Ripple Pledges $25M to Support U.S. Classrooms and Teachers
SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Ripple, the leading provider of digital asset infrastructure for financial institutions, today announced a $25 million commitment to leading education nonprofits DonorsChoose and Teach For America. This funding will equip young Americans and educators alike with the resources needed to improve academic outcomes, build economic resilience and thrive in a rapidly evolving job market.
Despite clear links between grade-level literacy and lifetime economic opportunity, many classrooms still face significant challenges in accessing adequate resources to enable all students to fulfill their academic potential. According to a 2024 Gallup survey, 55% of U.S. parents and adults are dissatisfied with the quality of K-12 education in America, reflecting broader concerns about constraints and gaps in funding for education. Ripple's commitment aims to help bridge this gap by supporting students, teachers and staff with the resources to re-build confidence and deliver results in the classroom.
'Ripple has always championed financial and educational access for all, and we're partnering with some of the most impactful organizations – DonorsChoose and Teach For America – to benefit thousands of classrooms across the U.S.,' said Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of Ripple. 'Together, we hope to inspire others to do the same, starting with Teacher Appreciation Week, and leading into the rest of the year to support students and teachers with the resources they need to build a stronger future for themselves and their communities.'
In a first-of-its-kind initiative, DonorsChoose and Teach For America will accept the majority of the $25 million grant in Ripple USD (RLUSD), Ripple's U.S. dollar-backed stablecoin. Stablecoins are quickly emerging as a practical method for disbursing funds, becoming the most widely used type of crypto-enabled payment mechanisms and representing over half of all onchain transaction volume in recent months according to Chainalysis data. As crypto-enabled payments become more prevalent, the ability for charitable organizations to utilize these technologies directly within their own networks through platforms such as The Giving Block will become increasingly valuable.
Ripple is partnering with DonorsChoose and Teach For America to support innovative, high-impact initiatives throughout the year, including funding thousands of classroom projects and teacher requests during Teacher Appreciation Week starting today, Teach For America's Ignite tutoring program nationwide, and a national STEM Innovation Challenge. These partnerships will also support new initiatives focused on financial literacy, helping students and educators across the U.S. build strong academic foundations and economic mobility in a rapidly evolving job market.
"Teachers are going the extra mile for their students' education, even spending hundreds - sometimes thousands - of dollars out-of-pocket for their classrooms," said Alix Guerrier, CEO of DonorsChoose. "Through their initiatives, Ripple is directly providing teachers with the resources their students need for the best education. Students will not only get their hands on materials that will enhance their learning, but they will also have the tools to help set them on the path to a bright future."
'We're deeply grateful to Ripple for this transformative support,' said Aneesh Sohoni, CEO of Teach For America. 'This funding will expand our Ignite Tutoring Fellows program, drive innovation in our Reinvention Lab, and provide crucial financial assistance to thousands of new corps members during their teacher preparation. With Ripple's partnership, we're advancing our mission to ensure every child has access to an excellent education and the opportunity to thrive."
Ripple's commitment to financial literacy and education builds on its broader mission to drive meaningful impact through philanthropy and crypto-enabled solutions. Since 2018, Ripple has contributed over $200 million to global initiatives, with nearly 80% of employees participating in giving and volunteering programs. By supporting hundreds of nonprofits, mission-driven fintechs, and leading universities through its University Blockchain Research Initiative, Ripple continues to drive long-term, positive change worldwide. Those interested in fueling the future of teachers and K-12 classrooms can donate RLUSD, XRP and other cryptocurrencies via The Giving Block at TheGivingBlock.com/donate.
About Ripple
Ripple is the leading provider of digital asset infrastructure for financial institutions—delivering simple, compliant, reliable software that unlocks efficiencies, reduces friction, and enhances innovation in global finance. Ripple's solutions leverage the XRP Ledger and its native digital asset, XRP, which was purpose-built to enable fast, low-cost, highly scalable transactions across developer and financial use cases. With a proven track record working with regulators and policymakers around the world, Ripple's payments, custody and stablecoin solutions are pioneering the digital asset economy—building credibility and trust in enterprise blockchain. Together with customers, partners and the developer community, we are transforming the way the world tokenizes, stores, exchanges, and moves value.
