and product-market fit (can it scale?)—most social entrepreneurs get stuck at level two.

You May Not Be the Founder Who Scales It: The team that takes a company from 0 to 10 is often not the team that takes it from 10 to 100—knowing whether you want to be king or rich is critical.

Stop Planning, Start Building: Go build a real business with real customers and real revenue before seeking VC funding—if you can't convince people you know to invest, you'll never convince institutional investors.

⏳ Chapters:

00:00 Introduction to Luis and Capital Factory

01:40 Luis's journey from organic chemist to VC

05:09 How Trinity launched 65+ student ventures with $60 million raised

08:01 The four components of startup success: idea, capital, mentors, talent

13:01 Why social entrepreneurship flourished in the 2010s

15:07 The nonlinear path from science to entrepreneurship

18:31 English majors launching tech companies at Trinity

21:05 Creating value vs capturing value in entrepreneurship

23:36 The difference between Trinity and Capital Factory

28:44 Why VCs promise superior returns to their investors

32:26 What venture scale actually means: velocity matters

34:49 Why social impact VCs are less common

39:07 The competitive advantage question most founders miss

44:18 The three levels of fit every entrepreneur must master

46:21 What makes a business actually scalable

49:27 Do you want to be king or rich? You can't have both

52:16 Go build a real business first

54:04 What would flip VCs toward social enterprise investing

59:12 Five pieces of practical advice for social entrepreneurs

01:04:43 Where to find Luis

🔗 Connect with Luis Martinez

Website: https://capitalfactory.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drluismartinez/

X: https://x.com/DrLuisEMartinez

🔗 Resources Mentioned

Capital Factory Portfolio: 750+ companies, 8 of Texas's 20 unicorns

https://capitalfactory.com/portfolio/

🎙️ About SowGood to GrowGood: Hosted by John Kane Gonzales, entrepreneur and innovator. We explore how change-makers and innovators are building sustainable systems for a better future, turning ideas into scalable impact.

Chris Hewitt had a problem. Every time he tried to explain his local currency project, people's eyes would roll back in their heads. For six years, he watched potential members tune out the moment he started talking about money, economics, and alternative systems.

In this episode, host John Kane Gonzales sits down with Chris, co-founder and executive director of Hudson Valley Current, a 12-year-old nonprofit local currency that's exchanged over 2 million "currents" across 400+ members. You'll hear how a sales coach taught him to stop explaining money and start talking about benefits, why he built a restaurant and magazine to make the currency actually work, and how he transformed from being 95% grant-dependent to generating 60% of revenue through diversified streams.

"We don't really understand exchange. We know that the dollar works to buy us things, to earn us money for our jobs, but we don't as a society understand money in a complex and deep way and how powerful we are with every dollar." - Chris Hewitt

🚀 Key Takeaways:

Stop Explaining, Start Showing Benefits: A sales coach taught Chris to talk about four benefits—innovative, hyper-local, shifts narrative, saves money—instead of explaining economic theory.

Extractive vs Regenerative Economics: The dollar extracts wealth and centralizes it in corporate headquarters, while local currencies regenerate communities by keeping money circulating locally.

Build the Missing Infrastructure: When not enough businesses accepted currents, Chris built a restaurant and magazine that take 100% currents to prove the model works.

Revenue Diversification Takes Time: Hudson Valley Current went from 95% grant-dependent to 60% diversified revenue over 12 years through eight different streams.

Start With What You Have: You can start a local currency with a notebook tracking barters, then scale to software like Cyclos when ready.

⏳ Chapters:

00:00 Introduction to Chris and Hudson Valley Current

01:49 The 2004 conference that sparked the idea

04:33 What is a local currency and how is it legal

06:05 Understanding exchange and how money really works

10:53 Why Chris built Tilda's Kitchen to fix the catch-22

13:52 Why supporting local economies matters

17:38 Regional specialization and the bio-regional economy vision

22:37 The triple bottom line: people, planet, profit

24:58 The sales coach who changed everything

27:09 Extractive economy vs regenerative economy

32:21 From revolutionary to evolutionary leadership

37:45 Revenue diversification: 95% grants to 60% earned income

41:54 Ratcheting your fundraising success

46:10 How mutual credit systems actually work

50:32 Building momentum with the first members

54:33 The marsh ecosystem metaphor for currency flow

59:40 Technology, people, and community building

01:05:29 Proving the model: 40% income in currents

01:12:27 Small gatherings drive currency movement

01:18:55 Why Chris is stepping down as executive director

01:21:22 Staying flexible while avoiding mission drift

01:25:55 It's just money—and it's justice money

🔗 Connect with Chris Hewitt

Website: https://hudsonvalleycurrent.org

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-hewitt-423a691b4/

🔗 Resources Mentioned

Tilda's Kitchen & Market: 630 Broadway, Kingston, NY | https://tildaskitchenandmarket.com

Midtown Lively (Publication): https://midtownlively.org

🎙️ About SowGood to GrowGood: Hosted by John Kane Gonzales, entrepreneur and innovator. We explore how change-makers and innovators are building sustainable systems for a better future, turning ideas into scalable impact.