So welcome everyone again at our last press conference already for the World Economic Forum on Latin America. On a very important topic here today I'm Peter Vannum, senior media manager at the World Economic Forum and I'll be joined here today to talk about the topic of economic inclusion worldwide and also specifically in Mexico with three guests here right next to me is Jacobusio that is vice president global insights at MasterCard right next to him is his colleague from from Mexico Carlos Montaño welcome Carlos vice president government services and solutions at MasterCard Latin America and also the former head of Bansefi government owned bank here in Mexico and then lastly but certainly not least is Rosario Perez the CEO and president of Pro Mujer which is a social enterprise I should say which is active in five countries and serves 300,000 clients in your case clients are women to include women in the economic mainstream in society so we're gonna be talking about economic inclusion and the reason why this is an important topic is because as you may remember from the spring meetings of the of the World Bank just last month in the world there are still 2 billion people that are unbanked and this is the so-called financial inclusion or in their case the financial exclusion 2 billion people that means by between one third and one fourth of the world population is still unbanked and what makes the problem even bigger is that financial exclusion is only a part of economic exclusion which is broader and so that's what we're gonna be talking about here today both let's say on the global level and also brought back to here in Mexico and here in Mexico it's also important I must say because I read that also in Mexico only 40% of people of age 15 and over actually have a formal bank account and that is not uncommon in the region I saw in Brazil for example it's the highest in the region but it's still only two-thirds of adults or I'd say people age 15 and over and across the region it's actually lower so great so welcome then we're gonna start with that that you're gonna be talking about the connectors project that you that you initiated and and you'll be talking about what it is who are these connectors and why is this is matter to economic inclusion yes thank you Peter and thank you to World Economic Forum also for inviting us to actually premiere this is the first time we'll be talking publicly about this research we think it's groundbreaking research and we think it could be game-changing research because what it does at the end of the day is it gives public private partnerships the ability to scale their programs for the economically excluded and so in a way it provides a blueprint an actionable blueprint for the construction of programs for the further refining of programs on the ground so I'd like to talk a little bit about the genesis of the research for the journalists in the room on your chair you'll find a press release also a brief presentation and some screenshots I would invite you and also anybody watching on the on the live stream to go to the website which is insights.mastercard.com slash the connectors project so what were we trying to do with this project there's been a lot of good work done about exclusion much of it has been about financial exclusion or financial inclusion if you want to look at the glass half full and that's it's all good work and a good deal of that work I have to say has been done by mastercard itself and but we were interested in financial inclusion as part of a larger picture as part of economic inclusion certainly it's one of the most important of the three pillars of inclusion that we identified which were access to knowledge access to capital which would be financial inclusion and access to employment but a lot of the work has been quantitative in nature and has been what I'd call top-down and that's fine because you have to have the numbers in place if you're going to make a case for anything but what we wanted to do is kind of flip the camera around take it from a top-down perspective and put it from the perspective of people on the street as it were in the developing world what does it feel like to be economically excluded what does it feel like to be on a journey to economic inclusion what are the factors that you face what are the what is the perspective that you have so to do this we went to four markets globally they were Egypt India Indonesia and Mexico and Carlos is going to talk more in more detail about the about the Mexico co-findings but what we did was we did some we did some quantitative research in order to in order to put some statistical bones in place so that there'd be a structure around our insights but we really wanted to talk to people so we engaged in very in-depth conversations with our research subjects and we asked them about what meant to feel economically excluded what did it mean yeah please Peter so this is a research that that shows a situation of people that are economically and financially excluded well it that's a great question one of the things it would be a fallacy to say that financial inclusion is binary it's not true and what people say is that well either you have a prepaid Carter you don't so it's yes or no in fact it's not it's it's because there's access to products which is one thing and the government may mandate a certain degree of access to products and then there's usage and you have to get from a to b so in fact it's not binary but let's stipulate that okay let's say that in fact a financial inclusion is to a certain extent binary economic inclusion is totally a spectrum it's not at all a yes or no question it's a it's a it's a it's a journey along a spectrum so a lot of the people we spoke to felt to a greater or lesser degree yes they did feel economically excluded but the stories that we highlight on the website and I would refer you to the website there are videos there are photographs there's very compelling information there's a white paper that's available in each of the local languages Spanish Arabic Hindi and Malay as well as English of course but what we found out I'm talking to these people were that there were people who felt a degree of economic inclusion and we found that the factor that made for that inclusion that got them on that journey towards being totally included in the municipal the national and even with technology the global economy was this notion of connectors which is why it's called the connectors project now what's a connector a connector is an individual who positively impacts the journey to inclusion moving forward so that the connector is someone an individual who can reach people who are on a journey to economic inclusion and positively impact them all right some of this is very much evident in the literature for instance in the developing world networks are very important we discovered nothing new there networks are important because civil society may not reach everyone so that the importance of personal networks social familial religious tribal these networks become become extremely important that's not new it's in the literature even the notion of the connector the individual who positively impacts your journey to inclusion that's not necessarily new either but what we think we were able to do in this research was delimit them we say there are five of them and we name them and that's really new news because we what we think this allows the p3 community to do and that go ahead please the p3 community public private partnerships okay okay people like Rosario people like Bunthefi working in partnership with governmental agencies to positively impact the journey to inclusion you're going to talk is now true who are what are those five connectors yes and the reason that you're going to do this is because if you impact these people these connectors then you can actually increase financial economic inclusion is that the purpose that's that's the that's the thesis yes okay and what we think is by identifying them and by naming them we're not simply pasting labels on them we're saying that there are certain behaviors associated with being one of these connectors and if you know those behaviors through leveraging of data you can reach them that is really the sharp end of the stick that's where we really think we have discovered something useful and something that can actually help locate more and more people and help them on their journey to inclusion and it helps us to go from that static number here in Mexico for example of 40% of people that have a bank account to go to the actual spectrum which you say is a spectrum from white to black a whole gray spectrum of people that are on that journey towards economic inclusion that's correct okay so our five connectors are the mentor the role model the introducer the business influencer and the and the and the and the and the migrator of these five the most important are the business influencer and the migrator I said that with the sharp end of the stick in fact the tippity top of the sharp end of the stick in fact is are those two people the business influencer who can put you in touch with banks with insurance companies with all sorts of people who can help you move forward and of course the migrator now when we say migrator let me make that clear we're not talking about migrations we're not talking about moving from one economy to another we're talking about more of a social migration we're talking about you there may be no geographical migration involved for instance Ugo who's featured on the website from Mexico City he stayed in Mexico City but his migrator was his grandmother who left to him her stall in Mexico City that he's turned into a thriving electronics repair business so that the migrator really gets you from one place to another it may be geographical so upon the gentleman from Mumbai he did go from his village into Mumbai to learn the textile trade it can be geographical but the journey can also be in your own head so if you can as a an entity if you're a bonsefi or if you're a pro-mujer working with the government if you can locate the business influencer and the migrator at the right moment and and locate these people in a scaled way we think it's a game changer that's the thesis of the research I would again direct you to the website there's a tremendous wealth of information there and I'll tell you a little bit more about how you could even contribute to the growth of this information and when you say game changer you mean we're trying to change the game of financial inclusion and economic inclusion we want to get more people economically included we want to get more people economically included and we think that this is a blueprint for constructing programs that can do that at scale and I think that the real important word there is at scale there's a great deal of great work that's been done but what we think we've discovered is a way to scale those programs by identifying and giving a name and an identity to each of the five yeah of the of the connectors thank you Ted and then maybe to make this a bit more tangible may I ask Carlos could you tell us a bit what that means here in Mexico thank you Peter and thank you thank the thanks for for the world economic front for having us here when we say game changer we actually mean to put things to work now we don't want to do for this piece of research a very good research to remain like an academic document and that's it when we say game changer it's it's basically the purpose of the meetings here and all of these days is how do we make these things move ahead and actually provoke and not just describe so a when we say game changer is how do we actually find these these these people in the different economies in Mexican economy so you can not only give them an account not only give them a debit credit or a prepaid