Susan Combs, the Founder of Pancakes For Roger, joins Charity Talks. Susan founded Pancakes for Roger to honor her father, Major General Roger E. Combs, by helping veteran address the unique challenges they face during and after their service. Through partnerships with 501(c)(3) organizations and initiatives tailored to veterans' needs, Pancakes fo…

Marijana Savic, the Founder and Director of Atina, and Board Director of Global Fund for Children, is this episode's guest. Atina is a Serbia-based nonprofit that fights against human trafficking. As Maja and Brooke discuss, not only does Atina help the transition process for trafficking victims, it also works to support the rights of women general…

Maya Ajmera, founder of the Global Fund for Children (GFC), and President & CEO of Society for Science and Executive Publisher of Science News, joins Charity Talks. GFC invests in innovative, community-based organizations around the world to help children and youth reach their full potential and advance their rights. Founded in 1921, Society for Sc…

Dan Hubbard, the founder and Director of 4Amanda.Org, is this episode’s guest. 4Amanda is a non-profit foundation that provides emergency financial support to cancer patients. The foundation is named for Amanda Pagans-Hubbard, Dan’s deceased wife, who with Dan set up the foundation before her passing. As Dan and Brooke discuss, the financial challe…

David Coker, the President of Fisher House Foundation, joins Charity Talks. The Foundation builds comfort homes where military and veteran families can stay free of charge while a loved one is in the hospital, and are located in military and VA medical centers around the world. The Foundation also operates the Hero Miles program to bring family mem…

Joey Savoie, the Co-Founder and Co-Executive Director of Charity Entrepreneurship, is this episode’s guest. CE’s core mission is to launch high-impact nonprofits by connecting entrepreneurs with effective ideas, training and funding. As Joey and Brooke discuss, each year CE dedicates hundreds of research hours to identifying the most effective char…

Andrea Goodman, the CEO of I AM ALS, joins Charity Talks. I AM ALS was founded by Brian Wallach and his wife Sandra after he was diagnosed with ALS in 2017. ALS is a terminal neurodegenerative disease that robs people of their ability to move, speak, eat, and breathe, usually in less than five years. Brian and Sandra founded I AM ALS to find a way …

Titus Syengo, the Executive Director of Teaching at the Right Level Africa (“TaRL”), is this episode’s guest. TaRL began as a joint venture between Pratham and J-PAL (whose Global Executive Director — Iqbal Dhaliwal — was a guest on Charity Talks last year). Its primary goal is to strengthen children’s foundational literacy and numeracy skills by u…

John Renouard, the Founder and Executive Director of WHOlives, joins Charity Talks. On a trip to Africa in 2010, John was shocked to see how little access to clean water many villages he visited had. So, working with college engineering students, he invented the “Village Drill,” which is a low cost, hand-operated water drill, and then started WHOli…

Marko Kasic, the Founder of FundLife, is this episode's guest. FundLife works directly on the ground in the Philippines, where a very high percentage of children live in poverty and without access to the tools to develop flourishing lives. FundLife has developed a youth-led, community-first approach to ensure that all children there have an equal o…

Sean Mayberry, the founder and CEO of StrongMinds, joins Charity Talks. StrongMinds treats depression suffered by women largely in Africa. For African women, depression is a leading cause of disability. Yet, due to the lack of investment in mental health services, approximately 85% of people in low-income countries – if not more – receive no treatm…

Catherine Spencer, the CEO of Cochrane, is this episode’s guest. Cochrane is a global organization that collaborates to produce trusted health evidence, make it accessible to all, and advocate for its use. Its work is internationally recognized as the benchmark for high-quality information about the effectiveness of health care. During the podcast,…

Dr. James Deutsch, the CEO of Rainforest Trust, joins Charity Talks. For more than 30 years, Rainforest Trust’s primary mission has been to raise funds in order to make grants in Africa, Asia and South America that preserve and protect land and habitats there. As James and Brooke discuss, by protecting millions of acres of land, Rainforest Trust is…

Princess Padmaja Kumari Parmar, the Founder and President of Friends of Mewar, is this episode’s guest. Padmaja is the daughter of the House of Mewar, which was founded in 734 AD and is the world’s longest, unbroken serving dynasty. She founded Friends of Mewar to address three pressing problems - women’s empowerment and education, lack of preventi…

Michael Chuter, the Chief Executive of Pump Aid, joins Charity Talks. Pump Aid works primarily in Malawi, and its goal is to achieve lasting positive change in the poorest and most disadvantaged communities there by implementing water, sanitation, and hygiene programs. As Michael and Brooke discuss, over the last twenty years, over 10,000 communiti…

Christopher Cassidy, the President and CEO of the National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation (“NMOHMF”), is this episode’s guest. Chris attended the U.S. Naval Academy and became a Navy SEAL, before becoming a commander of SEAL units in Afghanistan. After Chris left the SEALs, he joined NASA as an astronaut, flew on the Space Shuttle Endeavor and Ru…