About DonorsChoose
DonorsChoose is the leading way to give to public schools. Since 2000, 6.4 million people and partners have contributed $1.7 billion to support over 3 million teacher requests for classroom resources and experiences. As the most trusted crowdfunding platform for teachers, donors, and district administrators alike, DonorsChoose vets each request, ships the funded resources directly to the classroom, and provides thank yous and reporting to donors and school leaders. Charity Navigator and GuideStar have awarded DonorsChoose, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, their highest ratings for transparency and accountability. For more information, visit www.donorschoose.org.
About Teach For America
Teach For America works in partnership with communities across the country to reach One Day when every child has access to an excellent education. Founded in 1990, Teach For America finds, develops, and supports a growing network of leaders who expand opportunity for children from classrooms, schools, and every sector and field that impact a young person's education. Today, Teach For America is a force of over 70,000 alumni, corps members, and Ignite fellows working in pursuit of profound change so that one day every child has the opportunity to learn, lead, thrive, and co-create a future filled with possibility. Teach For America is a proud member of the AmeriCorps national service network. For more information, visit www.teachforamerica.org and follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Threads.
About The Giving Block
The Giving Block, a Shift4 company, is the platform helping nonprofits fundraise more effectively from modern philanthropists. Pioneers of the 'Crypto Philanthropy' movement, The Giving Block developed the leading solutions for cryptocurrency donations, taking crypto and NFT donations mainstream in the nonprofit sector. The Giving Block's team then developed a stock and DAF giving experience built to empower even more donors to give. When combined, The Giving Block's product suite empowers more donors than ever to give assets to their favorite causes. Today, thousands of nonprofits are using The Giving Block to fundraise from modern philanthropists. Learn more about The Giving Block here.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Business Insider
28 minutes ago
- Business Insider
The rise of job offer scams
It's easy to read a text offering what is clearly a fake job and think, "Who in the world would fall for this?" Of course, Temu or Target isn't going to send me an unsolicited message with a too-good-to-be-true employment offer out of the blue. Except scammers don't do things that don't work — so while it may seem obvious to you, there are people who absolutely fall for these tricks, and no one is immune. Scam texts have exploded in recent years (which I probably don't have to tell you — if you have a cellphone, you're most likely well aware). Consumers reported losing $470 million to text message scams in 2024, according to the Federal Trade Commission, five times the amount reported in 2020. The actual amount of money lost could be much higher, given that many people don't alert the FTC when scammed. Fake package delivery was the most common scam, but the No. 2 was job offers — texts from purported recruiters either offering positions at well-known companies or promising big bucks in exchange for doing online tasks that seem relatively mundane. "We are definitely seeing both a growth in reported losses to text scams and also a growth in reported losses to job scams," says Kati Daffan, an attorney for the FTC in its Bureau of Consumer Protection. "Reported losses to job scams increased more than three times between 2020 and 2023." Now, the flood of job scams could get even worse. There is increased opportunity for dupers: The labor market is getting rockier, Americans are increasingly on edge about their finances, and many people really want to work remotely. At the same time, the means of cranking out these texts is getting more sophisticated: AI makes scam texts easier to craft in ways that seem plausible and realistic. The overall result is that unsuspecting job seekers may become even more susceptible to hoaxes. "It's likely that as unemployment increases and more people are worried about the economic uncertainty, if the scams aren't necessarily increasing, the likelihood that people might fall for them will be," says Selena Larson, a staff threat researcher at Proofpoint, a cybersecurity company. The way scam texts work is pretty straightforward: You get a message out of nowhere about a supposed thrilling work opportunity. It may come from a phone number, or it's from an official-looking email address. The offer seems enticing, albeit somewhat unrealistic given how jobs and money usually go — it may promise a super-high salary for just a couple of hours a day of menial online work. It can also come with some weird facets, such as conducting interviews entirely via text, promising to pay in crypto, or asking you to pay them before they pay you. Eva Velasquez, the CEO of the Identity Theft Resource Center, a nonprofit, says her organization saw a