card but actually how do they get out of poverty imagine for a second that you don't have the financial institutions you don't have social enterprises and you don't have governments even in that scenario people are going to try to make it and they will go try to make it on their own these richer research would mean to improve their situation to look for their families to do better right to do to do well so what what this research is finding is they did it somehow and they did it through these connectors so what if social enterprises private companies and government these through these three piece together we work together to help those people to do more of what they're doing to actually even kind of reproduce these characters no to let them know that they're making a great contribution to fight poverty then we can make convert this research into an action item into something that it will actually change move the needle change the numbers of course get you financially included economically included and out of poverty right and so if we bring it down we're here in in Riviera Maya in Mexico so what you're saying is there are people even if we go out the conference center here you would find people that that have those roles of connectors yes maybe they are not themselves aware of the importance of what they do and the fact that they are doing it and if we would be able to make them aware then we could make progress in economic inclusion that's right and another thing couple of things these roles are not static they're actually people change of roles they would probably be a influencer at some time and later become an influencer of someone else and could you bring that down to where we are could you imagine a person outside that you know that we can definitely someone who actually just learn that he can do better by having a bank account a former bank account and when he realizes that he would probably tell his brother hey why don't you get a bank account so he and then he becomes exactly a change role introduce her or he becomes a role model maybe well depends on the level of nearness of that person no it would depend you could even have some of these characters not even be a person actually could be a public figure a TV figure that you have you see somehow and you say make sure change your mind make you start this journey so it could be someone who's really close to you it could be someone who is not that close to you but somehow influences you okay very well and so and could you tell us how how you would how you would suggest to do that here in Mexico definitely partners that you see I think that no one can do it alone no so to actually find these people is not an easy task most governments actually don't have the tools or the resources to actually reach that deep into the society because initially we assume of course that if we talk about things like poverty elevation or economic inclusion or employment we think of governments as the ones who bring it about and what you're saying they think it's important also Carlos that we say because you you you have actually two hats or you had two heads you were heading a state-owned government bank and now you're at the private sector what you're saying is that that the government in the private sector should should work together to it definitely there's no way that governments can do it alone right and and they don't have the the tools that they don't have the the knowledge that social enterprises like promulher actually does have so by partnering with such institutions government can increase and multiply its reach by by by a large proportion and by doing so you are building an alliance that will actually literally move the needle via game changer and get people faster out of poverty right and may I ask them maybe Rosario because you've been introduced here is going to play an important role in bringing this about but but how would this work for you and and Rosario you again you are the CEO and president of promulher and you work with women around Latin America in five countries including here in Mexico for to include women in the economic mainstream so so how do you how do you relate to what we've just talked about well first of all I want to thank the World Economic Forum and very much MasterCard because MasterCard has been an incredible partner to us they've given us a million dollars plus you know and very you know to address a few issues that we have both technologically and in fact they supported the opening of a branch here in Milpa Alta in Mexico City I feel that this research of the connectors is incredibly important because it is helping us understand behaviorally which is very important what are the the the connectors or the catalyzers for actual change and I know that the business influencer is an important one in the migration person but I think all of them actually as I read them they all relate to promulher you know so if you talk about the mentor you know we have we have assessores which are the people who go around the communities promoting you know to come to promulher and these people are you know promoters then we have our assessores who are actually developing a relationship a trusting relationship with with the clients who mentor them and you know if I think about the business intelligence promulher is business intelligence because we have a brand in the communities and so we actually are making sure that these people when they come to us they begin to be part of the whole economic financial formal process because we're a formal organization and we haven't said this but we also have 2,000 employees most 10% of them were at some point clients and they actually then you know they begin to move you know the they transform themselves into a different type of connector and so I I am a big believer and you know we've done our own research in in not as as of the same nature but in terms of trying to understand this the drivers of you know because we need to understand to get financial inclusion widespread I am a great believer that you cannot do it you know everybody's talk about technology yeah technology can help enormously but you need to understand what are the needs of this people what are they going through you know which in your examples are pretty very very vivid you know so you understand the groups and what makes those groups tick what was the the turning point that helped them get to the next level so I am extremely excited about this research okay well it almost sounds like we've solved the issue but that's of course not the case so maybe let's let's open it up for for a few questions now from the audience is it clear what we're doing here and and what would you want to ask about this this project and maybe we can ask for me from Mexico yeah go ahead hi I just want to ask you were talking about how to multiply this effect when you're talking about how to multiply it are you talking about that maybe in the government or in these social organizations or maybe through banks you act as a migrator and facilitate these kind of role models to people in maybe a new model of of financial educations for people that are now excluded in in the banking system it's a great it's a great question and and it's it's it's a tough concept to grasp the the the notion of these of these connectors is that they're archetypes their roles it's not that someone becomes a business influencer as a career or as a business influencer you know when they leave for work in the morning and then they come back home and that's their job it's a role that people play that they can put aside and assume another role or assume none of the other roles of being a business influencer what we're saying is is that these are individuals on the ground that private enterprise social enterprises and governments can reach and if they reach them at scale meaning many of them within an economy within a city like Mexico City that that the the possibilities for advancing economic inclusion become that much greater we're not saying that we've we we're not saying that we've discovered any kind of panacea for for economic exclusion rather what we think is we have a very powerful tool conceptual tool that the three components that I mentioned which are governments private enterprise and social enterprise working together can use to locate these people on the ground so that and then give them the tools that they need right give them the tools that they need at scale so it's not just Ugo because there are a hundred thousand in Mexico City if not five hundred thousand in Mexico City we located one but what we think the technique does because we can tell you what the behaviors of a business influencer are we give you the the the ability to reach if not the whole five hundred thousand a hundred thousand and you're that much farther ahead again again the government wouldn't be able to do it alone so if you actually know that certain organizations are helping to promote that more of such connectors exist then you can better target the public policies and then the effort from the government side together with social enterprises is much more powerful so let me get that right so what you're saying is that previously if if governments they said well we want to achieve more economic inclusion that they might have thought let's do it through a increasing financial inclusion and let's maybe just start a network of banks with branches all over the country let's open accounts or give open accounts give people bank cards and I said okay we reached financial inclusion great and what you're saying is well not really so maybe we achieve financial inclusion maybe not even but certainly not economic inclusion and if you want to reach economic inclusion and you want to talk about the how it's it's about reaching these five connectors and that can be done for example through social say it said that because she said you need to know these people no so you don't you don't get to know them by being a far apart from them a social enterprises can really touch them understand them and then actually do something more precise more specific for them okay right because you know just having access to a checking account I don't think it's financial inclusion and we know that that if it's not used you know which it's one of the issues that we face with financial inclusion is that it's about and I think Ted said it it's about access and usage you know and I think with this type of research you are getting to what are the you you know what motivates people to use it you know so maybe as a follow-up question so where do we go from here so now do we know that we have these five connectors and and and we still have that same goal of increasing economic inclusion here in here in Mexico what what is our next step what what do we recommend now what do we what do we ask and who do we ask to do that you could probably better shape your public policies no we know that we need the financial instruments but that's not enough so in the case of Mexico and this could be just an example of course once if he's doing a great job that great job needs to be tied up and and leveraged with the actions of organizations such as promulges so one idea would be to actually look in the government which government agency would be willing and able to help such organizations and to let them know there's a blueprint not to let them know you know what we have identified this and if you focus your actions on trying to reach these people you will have more impact this research was was new to Rosario it will certainly be new to lots of other organizations promote her like then probably when they hear about this they go like okay we can pinpoint this we know these people we we we've known them all alone but all along but we didn't know what else we can do with them how else we can foster what they're