Schultz Family Foundation

Entrepreneurial fire is the driving force of the American economy. But not all entrepreneurs are offered the same opportunities to thrive.    Diverse and woman-owned businesses face higher interest rates and stricter collateral requirements. Those burdens cost them an estimated $8 billion a year in excess interest payments, despite having equal creditworthiness and comparable firm characteristics, according to a new study completed by the UW Consulting and Business Development Center at the UW Foster School of Business and funded by the Schultz Family Foundation.    Read the full report: 

For more than three decades in Washington state, Treehouse has helped youth in foster care transition to young adulthood by providing academic and other essential support – and each year, Treehouse serves more than 6,000 kids. Our team was thrilled to volunteer at the Treehouse offices last week organizing donations and handwriting holiday cards.   We are so grateful for organizations like Treehouse who are providing critical services for young people in our community.   Learn more about Treehouse and their impact: www.treehouseforkids.org

We are proud to support innovative solutions and powerful partnerships that will help young people in King County access the careers and futures they dream of. Learn more below:

Navigating difficult family dynamics can be even harder over the holidays so this recent GrownKid episode, entitled “does your family get you?”, is pretty timely. GrownKid co-hosts Gael Aitor and Kayla Suarez, spoke with Jonathan Van Ness, the Emmy Award-winning TV personality and bestselling author about setting boundaries with their family and the importance of chosen family. Take a listen: https://lnkd.in/eT9bX44y The Schultz Family Foundation is proud to support GrownKid in partnership with Joy Coalition. GrownKid is a life skills and mental health podcast aimed at helping young adults tackle the challenges of their twenties.

The path to a successful career remains challenging for underrepresented college students, often due to limited resources and opportunities. Our partner CodePath is changing this narrative by fundamentally reshaping tech education. Their program provides comprehensive, no-cost technical training and mentorship to computer science students, creating direct pathways to opportunities at leading tech companies. They're not just training engineers – they're cultivating the next generation of Chief Technology Officers and founders. Through personalized support from education to employment, we’re seeing how their support is helping build a new generation of diverse tech leaders in the industry. Learn more: www.codepath.org

As a first-generation college student, Howard Schultz's experience at Northern Michigan University helped shape his entrepreneurial spirit and his commitment to creating opportunities for others. We are proud to empower the next generation of NMU Wildcats by supporting scholarships for first-generation students and initiatives to bolster student-athlete success.   Read the full announcement below. 

Every year, 200,000 service members transition from military to civilian life, bringing exceptional leadership experience and technical skills to the workforce. Yet this transition often presents unexpected challenges, from translating military expertise to navigating corporate culture. For a decade, organizations like the USO, IVMF's O2O, VetJobs, Combined Arms, American Corporate Partners (ACP), Hire Heroes USA, Still Serving Veterans, and Hesperus have created a powerful support network, helping thousands of veterans launch successful civilian careers. We're deeply grateful to the leaders and teams at each of our partner organizations who ensure our veterans thrive in their next mission. This #VeteransDay, we encourage you to learn more about them and how you can support this critical work. 

How did Grainger earn the #1 spot on this year’s American Opportunity Index? Bloomberg went inside Grainger's Illinois distribution center to find out.    Read the full article and learn more about companies leading the way in creating economic mobility for their employees: https://lnkd.in/g7KW3iTK

We have just released the 2024 American Opportunity Index, revealing which large U.S. companies are doing the best to advance the careers of their employees and grow the middle class in an evolving labor market. This year’s Index finds that many firms beyond the technology and financial-services industries, including those in the energy and resource-related sectors, are succeeding at providing pathways to opportunity for workers. Overall, companies from more than 30 sectors are represented in the Index’s Top 100 Employers of Choice list.   The Index shows that where you work matters: Employees at the 100-best firms on the Index’s pay metric can earn up to 130% more for the same job than those at bottom-100 firms.  Congratulations to the companies topping this year’s list: Grainger, Costco Wholesale, Capital One, Meta, ServiceNow, J.B. Hunt Transport Services, Inc., The Coca-Cola Company, PepsiCo, MetLife, and Bank of America.   The Index is a project in the public interest from the Schultz Family Foundation, The Burning Glass Institute, and Harvard Business School’s Project on Managing the Future of Work.  

Our country has a shortage of mental health providers. People in rural communities often face additional obstacles finding and accessing care. ➡️ Availability: Mental health providers are much more likely to practice in urban centers. ➡️ Accessibility: Because of the lack of providers, residents in rural areas often travel long distances to receive care.  ➡️ Affordability: Paying out-of-pocket for mental health care often inaccessible. ➡️ Acceptability: Residents in rural areas are more likely to face stigma for needing and/or receiving mental health care. In small communities there are fewer options for care, this can result in people relying on family members, friends, or others in their community for informal care. That’s why we worked with Pinterest, AmeriCorps, and America Forward to create the country’s first Youth Mental Health Corps to address the shortage of mental health practitioners while creating career pathways for young adults. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/d2uQm3SJ