Dr. Michael Plant, the Founder and Director of the Happier Lives Institute, joins Charity Talks. While studying for his PhD in moral philosophy at the University of Oxford, Michael realized that there was a pressing need for more research on the most cost-effective, evidence-based ways to improve global happiness. That led him to found the Happier …

Iqbal Dhaliwal, the Global Executive Director of MIT’s Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), is this episode’s guest. J-PAL’s mission for the last twenty years has been to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence. Anchored by a network of hundreds of affiliated professors at universities around the world, J…

Dr. Vicky Bond, the President of The Humane League, joins Charity Talks. As Vicky and Brooke discuss, animals raised for food (including predominantly chickens) suffer from abuses in factory farms at a scale that is shocking. THL exists to end the abuse of these animals. It does so by influencing the policies of the world’s largest food companies, …

Lance Kawaguchi, the CEO of Cure Brain Cancer Foundation, is this episode’s guest. As Lance and Brooke discuss, there has been very little progress made in the treatment of brain cancer in the last few decades, despite the fact that brain cancer has such a terrible impact on the people afflicted with it, including young children. However, Cure Brai…

Bonnie Carroll, the President and Founder of the Tragedy and Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS), joins Charity Talks. Since 1994, TAPS has offered compassionate care to all those grieving a military loss. As Bonnie and Brooke discuss, TAPS has a variety of programs that help so many affected families cope with the loss of a loved one, includin…

Ellen Agler, the CEO of the END Fund, and Mark Stoleson, the CEO of Legatum, are this episode’s guests. In 2006, Legatum realized that millions of people in Rwanda and Burundi were needlessly suffering from treatable neglected tropical diseases, such as intestinal worms, so it decided to fund programs to address this huge problem. After its work de…

Siegrid Holler, a partner and founding member at Instiglio, joins Charity Talks. Instiglio is based in Bogota, Columbia, and its mission is to ensure that every dollar spent on social programs in low and middle-income countries has the greatest possible impact. By focusing on three areas — systems strengthening and performance management, outcomes-…

Parth Ahya, the cofounder of The Taimaka Project, is this episode’s guest. Taimaka works hand-in-hand with rural communities, primarily in Africa, to tackle hunger and malnutrition. The problem it is addressing is post-harvest food insecurity arising from farmers being forced to sell their crops right after the harvest, leaving them with no food or…

Brooke Haggerty, the Executive Director of Faunalytics, joins Charity Talks. Faunalytics’ mission is to empower animal advocates by providing them with access to research and strategies that maximize their effectiveness in reducing animal suffering. It does so by conducting essential research, maintaining an online research library, and directly su…

Joshua Ross, the co-founder of Humanitix, is this episode’s guest. Humanitix is an online event ticketing business that Josh and his childhood friend founded when they realized that there was an opportunity to disrupt the ticketing business. But their real innovation was their decision to donate 100% of the company’s profits to effective charities,…

Joshua Greene, Professor of Psychology at Harvard University and co-founder of Giving Multiplier, joins Charity Talks. During the podcast, Joshua and Brooke discuss the “heart” versus “head” dilemma surrounding charitable giving, and the behavioral research his team at Harvard has been doing that led to his founding of Giving Multiplier. Giving Mul…

Svetha Janumpalli, the Founder and CEO of New Incentives, is this episode’s guest. New Incentives is an innovative nonprofit that uses small cash payments to boost childhood vaccinations in North West, Nigeria, which has some of the lowest childhood vaccination rates in the world. In partnership with local governments, it provides these cash transf…

Timothy Higdon, the President and CEO of Hearing Health Foundation, joins Charity Talks. HHF is the largest nonprofit funder of hearing and balance research in the United States, and for more than 60 years, HHF has awarded scientific research grants to foster the development of cochlear implant technology, more effective hearing aids and successful…

Dr. Kate Schecter, the President and CEO of World Neighbors, is this episode’s guest. During the podcast, Kate and Brooke discuss how World Neighbors focuses on training and educating communities around the world to find lasting solutions to the challenges they face, such as hunger, poverty and disease. It does this by investing in local leadership…

Cheryl Crazy Bull, the President and CEO of the American Indian College Fund, joins Charity Talks. The College Fund has been providing scholarships to Native American students for over 30 years. In addition to scholarships, the College Fund provides critical funding to tribal colleges and universities, as well as support to students after graduatio…

Luke Freeman, the Executive Director of Giving What We Can, is this episode's guest. Giving What We Can was founded by Oxford philosophers Toby Ord and William MacAskill to inspire donations to the world's most effective organizations. It was one of the first groups focused on Effective Altruism, which is a movement and philosophy that advocates fo…

Kelly Dolan, the CEO and President of Ronald McDonald House Charities, joins Charity Talks. The mission of RMHC is to create, find and support programs that directly improve the health and well-being of children and their families. It is best known for its Ronald McDonald House® programs around the world, which provide support and housing for paren…

