Income Share Agreements: Can a New Education Finance Vehicle Promote Racial and Social Equity?

As we all grapple with the economic and social consequences of the past year, many asset owners are seeking to activate their investment portfolios to advance racial and social equity more broadly. Investment in higher education and workforce development remains a proven pathway for achieving these goals.

The US is experiencing a crisis in education finance which is impacting educational access, completion, and the upward social mobility that higher education is meant to facilitate. Job insecurity and a rapidly evolving skills economy during the COVID-19 pandemic have laid bare the risks of traditional student financing. Moreover, these risks are amplified for low-income and minority students, raising a critical need for a flexible student financing tool that breaks down barriers to higher education enrollment without placing undue risks on student borrowers.

Income Share Agreements (ISAs) are a nascent but promising education financing structure that allow students to fund their education through a controlled share of their future income, aligning repayment with positive post-graduate outcomes. When strategically applied, ISAs can be used to support and scale higher education models that are delivering positive results for underserved student demographics.

Impact Capital Forum is excited to partner with Outcome on this event. The goals are to provide a fundamental overview of ISAs, discuss the present and future trajectory of the sector, and highlight the role that impact capital can play. Join us for a forward-thinking conversation on the potential of ISAs to deliver both financial return and large scale social impact that addresses educational access, racial equity and income mobility.

We are fortunate to have Senator Todd Young joining us for a special keynote. Senator Young was one of the bi-partisan Senators to introduce the 2019 ISA Student Protection Act to improve an innovative financing tool for students pursuing postsecondary education. 

Our distinguished panel also includes:

• Moderator: Michael Stynes, CEO, Jain Family Institute
• Ethan Pollack, Director of Financing the Future Initiative, Jobs for the Future
• Jukay Hsu, CEO and Founder, Pursuit
• Jacob Haar, Managing Partner, Community Investment Management
• Balaji "Raj" Rajan, CEO, Ceannate/IonTuition

• Senator Todd Young is a United States Senator from Indiana. He currently serves on the U.S. Senate Committees on Finance; Foreign Relations; Commerce, Science & Transportation; and Small Business and Entrepreneurship. Previously, in the House, he served on the House Armed Services Committee, the House Budget Committee, and most recently the House Ways and Means Committee.
• Balaji "Raj" Rajan is CEO of a group of fin-ed-tech companies, Ceannate/IonTuition.com and Meta.app serving colleges, students and families. IonTuition offers Income Share Agreements as the nation’s newest and most complete ISA program manager and Servicer. META.app is the nation’s only collegiate mental health marketplace. Raj has been engaged in higher education since 1990 and has worked closely on higher education policy, operations, and legislation over the years. He sits on various boards in advisory positions.
• Jacob Haar serves as Managing Partner of Community Investment Management (CIM) and leads the firm's investment and operations activities. CIM seeks to deliver positive social impact by partnering with innovative credit providers offering responsible and transparent financial solutions to underserved communities. CIM is an early investor in ISAs, backing up to $100M of Kenzie Academy’s ISA program.
• Jukay Hsu is the co-founder & CEO of Pursuit, a social impact organization that enables equality of opportunity and is closing the prosperity gap in America. Pursuit identifies and trains adults with the most need and potential to gain their first tech job, advance in their career, and become the next generation of leaders in tech. Pursuit graduates are hired as software engineers by leading companies like Pinterest, Kickstarter, LinkedIn, Citibank, and JPMorgan Chase, and on average go from making $18,000 to over $85,000 yearly. At the same time, their graduates represent the diversity of our society with 50% women, 60% African American or Hispanic, 40% immigrant, and 60% without a college education. In addition to training and career support, Pursuit’s innovative operating model combines partnerships with tech companies to retrain their blue-collar workers and social impact investments to re-envision funding for outcomes-based organizations. 

• Ethan Pollack is a Director at Jobs for the Future, where he leads Financing the Future, an initiative that seeks to reimagine the way education and skills development investments are financed. He explores innovative approaches to education financing, including income share agreements, aims to track the evolution and performance of these new approaches, establish best practices and policy guardrails to ensure that they are learner-centered, and cultivate an ecosystem that fosters experimentation and emphasizes consumer protection.

• Nora Delaney is Quantitative Social Scientist at the Outcome Group. Nora completed an M.A. in Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences and a Masters of Public Administration at Columbia University. She has held roles at the U.S. Department of Treasury and Harvard Kennedy School of Government. Her research covers higher education access and labor market outcomes, as well as topics in international economic development.

• Moderator: Michael Stynes is the CEO of Jain Family Institute. He has ledthe Jain Family Institute (JFI) since its formation, directing research into an array of economic, cultural, social, and political areas. Previously, he taught at Harvard University. Michael holds a master’s degree in philosophy from New York University and a bachelor’s degree from Harvard College.

Login instructions for this Zoom videoconference will be emailed after your registration is completed.