MyFriendBen Board
At MyFriendBen, our Board of Directors serves as both the compass and the conscience of our mission — ensuring that every decision we make keeps us true to our vision of dignified benefit access for all.
The Board brings together a diverse group of leaders, advocates, and innovators who share a deep commitment to economic justice and equitable access to opportunity. With insight, integrity, and compassion, they guide our strategy, steward our resources, and champion the communities we serve.
Their leadership ensures that MyFriendBen continues to meet people where they are — simplifying complex systems, amplifying dignity in every interaction, and building pathways to financial stability for millions. United by purpose, our Board helps us turn belief into impact, ensuring that dignity and access remain at the heart of everything we do.
Our Board & Funders
Our Funding Partners
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Gates Foundation works to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, we work with partners to create impactful solutions so that people can take charge of their futures and achieve their full potential. In the United States, we aim to ensure that everyone—especially those with the fewest resources—has access to the opportunities needed to succeed in school and life. Based in Seattle, Washington, the foundation is led by CEO Mark Suzman, under the direction of Bill Gates and our governing board.
Gary Community Ventures
Gary Community Ventures is a philanthropic organization that combines the power of business, policy and philanthropy to increase opportunity for Colorado kids and families.
We use our resources to make impact investments, fund policy and advocacy initiatives, provide philanthropic grants, and incubate new social change solutions through our Venture Lab.
In partnership with our community, we bring these tools together to break down systemic barriers and build breakthrough solutions that improve outcomes in the areas of School Readiness, Youth Success and Family Economic Mobility.
J.B. & M.K. Pritzker Family Foundation
The J.B. & M.K. Pritzker Family Foundation (also known as the Pritzker Family Foundation) was founded in 2001 by J.B. and M.K. Pritzker with a commitment to and a focus on social and economic justice and equity.
Each area of focus for the Foundation was chosen because of enormous inequities in those systems and a deep desire to create more just and equitable outcomes. The Foundation focuses its grantmaking in three areas: early childhood, community health, and civil and human rights.
- The Pritzker Children’s Initiative seeks to equitably expand participation in high-quality services for lowincome families with infants and toddlers and reduce racial disparities.
- The Pritzker Community Health Initiative is working to reduce health disparities for Illinois residents by addressing the conditions that lead to poor health outcomes.
- The Pritzker Civil and Human Rights Initiative seeks to address disparities in the criminal justice system and promote justice, tolerance, and dignity for all.
The Foundation has a range of Illinois-focused strategies across portfolios related to these three core grantmaking areas.
Annie E. Casey Foundation
The Annie E. Casey Foundation (AECF®) is devoted to developing a brighter future for millions of children and young people with respect to their educational, economic, social and health outcomes.
Our work focuses on strengthening families, building stronger communities and ensuring access to opportunity, because children, youth and young adults need all three to succeed. We advance research and solutions to overcome the barriers to success, help communities demonstrate what works and influence decision makers to invest in strategies based on solid evidence.
As a private philanthropy based in Baltimore and working across the country, we make grants that help federal agencies, states, counties, cities and neighborhoods create more innovative, cost-effective responses to challenges facing children and young people: poverty, unnecessary disconnection from family and communities with limited access to opportunity.
Since 1948, these efforts have translated into more informed policies and practices and yielded positive results for many kids and families.
Rainwater Charitable Foundation
The Rainwater Charitable Foundation (RCF) is a private family foundation based in Fort Worth, Texas. Established by Richard E. Rainwater in 1991, RCF originally focused on funding initiatives that support children, with the belief that high-quality education can transform lives and uplift families. For over 30 years, we have approached our philanthropy with humility, striving to create meaningful partnerships and measure the impact of our work.
Today, RCF’s focus includes supporting North Texas families and children through quality education, upskilling, affordable housing, and childcare. Additionally, we fund medical research targeting primary tauopathies in neurodegenerative disease. Our strategy is to address critical gaps in this field—such as basic research, drug discovery, clinical trials, and attracting new talent that may be overlooked by traditional funding sources.
Telluray Foundation
The Telluray Foundation is a family foundation with headquarters in Littleton, CO. The Foundation seeks promising solutions to key issues within Littleton, Colorado, and the surrounding areas, including: economic development; environment, health, and outdoor recreation; leadership; arts; education; mental health; and local institutions. Their approach to philanthropy seeks to bring the right assets to support high potential organizations, including grants, loans, investments, network-building, mentoring and other kinds of non-financial support. The Telluray Foundation is a lean organization, and everyone contributes to a broad range of responsibilities and activities.