doing how else we can impulse them I understand it maybe there's a follow-up question from the room as well no so maybe just a final question then let me ask so at the World Bank meetings the ambition was set to reach full financial and economic inclusion by 2020 that's only five years from now what would be your top recommendation to get there and do you think that we can actually achieve that who wants to really to get to work fast and and we've committed in mastercard we're committed to that because we actually in the in the end reunions we we pledge a goal of reaching 500 million new customers for that date and in order to get to that we need to apply every tool that we have in our back to achieve that this is a great tool the connector study is a great tool we cannot do it alone we need we need the help of course of governments comments would need our help would need the help of organizations such as a promulgatory so the idea is let's sit all together and and discuss how can we together a provoke these in a faster much faster way no design public policies around certain targets and this could be one as as as they were saying this is not panacea this is not the solution but this is a good a good way to start okay well with that maybe I want to leave one last minute to tit to give his conclusion or summary and then we'll end it there thanks Peter you know this is a work in progress it's very much what Carlos was saying that that now's the time to try and and and and socialize this work and work with governments and social enterprises to come up with the programs that are gonna it what it acts as we hope it can act as a force multiplier it's easy to imagine a government mandating a checking account or a debit card for everybody and and whether that's good policy or not I'm not going to judge but if you did have that policy and you were able to leverage knowledge like this of the behaviors who might actually get people to use such instruments that obviously would be a phenomenal step forward for that for that government and for that economy so so with that end in end in view if you go to the website again insights.mastercard.com slash the connectors project you'll find that there are com boxes there's a there's an interactive feature there that allows people to share with us either their experience with connectors their desire to know more and as the we gather the information and as we curate the results that come in through those comments boxes we'll share it in a rolling way on the website and we hope to be able to share it with people on the ground in countries around the world we looked at four countries but we do think that these archetypes are globally applicable I'd also like to say just quickly before we go that we're going to be doing a a Twitter chat and we're going to be going to begin at two fifteen local time one fifteen local time two fifteen eastern time one fifteen local time two fifteen eastern time it's hashtag connectors project and the handle is Mastercard LAC so if you'd like to hear more about it then if you'd like to get maybe more answers be delighted to speak to you at that time so Peter thanks very much for the opportunity it's been a great discussion and let me also thank you Rosario Carlos and of course you did for being here today and thank you all for being present thank you very much very well


I forgot to turn off the air conditioner. Just turn off, please. There we go. Hello, terrestrials and extra-terrestrials alike. I am Kim, and this is Dustmoats and Melcore. This is my first wrap-up video, like, ever! I read a bunch of books in October, and I don't have time. I do not have time to make a review of each of them, so I did- I'm doing a wrap-up video, so here we go! I cannot believe I just did that little dance. Okay. It is currently October 30th while I am filming this video, so I'm including the two books that I'm currently reading because I'm definitely, probably, most likely, maybe going to be finishing them before October 31st. So I think that counts. First up is Language of Thorn. A little square. I'm standing up for this video, so I had to make myself a little square of ribbon to stand in, and when I- when I grabbed the book, I messed up my square. Okay. First up is Language of Thorns by Libra Dugo. Midnight Tales and Dangerous Magic. Essentially, this is the Grimm's Brothers Fairy Tales of the Grishaverse, the stories that Nina would have been told as a little girl, and none of the stories and the way you think they will. I just finished her version of Hansel and Gretel, and man, I did not see that one coming. Also currently reading Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado. This book is an existential crisis on every page. This is a series of short stories from contemporary female characters dealing with sex and marriage and queerness and existing in the world as we know it and worlds that we don't know. I'll say it, it's a little creepy, but it's creepy in the I'm going to make you doubt every single one of your life choices ways instead of- it's not really the there's someone in your house kind of creepy, so check it out, but be prepared. Going back in time to the beginning of October, I had two books that I really struggled with. First of all was Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson. It's the third book in the Mistborn series, and I love the premise of these books but the execution was really difficult for me. The main issue was pacing. Goodness gracious, it felt like, felt like Brandon Sanderson was being paid by the word. Failed chosen one trope, and we're led to believe that one of our heroes is the new chosen one, but pretty much nothing is as it seems. And also the main female character, Vinn, is very much a hollow shell. The fact that Brandon Sanderson jumps through hoops to give her external conflict, internal conflict, she just ends up being a weapon. And then immediately after that, I read Crowns of Crosswall, which you might recognize from my unboxing video link here, here, here. That's better, that's smarter. I struggled with this one right off the bat because the author, D.E. Knight, wrote herself into her own book as a male character, also called D.E. Knight, and made the entire premise of the book that there was a spell that our main character, Ivy, had to break in order to find D.E. Knight. And that really, that really felt like the height of ego in my personal opinion. But also, Ivy has no personality. She has a quirky job, yeah, and she has a quirky pet, yeah, and several descriptive traits that belong to literally every other person at her school. And yes, you could argue that that is because of the spell. But I think that's a weak excuse, and we shouldn't go with that. Also, the love interest is so bland that he was more interesting when he was not there. That's not good character writing. Please, D.E. Knight, give your characters some personality. However, this book is rife with atmosphere. It's like Fantasia and Weasley's Wizarding Weasies had a baby that exploded. So, if you are okay with non-characters existing in a world that is much cooler than them, check it out. So, the beginning of the month was a struggle. But then, I popped into Barnes & Noble, which, by the way, is my favorite ship name for Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes. Think about that one for a little bit. I could not not pick up a copy of An Enchantment of Ravens by Margaret Rodgerson. Delicious, hilarious heartbreaking. A fair tale, if ever there was one. It is the story of a young woman who is excellent at portrait painting.  But, when she paints a true portrait of the Prince of Autumn and his secret hidden centuries-old heartbreak, she gets in a little bit of trouble. She gets kidnapped into the woods to stand trial for her crimes. But with her wit and several meddling fairies, she and the prince must find their way through the trouble that they have brought on themselves. It is fast-paced and juicy. This story took me by the hand and ran away with my imagination and hats off for interesting and complex female characters. Next up is a reread. My book club started off with one of my favorite books, Dealing with Dragon. Rich in whimsy, our strong-minded Princess Simmerine runs away to volunteer to be a dragon's princess. A position one is usually kidnapped into. Navigating through a world of dragons and witches and genies and, unfortunately, adventuring princes, our Simmerine fights for the life that she wants instead of the life that it would be proper for her to have. Then came a Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue by Mackenzie Lee. Now, this is possibly one of the gayest books I have ever read that I praise in my mind. Lush, romantic, deeply character-driven, this book is a romp, if ever I read one. Monty, a bisexual lordling, said to inherit an eroldo? Not sure. His name is Monty and he is in love with his best friend, Percy, and the litany of reasons they cannot be together is long. The story follows Percy, Monty and Monty's sister Felicity as they go on their tour of Europe. Everybody's got secrets, Monty's a rake, they have one point they get kidnapped by pirates, basically it's just fun. Next was The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black. Meet Hazel and her brother Ben. And last but not least, by kind of odd coincidence, I found a treasury version of a series I used to read as a kid in my local library. The series is called Sweep, it's by Kate Tiernan and this is the first three books, so one book, three books. And also some rude person with a purple pen has been doodling within this book. And I'm really irritated by that, so they need to stop. Set in Upstate New York in the age of dial-up, a young girl meets a young boy who starts teaching her about Micah. It's not supposed to be today, today is Monday, that only happens on Tuesdays. Why are you here? Okay, we're gonna do this. I'm sorry. There's drama, there's fantasy element, and super powerful blood witches, and also the traditional will she won't she. But at the core of the story is a young girl discovering herself. And I like it. So in the month of October I read nine books and I'm really glad to be out of my reading swamp. Let me know what you've been reading. Come talk to me about books. A viento!


What is going on guys, today I am back with another Destiny video and today I have something small but absolutely epic. Now full credit to Gugstiny on Twitter for spotting this, definitely the first to bring it to my attention so full credit to him. So what am I talking about you are wondering? Ok so the cutscene from Destiny 2's very first mission homecoming is actually a throwback to vanilla Destiny's very first mission. The cutscene isn't very long but it definitely does seem to show its respects so to speak. Check it out for yourselves. And there you have it guys, undeniable, actually something I think Bungie did on purpose to see if many people would spot it or even remember it. Personally I did not and like I said it was brought to my attention by a Twitter user by the name of Gugstiny. Just thought it was definitely worth sharing with you guys and a nice little addition. Now Destiny 2 is almost upon us, I can feel it, I actually already have my copy sitting in front of me but the servers ain't live yet so it's hurting me inside, it really is. But guys while I'm here, you want to win a Rockstar Destiny 2 exclusive in-game gear code? I have absolutely loads to give away. To win one simply drop a comment down below telling me what you will be manning in Destiny 2 that being either a Hunter, Warlock or Titan and tell me why also. Also leaving a like helps me out and on that note guys I am out. But I hope you enjoyed the video, thanks for checking it out as always and I will see you guys on that next one, hopefully that one being a Destiny 2 video.


Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much Ebony and all of the Indiana Ignite team for inviting me here to present some of our thoughts as to how we are moving forward particularly based on some of the work that this group has already been doing in one of our safety net hospitals in downtown Indianapolis also thank all of the Ignite Ward and of course Terry and Eric to invite me here to give a brief overview of what what is possible in a large health system if the health system were to adapt the principle that we could actually take genomic medicine and the findings of genomic medicine and try to make that part of our health system and health care process so just a brief overview some of you may be familiar with IU and IU Health what we have done over the last three years is to really create a seamless enterprise that has actually merged the the administration of the medical school and the administration of the hospital even though the hospital is a partially owned public corporation many of the senior officers including myself shared dual roles so I serve as the Dean for research at the School of Medicine but also the Executive Vice President for innovation and research in the health system so the concept here is that we are actually merging both the academic and the discovery mission to potentially health care mission and not that we are unique in that but there are very many schools that are trying to do that but I think one of the interesting aspects for us is that we do have a very huge reach and we essentially have the entire state as a possible laboratory to explore this opportunity so this just gives you a simple sort of overview of what IU Health is IU Health is one of the largest HBO's in the country probably think ranked as a seventh or eighth largest now it has about 19 hospitals that is spread across the entire state and covers about 3 million patient lives probably about 45 percent of the state so it's a very large health care system that has obviously several high-end academic medical centers in Indianapolis and surrounding areas but also very many tertiary I would say sites that are more critical care hospitals and affiliated with those are over a hundred community clinics and other types of service providers so it provides us with a very large canvas if you will and and as part of our clinical and translational sciences Institute or the which is another NIH funded program we've now created a very large sort of network of potentially both research but also what I would call academic types of service extensions so we have a single IRB system for all of these hospitals we have a single EHR in a data warehouse it's a CERNR based data warehouse that can essentially have data for all of these patients and then we have at each of these hospitals and many of these sites we have a space where patients can be consented patients the blood samples can be taken as well as a single laboratory system that that sends all of these blood samples to a central path lab and a central area for essentially high-end tests like genomic medicine and then we also obviously have a statewide bio repository that can collect samples and store them within the medical center so the infrastructure is implemented as is the the systems willingness to do that how do we we then went on to actually create joint goals a typical medical school goal of course is is to increase the number of programs number of funding NIH funding etc which is not always very meaningful to the hospitals they say yeah that's great but you know I'm more worried about revenue cycle and quarterly reports and patients flow and workflow so we've created a joint sort of goals for the enterprise but particularly we are focusing on accelerating clinical protocols within the system that particularly what we think would be beneficial to patients those type of protocols would be given priority and will become system goal what does it mean to become a system goal well essentially what it means is that most of our senior management's the CEOs of all these hospitals and the CFOs etc their compensation is about 40 to 50% based on performance and research becoming one these type of programs becoming one of the goals means almost 5% of their compensation depends on the success of these programs which provides an incredible motivation for the hospitals to actually make sure that they support the IT they support the infrastructure they provide space or the staff to do that so that's been part of the strategy here is to not only show the value of these types of innovations but also incentivize them to in some way make it happen at their sites so the areas that we are focusing particularly obviously these are the big areas for most hospitals and healthcare system to treat patients and and depend on their avenues but one of the cross cutting themes that with the we're thinking is extremely valuable is to focus on precision health obviously there are others such as you know population health which is more on health services and health outcomes related types of metrics but the the top one as you can see is precision health and we're defining precision health at least at this point primarily based on genomics types of information pharmacogenetics and other types of genomics as the the primary way of making it I would say more precise or a closer to precision at this point than anything else how are we moving this forward currently we as I said we're a CERNR shop so we have CERNR in all of the hospitals and is I would say about 40 to 45 percent of our non-hospital based clinical service areas and we're using a tool as if any of you are familiar with CERNR you know there's a tool called power trials within that that can actually tag patients that are either participating in a trial or potentially eligible for a trial and as I mentioned we are in the future our goal is to really have 20 impactful clinical trials that become preferred by the system and would become part of the system's goals and all of our physician practices all of our hospital CEOs will will be able to then create a platform for pushing out these these trials and once the patient is enrolled or consented there is a tag that shows up as this patient is participated in this trial or is it's potentially eligible for the trial the question of you know making physicians click on that if they're eligible is still a big challenge but certainly once they are eligible we we can enroll them and once they are enrolled they become tagged in the in the their patients electronic health record system and if any of the physicians that actually see this patient in any setting click on this then obviously you'll pull up the actual protocol they're on or even the consent and and and other documents that would be appropriate so by October and November period we're we're making the 20 impactful trial system wide but we have over seven that are now moving out and the number one as to as I hope to tell you would be the ingenious which is the ignite part of the trial we use the encore clinical trials software for actually entering the data so any patient that's enrolled in these trials will be entered into encore which is now directly connected to CERNR so every patient that's enrolled in any of these trials will automatically populate into CERNR the other thing that we can also do based on this encore tool is that if we put the inclusion and exclusion criteria for the clinical trial for the top trials that we select this will automatically search our electronic data warehouse and actually tag all the potentially eligible patients and we've just rolled out three trials so far and those searches can be done on a weekly basis and that list then goes to the study coordinators who would know where these patients are within the system and they're then able to let the exact facility know how to enroll these patients so as I mentioned one of the top trials we're moving forward with are the pharmacogenetic service to patients there are some other bio banking studies but our goal in the long run is to move 20 trials but the first one would be ingenious which is the part of the ignite trials I think you just heard that this is a pharmacogenetics based randomized control trial and the hope is that with the with at the end of this trial we will be able to show that there is significant cost savings and patient benefit using pharmacogenetically based decision support for particularly for prescription medications I think this is becoming increasingly valuable within our system as you can see this is the site that we use to actually educate providers engage patients or once they're enrolled they can get continued information about the about the trials might have seen this before but already we're beginning to reports the substantial actionable results and consultation outcomes but we hope this would be expanded to essentially a 2.5 million patients in addition to what's already been being done so our hope is that with this we'll actually be able to say as a health system we're providing precision health which you know we were broadly defining and for the system as both genetic but also behavioral and environmental factors while we're just at the beginning of some of the other components the behavioral and environmental component we certainly feel like we're in a place ready to move some of the genetic stuff forward and this is big again become also part of our entire university's I would say goal Indiana University is going to be 200 years old in 2020 so as part of the 2020 strategy precision health has become one of the grand challenge initiatives that the university has embraced which means that the the plan to invest substantial resources to create significant genomic discipline as well as some additional actionable items like cell and gene therapies by a lot the drugable genome and biological discovery based on that and of course significant data sciences and informatics so the idea is to really embrace this fully and make all of our health systems be part of a precision health environment over the next decade and and I say the two areas that we're already making substantial sort of investments one is in pharmacogenetics and and the second one is cancer genomics as you would expect this has become increasingly more and more part of our clinical care so we're beginning we're partnered with the couple of different areas to sequence gene whole genome whole exome sequencing of tumors and and then based on that refining our chemotherapy regimen so right now we have several hundred probably around 800 cancer patients that have gone through this within the last two years and already within our system we're seeing a substantial benefit to patients in terms of their survival curves those that have been treated with genomic based chemotherapy regimen versus those that are using standard usual care regimen and and this becomes part of the value that we can provide to our patients but it from the system level it also becomes a major market differentiator when you're trying to compete in a health care environment with other health systems in your market area so I think with we think this is a an important move forward and finally one of the things that we're beginning to see also is some some ways to address the health equity and health disparities one of the big exams surprising examples for us we're still analyzing the data is that it turns out that breast cancer outcomes have been in a reported uniformly poor as poor for African-American women as opposed to Caucasians and at least in our system what we're finding is that African-American women get much lower dose of tax all because of some of the potential side effects and that may well be one of the major reasons why they show poor outcomes because they don't get adequate high enough doses of tax all so we're beginning to now use pharmacogenetics to actually look at plasma levels to see if that can be addressed so there are many potential ways I think this this approach the