big bump in job scam reports in 2023 that took them by surprise. Since then, the number has ebbed and flowed, but the scams are here to stay. "They are very lucrative. They can capture not only your data but often your money," she says. Scammers get people to hand over personal information that would be par for the course for a legit hiring process — Social Security numbers, pictures of their driver's licenses and passports, bank account numbers. That information can be used to try to steal people's identities and for other nefarious ends. And for someone who really wants a new job, the mundanity of the requests can be deceiving. "That I think is why it's confusing to people is when you have a legitimate offer and you do start with an employer, they do need that information," Velasquez says. What's not so normal is job scammers asking victims to kick in their own money. The trick goes like this: After supposedly hiring someone or getting far enough in the process, the scammer will send someone a check and ask them to buy work-related equipment with it, such as a printer or office supplies. But the check will be for more money than the stuff costs, so they'll ask the person to send the difference back. Later, the check bounces, and the person is out of the money they spent on the equipment and sent to the scammer — and, potentially, in hot water for depositing a fake check. They may also ask people to buy gift cards or make payments to fake vendors who are in on the scam. Daffan, from the FTC, says it has specifically seen a spike in task scams, in which consumers are asked to complete little activities online, such as liking videos or rating products on an app or platform, to earn commission. The texts say the activity is for "product boosting" or "app optimization," which can sound realistic. "But then once people start doing this work, there's a whole system designed to trick them to actually pay money into the app, and eventually, they'll end up losing money and never being given any of the money that they were promised," Daffan says. And as much as many people like to feel that they'd never fall for a scam, we're all susceptible to them, to some extent. "It relies on this concept of social engineering and the hackers being very compelling. They make you feel something, they make you feel excited," Larson says. "They make you feel like you want to be a part of this ecosystem, that this job is a great opportunity that you don't want to lose." The stereotypical victim of a fraudster is an older person — your grandmother on the phone with someone who claims to be from Publishers Clearing House, telling her she's won a million dollars but has to kick in some of her own cash first. But in the modern world, that stereotype is out of date, including when it comes to job text scams: A lot of young people take the bait. Gen Zers and millennials are used to doing everything online, even making major life decisions. Nothing, whether it's booking a vacation, renting an apartment, or paying a friend back, feels like a "big screen" task anymore, let alone a do-this-in-person one. It's all on the small screen. "I'm a Gen Xer. For me, someone conducting very serious business over text just doesn't resonate with me," Velasquez says. "For young people, they're like, we do everything over text. It doesn't raise alarm bells." You look at the Gen Zs and the younger millennials and they just click, click, click, click, click, click. Younger people are more accustomed to the idea of side hustles. They're in the hunt for extra cash, especially if they can earn it with little effort online, and "like these videos for money" may not seem that abnormal to them in a world where "post videos on TikTok for money" is an aspired-to reality. Gen Z also faces an especially tough job market. Between tech layoffs and federal government job cuts, many avenues they may have pursued have dried up. Companies aren't hiring the way they were a few years ago, and people with jobs aren't quitting. That can specifically affect younger people looking to get a foot in the door — if nobody's going out, they can't get in. The result: a generation that's extra prone to falling into scams offering jobs and side-hustle cash. "You look at the Gen Zs and the younger millennials and they just click, click, click, click, click, click," says Alex Quilici, the CEO of YouMail, a service that helps block scam texts and calls. As I reported this story, I became increasingly alarmed about job scam texts. If the labor market is worsening, meaning more people are going to fall for this stuff, shouldn't we be doing more to stop it? On the list of a million worries, I'd really rather not add "my niece got bamboozled out of $1,000 because of some click farm scam" to the list. It turns out that doing something about this is hard. When I ask Kate Griffin, with the Aspen Institute's Financial Security Program, who's responsible for clamping down on scam texts, she tells me, "That's the problem." It's sort of everyone's job, which also means it's sort of no one's job. "A lot of people have a component part of it," she says. "There's a part of the FBI that goes after this. There's a