Debbie Drell, the Director of Membership for the National Organization for Rare Disorders, is this episode’s guest. NORD is the leading advocacy organization representing patients and families affected by rare diseases, and is committed to the identification, treatment and cure of 7,000 rare diseases. For almost 40 years, NORD has led the way in vo…

Whitney Flanagan, the Marketing and Communications Director of the Conservation Fund, joins Charity Talks. The Conservation Fund protects America’s most critical lands and water to provide greater access to nature, strengthen local economies and enhance climate resiliency. The Fund's programs focus on land and water conservation, wildlife preservat…

Marcus Daniell, the Founder and CEO of High Impact Athletes, is this episode’s guest. Marcus is a professional tennis player and two-time Olympian representing New Zealand, and founded HIA after he engaged with the Effective Altruism philosophy and movement. Effective Altruism asks “how can we best help others,” and answers that with, “by using evi…

Art delaCruz, the CEO of Team Rubicon, joins Charity Talks. Team Rubicon is an international disaster response nonprofit that unites the skills and experiences of military veterans with first responders to rapidly provide relief to communities in need. Team Rubicon’s over 130,000 volunteers deploy across the United States and the world wherever dis…

Kandi Pickard, the President and CEO of the National Down Syndrome Society, is this episode’s guest. As the leading human rights organization for individuals with Down Syndrome, NDSS’s goal is a world in which all those who live with this syndrome have the opportunity to enhance their quality of life, realize their life aspirations and become value…

Dr. Temple Grandin, professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University, is this episode’s guest. Dr. Grandin is a trailblazing advocate for the humane treatment of livestock, an inventor, a best-selling author, and a widely-sought speaker on autism. In 2010, Time 100, an annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world, named her i…

Ronald Carter, the President and CEO of Children Incorporated, joins Charity Talks and discusses CI’s mission to help impoverished children in the United States and 22 countries around the world. CI does this in two key ways: through child sponsorship and special funds. Sponsorship ensures that children in poverty get the basic necessities, such as…

Dr. Wendy Harrison, the CEO of the SCI Foundation, is this episode’s guest. SCI’s vision is a world free of preventable diseases. One preventable disease that SCI is focusing on eradicating is caused by parasitic worm infections, which is not a problem those in developed countries hear about very often. However, they affect over a billion people ar…

Annie Duflo, the Executive Director of Innovations for Poverty Action, joins Charity Talks to discuss IPA’s mission to create high quality evidence for the best interventions to alleviate poverty. IPA has programs that improve education in developing countries and reduce human trafficking in Africa. It also has tested the effectiveness of direct pa…

Jaime Benedicto, the Director of Project Bantu Philippines, is this episode’s guest. Project Bantu Philippines uses the music and movements of Capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian art that combines the elements of dance, acrobatics and music, to help children and young people from the poorest neighborhoods in Manila. Project Bantu’s support and classes prov…

Keith Harward, who spent 33 years in prison for crimes he did not commit, and Nigel Quiroz, an attorney and policy analyst at the Innocence Project, are this episode’s guests. During the podcast, Keith discusses how he was wrongly convicted of a murder and sexual assault based on faulty forensic evidence, and what life has been like for him since h…

Caitlin Smith of the World Resources Institute joins Charity Talks. WRI is a global research organization spanning more than 60 countries that is dedicated to working with leaders in those counties to sustain the world’s natural resources. From climate, energy and water, to our oceans and cities, WRI's over 1,000 experts and staff turn big ideas in…

Dr. Keith Sheth, Professor of Neurology and Neurosurgery at Yale School of Medicine, and a neurologist at Yale New Haven Hospital, as well as a member of the Quality Team at the American Stroke Association, is this episode’s guest. Strokes affect 1 in 6 people, and while most people generally know what a stroke is, they do not necessarily know what…

Michael Roberts, the President and CEO of First Nations Development Institute, is this episode's guest. Native American tribes have been marginalized for over 400 years, and as Michael discusses, philanthropy and funding provided to American Indians to address this is a small and disproportionate fraction of that distributed throughout the country.…

Priya Palani, the Associate Creative Director for the Task Force for Global Health, is this episode’s guest and she discusses the important work that the Task Force does around the world to improve the health of those in low and middle income countries. Fighting infectious diseases, distributing vaccines and conducting field epidemiology are just s…

Charity Talks welcomes Jennifer Hyman to the podcast. Jennifer is the Director of Communications for Living Goods, which provides critical healthcare solutions to women and children in Africa by deploying a network of community health workers. Partnering with local governments, Living Goods ensures that quality healthcare is available to those who …

Susannah Schaefer, the President and CEO of Smile Train, joins Charity Talks to discuss the problem of cleft lips and palates that many children are born with around the world. Children with this ailment live in isolation, and often have difficulty eating, breathing, hearing and speaking as a result their untreated clefts. Smile Train’s mission is …