at a halt system level can bring a lot of value and and and makes good science but also very intelligent business so that's what we're excited about and we look forward to partnering obviously with our academic partners and NIH and other interested parties to make this reality so thank you very much thank you another we have some time for questions it looks like hands are already raised we have Eric and then Dan sure hi that was very helpful thank you could you maybe just describe a little bit more I was trying to understand sort of how the CTSA funding that you get for this and one slide you sort of showed it in the center but I wasn't sure if this was sort of a critical part of it was sort of it was a really the center of the of your universe or is it just a component part like other sources of funding yeah so the CTSA has helped in several components of this one for example starting with the single IRB for our entire hospital system that was one of the things that we did through the CTSI the second area is the rolling out of Encore for all clinical trials which we worked with the University clinical trials office which is part of the CTSI so those are two big ones that we have already used the CTSI resources for and establishing some of our clear processes for genome testing at all of these sites sample transfer from multiple peripheral sites and setting up SOPs for those kinds of processes at all of these sites have all been part of the CTSI regulatory program that's helped with us so I think we know we have sort of leveraged the health system and the NIH investment in the CTSI very nicely to create that that whole network across the state and and the universities in our CTSI three of the university academic universities in Indiana our partners it's Indiana University but also Purdue University and Notre Dame and Purdue has a lot of process engineers who have helped us actually conduct a lean six sigma process to improve all of our process across the state so I had a sort of a question a similar vein and and maybe I can just sort of phrase it a bit differently and get a different sense of the answer of do you how much of an investment has the institution made the and for you the institution I guess is also the state and the CTSI and NHGRI can you sort of give us a numbers and and how so how much skin is does each of those players have in this game yeah yeah I mean I think you know I I can't give you the exact amount of NHGRI support I think that's that's pretty much through the Ignite program primarily I can't say the health system has made huge investments in this right now we provide probably about close to three million dollars a year to maintain this infrastructure across the 19 hospitals and this involves essentially staff of part-time nurses at these different hospitals space utilization as well as probably about a million dollars of that goes to the electronic health or our IT systems to to be able to do the required searches through the adw to pull out the the tracking and pushing out of the message and that's just the operating costs at this point we have obviously the the school is invested substantial amount in the precision health in terms of faculty development and faculty hires the other investments which are partially helping this are you know obviously the building out of the adw and connection to all of the electronic health records so while there is in kind support of several million dollars there's actual direct support of about three million per year and and the other thing that I would also mention is that this we were able to talk to the state legislatures about this and they were quite interested in this so we are through the CTSI we actually got a two million dollar line item in the state budget to help with this as well so there's there's substantial interest in investment in this yeah so I'm I'm sort of interested in the sociology of this of this whole process of embracing precision health could you describe you know whether you met with any resistance at all and what did you promise would be the results at the end to get you this type of investment that you've been able to achieve yeah the it is part of part of this is of course the promise of what we think would be better patient care and while you know one can say as Jeff you know you can say this is going to solve all human health and really going to find all kinds of cures for every incurable disease the short-term benefits really is even cost savings aren't a big deal for the health system they will say well you know if I'm putting three million dollars every year I could do that in another program and get you know three X returns very easily so I expect to justify that unless it's it saves me 15 to 20 million dollars it's not worth my time to put three million dollars so I think that's that's really not the only cell we can say that certainly is going to save you some major adverse events and major benefits but it'll be for a subs much smaller patient a population the biggest selling point for me was that this will be your market differentiator in the healthcare market so that more of the patients with these high-end sort of care-needing diseases like cancer like cardiovascular diseases like people with treatment resistant conditions will come to you rather than go to your competitors because you are able to even if you can't find the right treatment you're able to give them a better answer than the other health systems so that's been the biggest thing that's worked on the c-suites for me yeah I was kind of interested in the in a similar question but maybe in the practical sense I think you said something about incentivizing physicians for demonstrating innovation in genomic medicine broadly could you elaborate a little bit on how you measure that is it just enrolling people in immunology trials or yeah yeah so right now it's it's fairly crude so what we're what we're saying is that these top 20 trials will have enrollment metrics for each of the systems and those enrollment metrics are based on eligible patients within that system so every hospital or every clinic we can look at the EDWC what percent of patients are at least based on the inclusion exclusion criteria are eligible and our goal is to say if you have 10 eligible patients you would have been you would have met your satisfactory metric if you've enrolled at least one patient within out of that 10 and you would exceed your goal if you enroll two patients and that satisfactory metric actually determines 5% of the comp for many of the executives and also provides a research RVU for four physicians so we're still refining that system but it's relatively crude at this point so yeah if I could ask the research RVU is a very interesting approach to incentivizing physicians how how where do you get that money from to be able to provide it to them yeah so what we've said is that everybody in order to get their clinical pay they have to meet 80% of their clinical RVUs the remaining 20% is met by either teaching RVUs or research RVUs so you could do 100% clinical RVUs and not teach or not not do any research as affiliated activities but it's a lot easier for them to help recruit patients and get that 20% RVUs well and obviously it's very important for clinicians who want to do research when they're being really pressured to get the value units up for clinical care so yeah we think that's really the value it's a lot of our academic or clinical faculty feel actually that they are they're very excited to do this and they really even the hospital CEOs really want us to give us all kinds of information how to roll this out because they're all interested and excited it's mostly protecting time thank you very much as you see everyone was very excited to hear about the Indiana Health University thank you we next have Tony Poland who is a PI at the University of Maryland and she actually led a workshop engaging insurers and payers and other people from technology companies that was not even two weeks ago and she's just going to give us feedback I just want to let you know this preliminary feedback because she hasn't got the input and written up but she's going to give us feedback and what we heard that day thank you very much Tony


How many of you were there? I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Are we looking for a guy? That is a matter of assuming who you want us to meet up with? I don't know who you might have or who you might have or that was as a hom Syndrome Bring it up in... Does that make sense? What do you mean it up? Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Okay, now you two are going to get the visiting cards. Please join in a moment of centering silence so we can be fully present with each other this morning. Let's turn to the words for our in-gathering hymn so that we can become musically present with each other. You'll find those words in your order of service. Good morning, everybody. Welcome to another Sunday here at First Unitarian Society, where independent thinkers gather in a safe, nurturing environment to explore issues of social, spiritual, and ethical significance as we try to make a difference in this world. I'm Steve Goldberg, a proud but very shy member of this congregation, and I'd like to offer a special welcome to any guests, visitors, and newcomers. If this is your first time at First Unitarian Society, I think you'll find that it's a special place. And if you'd like to learn more about our special buildings, we offer a guided tour today right after the service. Just gather over here by the windows, and we will take good care of you. Speaking of taking good care of each other, this is the splendid time to silence those pesky electronic devices that you just will not need during the next hour, and it goes for you watching at home. And while you're taking care of that, let me remind you that if you're accompanied today by a youngster, we welcome children to stay for the entire service, but if you think that your child would rather experience the service from a more private space, we offer a couple options for you, including our child haven in the back corner of the auditorium and some special seating right outside the doorway in the commons, from which you and your youngster can hear and see the service. And one of the reasons we are able to hear and see the service today is that it is brought to us by a wonderful group of people. We call them volunteers, and we want to give them a high-five or a hug and a handshake by announcing their names and expressing our appreciation for these volunteers. David Bryles, thank you for operating the sound system. Tom Boykoff, thank you for being our lay minister today. Corinne Perron, thank you for greeting us this morning, upstairs as we arrived during this gray, drizzly, almost Irish day. Ken Gage, Ann Ostrom and Gail Bliss are the ushers for this unruly crowd, and our coffee is being hosted today after the service by Sandra Plisch and Nancy Kossoff. The foliage up here is tended by Betty Evenson, and John Powell will be our tour guide. There's only one announcement, and that announcement is that we have 47 days until cabaret. The theme this year is an evening in Ireland. So did you know that cabaret is coming?  