part of the Treasury Department that is focused on the anti-money-laundering part of it. The FTC, of course, holds their component of it, but there's not a single coordinating entity to say, 'What is our national approach to fighting this?'" As far as how the private sector can combat this, it's complicated, too. Griffin explains that while telecommunications companies are the infrastructure layer, they don't necessarily have the ability to know what's inside messages. She notes that CTIA, a trade association that represents the wireless industry, has a " secure messaging initiative" whose goal is to put a stop to unwanted or illegal text messages. Besides its app that lets consumers block unwanted communications from spammers and scammers, Quilici's YouMail also collects data to alert phone carriers of scams and bad actors. Still, it's hard for companies to get their arms around the problem — scammers are savvy, and the business incentives to crack down on them aren't particularly compelling. "If you wanted to try to stop it, you'd have to make it really, really difficult for anybody to get a phone number," Quilici says. Texting and calling cost next to nothing. Making communications more expensive would make scamming less lucrative, but it would also make basic functions pricier for everyone else. Companies (or the government) could implement know-your-customer laws, as banks have, so carriers have to know whom they're giving a number to, but that would be onerous, too. "There's a big tension between their desire to sell services and quickly and stopping fraud," Quilici says. "I don't view the carriers as bad guys. I view them as having a business problem." The unwillingness of the government and phone carriers to make a concerted effort against scam texts puts a lot of onus on individual consumers to try to protect themselves, which is not an easy task. A lot of these scams look realistic — ChatGPT makes it easier to write a scam, meaning the grammar mistakes that might have set off some spidey senses are less likely to appear. These scams don't just take place via text; they can also come in emails or even in social media messages on platforms such as LinkedIn, where contact from a recruiter would seem quite normal. And they often invoke big-name companies that people would like to work for, which may increase the likelihood that someone falls for a trick. What's one to do in this scenario? First, scrutinize where the text came from. (Is it a weird email address or a foreign phone number? Though scammers can make those look plausible, too.) Next, do a deep reading of the message itself, checking whether the grammar is right and whether the offer seems too good to be true. A six-figure job for clicking boxes on an app sounds lovely, but it's also not a thing that exists. Mention of pay in crypto is a red flag, as are interviews via text. If the alleged employer asks you for money, that's a no-no. As a general rule, you shouldn't have to pay money to make money. "Our advice is never click on links or respond to unexpected texts or WhatsApp messages or other messages about jobs. Real employers will never contact you that way," Daffan says. She asks people to report fraud to the FTC. If you do think a job offer could be legitimate, see whether you can find the listing online — and make sure it's real and matches on details such as salary and location. People can also just contact the prospective employer directly to find out if it is a fake. And if you do get scammed out of money, contact your bank immediately and try to get the money back. Ultimately, Quilici says, the best advice is to slow down. There's no need to respond to that job offer text right away. Larson echoes the point. "If they're trying to rush you, they're trying to hire you, and they ask to be paid for something, that's all red flags," she says. Anyone who's interviewed for a job lately knows that the process can drag on for a wildly long time. Overall, the good news is that as time goes on and more people learn about scams, the more we collectively become inoculated to different tactics and hoaxes. People were highly susceptible to email scams when they first got email addresses. Now, you still hear about them, but they're a lot less common, and most people have an easier time spotting them. In the meantime, the bad news is that a tougher labor market means we may not have time for this natural collective education to happen. When people are anxious about money and work, they're likelier to have blind spots that scammers know how to exploit. If you're on month five of the job search and worried about how you're going to pay rent, you'll probably reply to that text faster than you would under normal circumstances. "One of the reasons that job scams are flourishing is that many people do want to work extra and make extra income, and they're looking for an opportunity to do that," Daffan says. "And scammers know that, and so they know there's a big market out there if they can have a convincing job scam. And, unfortunately, that is the case."
Yahoo
36 minutes ago
- Yahoo
$1.7 trillion sits in lost and forgotten 401(k) accounts. Is one of them yours?