We'll spend a night in Ireland, and we'll dance to some Irish tunes. Well, to hear the rest of the song. Come to cabaret in 47 days, Friday, May 12, when this entire building will be turned into one big Irish party, complete with Irish music. Wonderful food. I didn't say Irish food, because wonderful and Irish food doesn't always go together. We'll have wonderful food. We'll have beverages, including some Irish variations on that theme. And of course, we will have a terrific auction of items and services donated by FUS members. We'd like you to have a chance to be a part of our Irish cabaret on Friday, May 12. We invite you to find out if you've got the right stuff to be part of the Irish cabaret team, and after the service today, you'll have a chance to sign up for that. Also, we invite your auction items to make an evening in Ireland a wonderful success and a lot of fun for FUS. So with that, I invite you to sit back or lean forward to enjoy today's service. I know you'll find that it will touch your heart, stir your spirit, and trigger one or two new thoughts. We're glad you're here. Thank you to our Meeting House course for a rigorous and rousing opening to our service. The words today are by Gordon McKeeman. We summon ourselves from the demands and delights of the daily round, from the dirty dishes and unwaxed floors, from unmoved grass and untrimmed bushes, from all incompletenesses and not yet startednesses, from the unholy and the unresolved. We summon ourselves to attend to our vision, peace and justice, of cleanliness and health, of delight and devotion, of the lovely and the holy, of who we are and what we can do. We summon the power of tradition and the exhilaration of newness, the wisdom of the ages and the knowing of the very young. We summon beauty, eloquence, poetry and music to be the bearers of our dreams. We would open our eyes, our ears, our minds, our minds, our hearts to the amplest dimensions of life. We rejoice in manifold promises and opportunities. I invite you to rise and body or in spirit to join in our chalice lighting printed in your order of service. For every time we make a mistake and we decide to start again, we light this chalice. For every time we are lonely and we let someone be our friend, we light this chalice. For every time we are disappointed and we choose to hope we light this chalice. I invite you to greet your neighbors. It pains me to say we will not have a story for all ages today. I dressed like an Easter egg for the part. But once a month we generally set aside a few minutes at the first part of the hour for the sharing of joys and sorrows. This is a time for members, friends, and visitors to relate to the entire gathered community some special event or circumstance that has affected your life or the life of someone close to you in recent days or weeks. General announcements, news items, and partisan appeals are discouraged. Anyone who wishes is invited to step to the front of the auditorium with a candle in one of our candelabras and using a microphone provided by our lay minister. Thank you. Share your name if that is comfortable to you and a brief message. Please note that our services are livecast, so listeners are not restricted to those sitting in this room. You may also wordlessly light a candle of commemoration and simply return to your seat. I open the floor now to your sharing of these significant matters of our lives. I'm Roxanne and one of my best friends and her family are currently gathering for a hospice vigil for their mother. So I ask for prayers and thoughts for them. I regret that I'm cleaning up the earth with my friend. Good morning. I'm Pamela McMullen. I'm going to light this candle in honor of my father who was Irish and who gave me my musical ability, which I treasure very, very much. He's been gone for 25 years, but he's still very much in my heart. Hi, my name is Gayle Epping Overholt and I have been gone from this community for a long time, a couple, about 15 years. And I'm back with my husband and we are so glad to be back in Madison in this community. And so I look forward to getting to know those of you whose face is not yet familiar. So thank you. I'm Elizabeth. I have a candle of joy for my brother Joe. He had a brain injury a number of years ago. I just visited him in Asheville, North Carolina. He has a professional job helping other people who have brain injuries and now he has a partner and a house and he is so happy. I'm happy for him. He and I have a joy that is spring break. My name is Tori Broker and my joy is that my birthday is tomorrow. Other joys or sorrows to share anyone in the balcony? Let us then take a moment of silence to remember those who are not with us today to honor the joys and sorrows shared here and to hold close to us the cares left unspoken but which still abide in our hearts. Blessed be. If you would please rise in body or in spirit for our next hymn, number four. Please be seated. You will note in your order of service that we are sharing today's outreach offering with the UW-Madison Odyssey Project which offers economically disadvantaged adults the opportunity to begin college studies with the hopes that they will go on to further and finish their studies at a four-year university like UW-Madison. Emily Auerbach is the director and founder of this program and is here with us today and as in the past we welcome today one of Emily's students to read an original composition on the theme of our service. Joining us today is Renee Robinson who will share a poem by Langston Hughes something of her own journey and her own composition. Welcome Renee. Good morning. I counted a privilege as well as a pleasure to be here. In the Odyssey Project we read many poems and stories about persistence and the face of adversity about continuing the struggles of our ancestors and about continuing the struggles of our ancestors. One poem we read is by Langston Hughes from the 1930s called The Negro Mother. Children, I come back today to tell you a story of the long dark way that I had to climb that I had to know in order that the race might live and grow. Look at my face dark as the night yet shining like the sun with loves true light. I am the child they stole from the sand 300 years ago in Africa's land. I am the dark girl who crossed the wide sea carrying in my body the seed of the free. I am the woman who worked in the field bringing the cotton and the corn to yield. I am the one who labored as a slave beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave. Children sold away from me husband sold too. No safety, no love, no respect was I due. 300 years in the deepest south but God put a song and a prayer in my mouth. God put a dream like steel in my soul. Now through my children I'm reaching the goal. Now through my children young and free I realize the blessing denied to me. I couldn't read then I couldn't write. I had nothing back there in the night. Sometimes the valley was filled with tears but I kept trudging on through the lonely years. Sometimes the road was hot with the sun but I had to keep on till my work was done. I had to keep on, no stopping from me. I was the seed of the coming free. I nourished the dream that nothing could smother deep in my breast the Negro mother. I had only hope then but now through you dark ones of today my dreams must come true.  Remember my years heavy with sorrow and make of those years a torch for tomorrow. Make of my past a road to the light out of the darkness, the ignorance, the night. Lift high my banner out of the dust stand like free men supporting my trust. Believe in the right, let none push you back. Remember the whip in the slaver's track. Remember how the strong and struggle and strife still bore you the way and deny you life. But March ever forward breaking down bars look ever upward at the sun and stars. All my dark children made my dreams and my prayers impale you forever up the great stairs for I will be with you till no white brother dares keep down the children of the Negro mother. Now a short story I wrote about me. I was born in Chicago, number 11 of 14 children. At one point in my life we had 10 people in a three bedroom, one bathroom apartment. It was lively, challenging and sometimes disappointing but never a dull moment. It was family, my family. I didn't have a choice in the matter. We were poor. How poor were we? We were so poor that my uncle who worked at the Campbell's soup factory would bring us cans of soup that couldn't be sold because of flaws, dents and bands. The cans didn't have labels but contained numbers which identified the soup. We memorized the numbers because we had to. If you didn't know the numbers you were stuck with the soup no one wanted which in our house was the tomato soup.  Not only did I have to survive on the south side of Chicago in the ghetto, the low end as we call it but at home as well. Can you imagine 14 children buying for attention? 14 children wanting to be loved. 14 children striving to be better than the next. It wasn't all good but neither was it all bad. We were taught principles, morals and Christianity. We were required to excel in school. You would think that such an upbringing would produce upstanding and productive individuals and it did for ten of us. Unfortunately, I was one of the four who didn't quite meet the challenge. I was persistent at taking the wrong path and making poor decisions. I had my oldest son at 16 and was forced to attend a high school for pregnant girls. I married at 17 and had my second son at 18. It was a blessing to have a husband who was also the father of my children where I come from. That was a unique happening in itself. But unfortunately with that came physical abuse. I could go on and on about the many ups and downs due to the poor decisions I made over those 30 years but I want to talk about the good news. I made it out of that situation and relocated to Madison, Wisconsin. I got a job. I got an apartment. Then a used car. I joined a church that made me feel at home and there I heard about the UW Odyssey project. One of the best decisions I have ever made. Uh oh, on the page. Odyssey is for people just like me. Those who wanted to do better but couldn't for whatever reason. Having made so many poor decisions in my life I feel I'm somewhat of an expert in understanding how easy it is for people to mess up to make mistakes and to choose the wrong path. But Odyssey gives you the feeling like the little red engine we read about in elementary school. I think I can. I think I can. It releases the wow factor as in he did that. She did what? Really? They left Britain to do the same thing in America? I didn't know that. Then it begins. The desire to know more. The desire to understand. The drive and tenacity to do better. And to critically think, analyze and understand what you are reading. And what's so fantastic about Odyssey? It's generational. I tell people that all the time. Not only does it change the lives of parents. It changes the lives of their children. Which will change the lives of their children, etc. Odyssey is a mind-opening experience. Before Odyssey, if someone had asked me to write a poem or told me that I would be analyzing Socrates, my favorite, Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, and Frederick Douglass, I promise you I would have rolled my eyes up, down, and sideways. But there I was at my Odyssey graduation earning six UW Madison credits and reading the following poem that I wrote about the value of lifelong learning. The poem was titled My Journey. My journey started about eight months ago. How I would fare, I really didn't know. Now, reading and writing, I thought it would be but from six to nine, that I didn't see. The professors were there for all to meet outlining history, humanities, and philosophy. I was scared, but I didn't know why. Maybe it was the 30 years that had quickly gone by so. Getting acclimated was a little rough at first but soon thereafter to read books I would thirst. See, prior to Odyssey, I didn't read all the info I got was from the TV but things have now changed. Mainly the screen, from the TV to the computer I am now a Google Queen. My journey, my journey, who would have thought would be the beginning of me being taught, being taught the importance of opening my mind instead of sitting around and wasting my time. So, thank you Odyssey for choosing me. I have found knowledge, my greatest discovery. Welcome to the real world, my father would say. He said this repeatedly as I was growing up. The inherent sarcasm and its underlying suggestion that my life would be filled with disappointment was not exactly what I wanted to hear in my pre and post-cubescent years. Ultimately though I found it to be true in some ways I had been sheltered from life's hardships. A childhood