At least $1.7 trillion languishes in lost or forgotten 401(k) accounts, with an average unclaimed balance of $56,616. Those 29 million idle accounts represent one quarter of all assets held in 401(k) retirement plans. And those figures come from a 2023 report from Capitalize, a financial services firm. The numbers could be higher now. 'That's a heck of a lot of money,' said James Royal, an investing analyst at Bankrate. 'You could really have tens of thousands of dollars out there.' It's hard to fathom how anyone could lose track of $56,000, until you stop to consider the circumstances behind the typical lost 401(k) account. 'People who are leaving a job, and especially if they're moving to another one, usually have a bunch of things going on,' said David John, a senior strategic policy adviser at the AARP Public Policy Institute. The average American born between 1957 and 1964 has changed jobs about a dozen times, AARP reports. A record 47 million Americans quit their jobs in 2021 alone, amid the Great Resignation. A worker who leaves a job after a year or two might have only a few thousand dollars saved in a retirement account. In the stress of a job change, it's easy to lose track of those funds. Workers might struggle with how to 'roll over' the savings into a new account. The balance might not seem to justify the effort. Wait a decade or two, however, and the balance in a forgotten account can balloon into a tidy sum. The reason: Most 401(k) funds tend to be invested in stocks, and the market has made enormous gains in recent decades. 'Even 10 or 15 years ago, if you put in $5-, $6-, $7,000, that could be worth three, four or five times as much today,' Royal said. Tracking down lost 401(k) accounts has never been easier, according to Royal and other retirement-plan experts. A curious consumer with an hour to spare can go a long way toward rooting out lost savings. Here are some tips, starting with the easy stuff. First, visit the National Registry of Unclaimed Retirement Benefits. As the name suggests, it's a national database of unclaimed retirement accounts. Enter your Social Security Number, run a quick search and see if any idle accounts come back. Next, proceed to the Retirement Savings Lost and Found Database. This is a new site, launched by the Department of Labor to help workers locate unclaimed benefits. The lost and found site is 'still trying to reach scale with a lot of providers' and not yet comprehensive, said Rita Assaf, vice president of retirement savings at Fidelity. But it's another convenient, one-stop destination for finding retirement funds in your name. Third, visit Missing Money, a clearinghouse of unclaimed property held by U.S. states and Canadian provinces. Another one-stop site, Missing Money can direct users to all sorts of unclaimed property, including retirement accounts. 'It's been around for a few years, but it's not as widely known as it should be,' said John of AARP. The steps above should provide a good sense of potential unclaimed retirement funds in your name. The next moves might take a bit more time. Search your employment records. Look for old retirement plan statements, in electronic or paper form. Alternately, seek out old pay stubs and W-2 forms, and look for contributions to retirement plans. Contact old employers, if you can find them. Start with the human resources department. Someone there might know if you participated in a 401(k) or, at a minimum, which company administered the plan. If you think you know which plan administrator held your account, contact that company directly. 'There are not that many 401(k) plan administrators out there,' said Kate Ashford, a retirement expert at NerdWallet. 'You could take an afternoon and call them all.' Ask to speak to the 401(k) department. A representative will typically ask for your Social Security Number and other identifying information, which can help the administrator find any old retirement accounts under your name. If a lost retirement plan is 'from many years ago,' Assaf said, 'that plan may not still be available at Fidelity. It could be somewhere else.' For retirement accounts with a balance under $1,000, a plan administrator may have liquidated the account and cut a check, which might have gone 'to your last-known address,' Ashford said. For balances in the low thousands, the administrator may have rolled the account into an IRA at another financial institution. Several other sites can help consumers search for clues about abandoned retirement accounts. The Department of Labor's abandoned plan database can help an ex-worker locate a terminated plan. The same agency allows users to search a database of Form 5500, which is filed annually for 401(k) plans and can help users identify and contact both former employers and plan administrators. But records only go back to 2010. Don't want to search for lost 401(k) funds yourself? At least two private companies, Capitalize and Beagle, operate concierge services that can do it for you. Fewer 401(k)s will go missing in future, experts say, thanks to the evolving concept of "auto-portability" in retirement plans. A new initiative in the retirement-savings industry encourages workers to roll over a 401(k) account into an IRA when they leave a job, whereupon the money can automatically transfer to a retirement plan at a new employer. The auto-portability program applies to accounts valued at $7,000 or less. Research shows low-value accounts are more likely to be cashed out or forgotten, potentially losing thousands of dollars of compounded interest over time. In 2022, a consortium of private retirement-plan providers announced a collaboration to boost the portability of small retirement accounts. When someone leaves a job, the network of providers will make sure that any retirement funds 'move seamlessly from one job to another,' said John of AARP. This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: $1.7 trillion sits in lost 401(k) accounts. Is one of them yours? Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Boston Globe
2 hours ago
- Boston Globe
The conservative-friendly studio beating Hollywood at its own game
Get The Gavel A weekly SCOTUS explainer newsletter by columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr. Enter Email Sign Up The movie is one of the latest from Angel Studios, which is devoted to TV shows and movies that 'amplify light.' It successfully caters to a growing market of Americans who want values-driven entertainment and are dismayed with what they consider Hollywood's nihilism and tired storytelling. Advertisement As the lights dimmed for the screening of 'The Last Rodeo,' McDonough told a whooping crowd of family, friends, and fans that they'd see him kissing Ruvé in his portrayal of Joe Wainwright, a retired rodeo legend who has to return to bull riding in hopes of winning enough money for his ailing grandson's cancer treatment. Advertisement Neal and Ruvé McDonough were coproducers on the film, giving them the creative freedom to shape the casting. But McDonough told me that it can be a gamble for major studios to sign off on such maneuvers. He believes his project only made it to the big screen because he worked with a studio that shares his values. 'They said, 'Who do you want to play your wife in the film?' And I said, 'There's only one person's gonna play it; it's my wife, Ruvé,'' McDonough told me. 'And [Angel] said, 'Well, that makes sense.'' The differences between Angel Studios and Hollywood were apparent at the Texas premiere of 'The Last Rodeo,' starting with the suggested dress code on the invitation: boots and bowties. A Stetson-sporting McDonough beamed with his gaggle of five children while Ruvé stunned in a floor-length gown of denim patchwork. The stars, producers, and director of "The Last Rodeo" posed with family members at the film's Texas premiere. Carine Hajjar/Globe Staff But the overall vibe was decidedly less about couture than culture. Speaking to a mix of press, country influencers, and Southwestern personalities lining the red carpet, people involved with the film were open about how 'The Last Rodeo' deals with themes that aren't popular in the Hollywood circles they know well. The movie's director, Jon Avnett, who directed 'Fried Green Tomatoes' and produced 'Black Swan,' told me about the film's emphasis on 'the power of family.' Mykelti Williamson, who portrayed Private Benjamin Buford 'Bubba' Blue in 'Forrest Gump' and plays Wainwright's old friend in 'The Last Rodeo,' said the movie tells a story of an America that's 'actually a good place, with a lot of good people in it.' He added: 'She's not perfect, but she's worth it.' Advertisement Instead of a glitzy afterparty, Angel put on a barbecue for fans and benefactors and their families. Parents holding hot dogs looked on with half terror, half amusement as little boys fought for the next turn on an electric bull. Rodeo queens in fringed red leather and rhinestone cowgirl hats took selfies, while toddlers took wobbly steps around the various field games. If you wanted to wash it down with a beer from the drink stand, you'd have to settle for a Coke. It was unlike Hollywood in every way. And that's been the key to Angel's success. Mykelti Williamson in 'The Last Rodeo.' Angel Studios Avoiding cringe and outrage The American mainstream is in turmoil — and it's not just the 'liberal media' or lefty universities. It's many of the cultural institutions that have been swallowed up by the progressive crazes of the last decade. From Actors have always had a knack for publicly fawning over progressive causes and shaking their fists at Republicans. But those progressive sensibilities have spilled over to the way films are made, too. Now it seems as if every movie that portrays a white or male protagonist needs a remake. (I'm looking at you, 'She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.') It's safe to assume that Americans who are sick of having progressive politics shoved down their throats might also feel as if it's being stuffed into their popcorn buckets. That creates an opportunity for a studio like Angel to make entertainment for a market underserved by the mainstream. Advertisement Starting with families. Angel's cofounder Jeff Harmon says the studio began as the answer to a Harmon family problem. For him and his three brothers, Neal, Daniel, and Jordan, that problem was the erosion of values portrayed by Hollywood. 