of relative privilege had not prepared me for what I would see or come to understand as an adult. Suffering I learned is common as mud and reality won't match our expectations all the time. Reality will knock us down sometimes. Some disappointment is an inevitable part of life and our determination will be tested as Shakespeare posed to us in Act III of Hamlet as the Danish prince considers ending his life to be or not to be that is the question. Whether it is nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing them end. Perhaps you or someone you know has suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, survived experience of violence, personal tragedy or catastrophe. I was going to read a list of them to you starting with fire and flood but the longer the list got the more depressing it became. Perhaps you can identify as having been widowed, divorced, unemployed, disabled, mentally ill, formerly incarcerated, formerly homeless, an immigrant or refugee. Starting again often is not optional for many people but is made necessary by such experiences. Perhaps you have not had to face such hardships and misfortune. Perhaps you've been able to choose when and where and how to manage life's more mundane transitions, moving a household, changing schools or jobs, starting or ending a relationship. Along the way every one of us makes our share of mistakes. We have fallen short of our ideals. We have done bad things for good reasons and good things for bad reasons. We have hurt someone we know and love. We have had a friend or loved one die or leave us. Perhaps our bodies won't do what they once did and yet regardless of whatever experiences we have faced somehow here we are together. Each time we have known disappointment or loss we have survived, picked up the pieces, learned what we could, asked for forgiveness when we needed to and started again. While last week's service dealt more with loss and saying goodbye, this week's deals more with discovery and saying hello, developing resilience and being open to new opportunities. I don't know that the adage is true that whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger but there's something to be said for resilience. Karen Rivich and Andrew Chateau in their book The Resilience Factor identify four fundamental uses for resilience. Overcoming the obstacles of early childhood, steering our way through everyday adversity, surviving a life altering event as a child and reaching out in a spirit of exploration. I think all four of them are relevant to today's discussion. Resilience is one of the first things we teach our children, isn't it? When they fall down we teach them the essence of the song by Dorothy Fields and Jerome Kern to pick themselves up, dust themselves off and start all over again. Well it's easier to do this when we know that rewards or opportunities lie ahead of us which is one of the effects I think of the UW Odyssey project. Today we receive with deep gratitude Renee's powerful, beautiful contribution. The good news of someone who has overcome some of life's struggles and started again who turned a corner and found new hope and new life. Thank you Renee. It's a pleasure to have you, a privilege to have you here with us. As I prepared for this service I came to appreciate how the Odyssey project honors and empowers adults who have shown tremendous resilience in their lives. Bad things happen to good people. Trying to understand how evil can exist in the world if God is all loving and all powerful trying to understand this is called theodicy. Many in our society, particularly Unitarian Universalists, atheists, agnostics, humanists, other religious liberals and those identifying as none of the above, many in our society no longer see the theodicy problem as relevant and simply do not worry about it. That's a sermon for another day. But I had to wonder how theodicy had why bad things happen to good people might be connected to theodicy, the ancient epic Greek poem by Homer and the UW's Odyssey project. I had to wonder if the word theodicy was rolling around in the back of the minds of the project's organizers as they considered the long journeys and changes of fortune that people face. As Renee pointed out in her reading we often don't have a choice about what life puts in front of us. It can be a long hard climb and at the same time she reminded us that it's easy to mess up, to make mistakes or poor choices or choose the wrong path. What do we do when our hearts are broken or we've been deeply wounded in some way? How do we respond to life's hardships? Experience has taught me that we may respond in any number of ways. We may curl inward into a seething bundle of rage. We may feel doomed, stuck, impotent, and immobilized. We may lash out in anger and frankly further complicate our lives. We may dissolve into sorrow. Weep in pain and grief feel all the feels. We may seek solitude and the wisdom to be found in the natural world. We may reach out to those we know for comfort and perspective. All of these are natural responses. With time and good fortune, our wounds may heal. We may come to understand our heartbreak or woundedness in a greater context from a new perspective. Our vision might expand so that we may see both life's sorrows and its joys and know that we are more than just our moments of pain. Even as such experiences might help define who we are, we come to see them as finite moments or periods in our lives. We give those experiences meaning. And having done so, perhaps we come to a better understanding of life. Perhaps we even dare to love or trust again. Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, Life based on a big love of the world is full and rich. I've employed this phrase when I have known hardship, when I've been knocked down. One of the ways I have learned to pick myself back up and help recover that big love toward the world is to remind myself with great irony that my life is still full and rich. You may see me walking down the hall chanting it to myself, full and rich, full and rich, full and rich. Anybody else been there? I have come to understand my father's view of the world. But I've also come to know that simply being alive is a miracle and a blessing. Some source of all has breathed life into our being. The challenge of living a fuller, richer life it seems to me is to accept and integrate our losses and still keep our minds and hearts open to possibility. Sometimes we can, sometimes we must start again. But starting again can be difficult, even harder than when things end. Unitarian Universalist minister Lynn Unger says, here's the thing about endings. You don't really have to do anything about them. If you've lost a friendship or a job or a marriage or even a beloved stuffed animal you'll probably feel sad and likely angry and possibly guilty or regretful. But if something has truly ended there's nothing you can do about it except learn to live with the loss. But beginnings are a heck of a lot of work. It's not easy to walk into a room full of people you don't know. When you start a new job you have to learn a whole new set of policies and principles and purposes and procedures. When you start a new grade in school you not only have to learn the classroom rules and meet new people and figure out just what your teacher expects you're also facing a whole bundle of new things to learn from multiplication to writing paragraphs from cursive to algebra. Endings may be hard because of how they feel but beginnings are where the real work begins. Unger suggests that anytime you take on something new you're basically committing an act of faith. You walk up to the open door of a new relationship a new skill, a new job or hobby or idea without knowing where it will take us. But you know that you're going to have to put some work in before you have any idea what your new beginning will grow into. And the best part, she says is that as long as we can maintain a beginner's view we get the special sense of excitement that comes with exploring the unknown. To be a beginner is to be filled with a sense of possibility with a feeling of new worlds unfolding in front of you. As I understand the Odyssey Project this is one of its greatest gifts that by learning new things, developing new skills and coming to know themselves better Odyssey students experience this sense of possibility of worlds unfolding before them. They find the courage and the will to embrace the unknown and to change the patterns of life that have defined them. They have listened to the still small voice within and have discovered Degadankan sin fry. Their thoughts are free and their thoughts give them power. Rene and hundreds of other Odyssey students are proof that some of us do make it out of bad situations that with the mind-opening experience of education comes empowerment, feeling like the little engine that could with the compounded benefit of affecting not just one life but generations. Unitarian Universalism's guiding principles celebrate the inherent worth and dignity of these students and the free and responsible search for truth and meaning that has made such a difference in their lives. I imagine the experiences of Odyssey students being like those expressed in today's songs bringing their spirits to the sea, feeling a light within, an inner flame burn away their tears, awakening and a rising from bended knee, feeling once lost but not found, but now found. Unitarian Universalist minister and author Robert Fogum is known for a story he wrote in which the neighborhood children are out playing hide and seek but there's always one child who hides too well and just as the others are about to give up searching, Fogum shouts, Get found, kid! Fogum prefers the game of sardines. Has anybody here played sardines? Yes. In which one person hides and all the rest join him or her until everyone is packed in like sardines. This simple game illustrates the Universalist theology that in the end all are found, that God provides salvation to all. Fogum says he thinks God is a sardine player and that God can be found in the same way everybody gets found in sardines by the sound of laughter of those heaped together in the end. I love that image for spiritual practice. Finding God by the laughter of those heaped together at the end. Well, we came together today to this community of fellow seekers as Gordon McKeeman said in our opening words to summon the power of tradition and the exhilaration of newness, the wisdom of the ages and the knowing of the very young. We would open our eyes, our ears, our minds, our hearts to the amplest dimensions of life and we rejoice in manifold promises and possibilities. In the days ahead, every time we make a mistake and decide to start again, each time we are lonely and we let someone be our friend, every time we are disappointed and we choose to hope, let us harken back to the songs and stories we've heard today and the time we've spent together. Let us go forth with our minds and hearts open to the amplest dimensions of life and live in faith that new worlds will unfold before us. May we walk in peace united. May we live in love enlightened and know that we are one. O source of all, help us to grow. May it be so. May it be so. As I mentioned earlier, today's outreach offering will be shared with UW Odyssey Project. More information is available in the commons after the service. Please be generous. If you would, please rise in body or in spirit for our closing hymn, number 277, for our closing words and our post loop. Our closing words come to us from Melissa Carville Zemer, Associate Executive Director of the UU Ministers Association. Let us give thanks for the will to survive and for the grit of survivors. Let us give thanks for the determination to thrive and ask a blessing upon all those taking risks to find their way. Let us praise persistence and perseverance in the name of love and let us praise the power that will not stop calling us toward transformation for the sake of us all here on this earth.


Everybody forced here up in 2023 panini black football hobby six box half-case number six PYT Adam E with the Panthers Andrew H. Bucks Ben S. Brown's Pat's Brandon S. Titans, Washington Ryan L. Vikings Curtis D. Texans Daniel L. Bills Diego Raiders Derward Jags Isaac has the Cardinals Jesse S. Falcons John a Steelers Jose S. Rams Maximilian Bengels Nicholas S. Giants and Seahawks Paul B Jets Peter B Eagles Niners Richard P. Chargers Ron a Bears Sean O. Cowboys Stephen L. Colts Steve C. Packers chiefs Terry F. Broncos TJ with the Saints T-split shower with the Ravens Tyler W with The Dolphins and UW with the Lions good luck y'all get last one daytime there was still A full case divisions with spots left players down to three though And if you have cases are left for tonight are at 10 or less all of all of them We did we do not have a ton of black football guys Lane is also live right now Right now on fanatics live With black football PYT's and moment Chrome hobby PYT's great pricing on boomer Chrome hobby and then black football It's sold out here. So you may as well head over facts live and get the team you're looking for 15 to go on the one he's working on past halfway Shelves in some breaks to 75 falski foski or foeski rookie for the Saints Deuce Vaughn for the Cowboys Steve's here guys First we've seen to this player today Good rookie to Jordan Addison on the rookie patch to 25 Minnesota. We're gonna go futuristic Ricky patch 25 Vikings Jordan Addison It's a good offense, man. Him Jetta's and Hawkinson go go really well together. I think Redemption RG three night light signatures emerald That's I would have to assume this is a commander's hit. Yeah, that's cool though. There we go His value his value is solid too as far as a guy that Thought a lead to injury. Yeah gonna be Washington very cool. Hey, that's his only hit his only hit in the set There you go Brandon. Yeah, very not especially for like, you know He's a stud in college.  There you go commanders in a Jalen a Hyatt's RPA to 50 for the Giants Not the cleanest sticker out of there. It goes it goes off the sticker a bit, but so nice hit on the Hyatt there Jalen stays at the Hyatt No, that's T why That is T why this T why He's not playing as he's T why I know he joined the Cowboys late last season The 35 is a Jerry Judy for Denver like Evans buck space That's why when like last year when like Lamar Jackson like sat out I'm like, you cannot blame the guy like you really can't Will Leviss rookie Jersey to 150 for the Titans like RG three is like a warning to guys like Lamar Jackson like dude If you're not how you can't do it, man, and like just don't put yourself out there for that risk Jake Hainer rookie out at a 25 nice hit Saints There we go nice hit Saints and there's have done well today. I will say RPA Roshan Johnson at 25 Probably their rookie Chase's Roshan Johnson Here you go Chicago nice green three-color RPA there to 35 Zach Evans rookie for the Giants Sorry, not not Giants. That's Rams. Obviously what thinking up for the Giants Something Evans. I think Evan something. I don't know. I could confuse though schoonmaker rookie for the Cowboys Scoon do they say schoon when he catches the pass? Yeah triple Jersey rookie Johnston for the Chargers. You definitely have to Chargers their nice one Tyler Scott bears rookie auto now number to 15 Like a fog horn There you go bears dude bears Roshan Johnson dual Patrick you got it a 75 All right bears Bears get a dub somewhere at least this break is the one place right now They're like they're like oh, yeah, thank you for Caleb like what makes you think Caleb Williams gonna come out of college If the bears have number one overall pick what makes you think he's leaving USC for the Chicago Bears for tragedy It's the same thing the same thing is having a field is gonna happen to him Someone called it force field B. John Robinson. Oh my goodness Somebody did call it Spencer's gifts SSP right there. Got the the orb of I don't even know what it was That's sick. I'm gonna send a box wrapper a little thing in the white there See whiting on the corner, and then you see like a line on the left Still sick card for Atlanta that bathroom you John Got a Kincaid Jersey to 150 rookie for Buffalo They may replace that but either way still sick. I think we missed the parallel Yeah, it's a 15 rookie Jaren Hall for Minnesota Elijah Higgins rookie out of the 199 for the Dolphins. I think we've got an RPA here of Anthony Richardson 15 up 50 orange RPA Colts Great hit Great box the B. John force field and the Richardson RPA Heck yes That's so sick big congrats to the Colts two mags in a box that has five cards in it I like it the 75 you got Maisie Smith rookie for Dallas Mazzie Smith Maisie Smith Parker Washington Jags rookie got a Leviss and Hooker dual Jersey to 99 for the Titans and Lions That'll be a random at the ends Dusk to dawn dual Jersey Redemption Goes to the Patriots rookie autographs Citrine so that's orange. I think that'll be pretty low numbered there to Mario Douglas for the Patriots Citrine, I've it has to be the orange. Let me see if they have it Should be a 25 unless unless he's might be different, but it should be the 25 there you go Pat's Good hit there, and then we've got Zae flowers is 75 rookie dual patch autograph for the Ravens. I like that one Nice Zae, you know purple color match on the accent pretty card. All right. What a great break to a And the black football on today One random after this last box here than a recap Justin shorted a 25 rookie for the bills Gino base for Seattle Bonnie Chan Ricky Jersey to 99 dolphins Cedric Tillman rookie out at a 199 for the Browns There you go Browns and Detroit's rookie dual patch out at a 75 Jameer Gibbs Very nice for the Lions. They did well all day today. It seemed like At least for the most part maybe not every break, but we had a few big Lions cards nice Jameer Gibbs dual relic rookie coming up Jersey here. All right again is a Leviss and a hooker to 99 Titans and Lions 11 11 times Whoever's up top we'll get the card One two three four five six seven eight nine Ten and eleven Titans Titans up top Quick recap here of the hits relics of Kincaid Leviss HN Johnston Jordan Addison we had autos for the past tomorrow Douglas rookie auto citrine redemption should be to 25 RG3 nightlight signatures emerald commanders Happy for your brand and that's a cool one man Higgins Tillman Roshan Johnson Jameer Gibbs is a flowers Jalen Hyatt We had Hainer Roshan Johnson and Tyler Scott a lot of bears there nice hits to Some other teams we had a force field short prints of B. John Robinson for the Falcons and RPA orange to 50 is Anthony Richardson for the Colts fire collegiate jersey number 15 That'll do it on to some soccer


When will you stop holding yourself back? When will we as humans stop holding ourselves back? See, every limitation in this world is optional. We decide how we are limiting ourselves, whether we realize it or not. You know, they used to think that it was impossible for a human to run a mile and under four minutes. Actually, scientists said that a human heart would explode due to overexertion. And then in 1954, a man named Roger Bannister ran a mile and under four minutes. Improved everybody wrong. Do you want to know the craziest part about that story? It's over the next four years, 20 more people ran a mile and under four minutes. So let me ask you, do you think that the humans magically evolved over the next four years and their bodies were actually able to run a four-minute mile? No, of course not. So what does that show us? It shows us that people were limiting themselves based on what they thought or what other people had said to them. You know, for thousands of years, people looked up into the skies and were jealous of the birds, thinking that human flight was impossible until the Wright brothers proved them wrong. And people used to stay up at night under candlelight thinking that candlelight was the only way to light the night sky until Thomas Edison decided to prove them wrong as well. See, every groundbreaking human invention came because somebody decided to think outside of the realm of human possibility. From the wheel to the spaceship to the smartphone, every single thing that we've created has been because somebody decided to think outside of the box. Think about it, if we were to take someone from 3,000 years ago and plant them in this city right now, they would think that they are on some alien planet because of all that we've created, from cars to planes to skyscrapers as well.  Think about all of the great things we could create and worldwide issues we could solve if people just decided to think outside of their limitations. So now I ask you this question, how are you limiting yourself? How are you holding yourself back? Because there's greatness inside of you. You are great, we are all great. We just have to give ourselves a permission to release that greatness out into the world. Don't ever say something is impossible. Replace that with the phrase, I'm possible.