'I think for all of us as fathers, we were looking with our families at how quickly the entertainment was accelerating toward nihilism,' Jordan told me, sitting next to Jeff. Naming examples like 'House of Cards' and 'Game of Thrones,' he bemoaned the fact that 'you watch a great movie, the whole thing's great. And at the very end, the whole moral of the story is, 'Everybody's bad.'' The brothers figured that addressing this problem could make for a good business. Jordan, Neal, and Jeffery Harmon at Angel Studios in Provo, Utah, on March 31. RUSSEL DANIELS/NYT At the Fort Worth barbecue, I met Brittany Graves, a 36-year-old mother of four and member of the Angel Guild, whose roughly 1.2 million members pay a monthly fee for access to Angel's content. She told me that 'it's a lot more refreshing to watch [Angel's] movies than kind of the predictable Hollywood norm.' She describes herself as a Christian and homesteader, saying that she agrees more with 'the values that are portrayed in [Angel's] movies' than 'just being hit with cussing and soft-core and sometimes even hardcore porn' that you get from Hollywood. Nearby, Shandelyn Spadke told me that she and her husband, Trae, invest in Angel because they are 'very firm believers in conservative ideas.' As she bounced a baby on her knee, the mother of five said, 'Most of the time we have to censor and preview what they watch. But she doesn't have that problem with 'Tuttle Twins,' a children's show that Advertisement The Harmons say that Angel is essentially replacing the traditional tastemakers who turn up their noses at values-infused entertainment. 'Filmmakers have no issue making great family content; they don't have an issue making faith content, as long as it resonates and it's good storytelling, and it's done with craftsmanship,' Jeff Harmon says. What's missing are studio executives who want this kind of entertainment. 'You replace those gatekeepers — these executives that are out of touch, generally don't have normal families, don't look like Middle America; they don't look like the rest of the world — and you replace those people with the people who are the rest of the world.' Shandelyn Spadke and her baby at the Fort Worth barbecue hosted by Angel Studios. Carine Hajjar/Globe Staff That's where the idea for the Angel Guild came from. The members pay $12 and up per month for access to the programming at home — and the ability to shape it. Angel only produces films that the guild members want to see. First they vote on a 'torch,' or a proof of concept from filmmakers, like a short clip or a pilot episode. If the torch passes the guild, filmmakers can go on to produce their projects. But members also get to vote on final cuts and even provide feedback. Jordan Harmon says Angel Studios filmmakers have gotten more than 100,000 comments from guild members over the last 18 months. The Harmons believe that this is the key to Angel's high audience ratings. Angel Advertisement Wookyung Kim, Kristin Chenoweth, Seong-ho 'Jay' Jang, and Leia Jang attended the premiere of Angel Studios' "The King Of Kings" in Franklin, Tenn., on March Angel Studios Some of Angel's films deal with conservative themes or religious subjects, but it would be a mistake to lump them in with overtly conservative entertainment projects — like those produced by the entertainment studio that the Daily Wire, a conservative news outlet, announced in 2021. If titles like 'Am I a Racist?' and 'What Is a Woman?' don't give it away, many Daily Wire productions are an attempt to make entertainment out of owning the libs. Other conservative productions can be driven overtly by religion and are less concerned with production values and storytelling. Angel avoids earnest cringe and political outrage. That's because its projects aren't ever just characterized by a political or religious message. Even the New York Times The deference to storytelling over pontificating hasn't stopped critics from trying to label Angel conservative ideologues. 'Sound of Freedom,' for example, was The Harmons, who belong to the Church of Latter Day Saints, call Angel a 'faith-friendly' studio and don't allow their productions to take the Lord's name in vain. But the themes and stories they help produce are determined by the Angel Guild, and will evolve as it grows. And since it is serving an underserved market, an initial rightward tilt is to be expected. What's surprising is just how large that market seems to be. 'Our hypothesis is that we're actually going for the biggest segment of the entire entertainment world,' Jordan told me. In collaboration with the Faith and Media Initiative, Harris X Neal McDonough starred in Angel Studios' "Homestead," which had its premiere on Dec. 10, 2024, in Los Angel Studios Like the film 'Cabrini,' which tells the story of Mother Francis Xavier Cabrini's life and ministry to poor immigrants, especially orphaned Italian children in New York City. On the surface this is a story about a Catholic saint. But it deals with themes like standing up to the male-dominated church leadership and overcoming racism through her work for the poor and scorned migrants in America. The film earned a Rotten Tomatoes audience score of 98 percent and Some Angel productions aren't religious at all. Tony Hale, known for his role as Buster Bluth in the hit show 'Arrested Development,' is Even though the Harmons have kept to the sidelines of the raging culture wars, they have clearly benefited from conservative victories. Like Donald Trump's which depicts an animated Charles Dickens sharing the story of Jesus' life with his son. But Angel isn't interested in sticking it to the mainstream — its intention is to become the mainstream. 'Stories are upstream from culture,' Jordan Harmon says. And Angel intends to produce 'some of the most timeless stories throughout history.' Carine Hajjar is a Globe Opinion writer. She can be reached at
