Third Sector Attends Salt Lake Innovation Summit

By Nadia Ahmed and Will Toaspern

Last week, Third Sector engaged with some of the country’s most forward thinking leaders at the Salt Lake County Innovation Summit in Salt Lake City, Utah. We connected with over 400 attendees who share our commitment to innovative solutions to society’s toughest problems.

Pay for Success (PFS) was at the center of the conversation, including a panel entitled “Pay for Success 2.0” moderated by Third Sector Co-Founder and Co-President, Caroline Whistler. To a standing-room only crowd, Caroline facilitated a discussion between the industry’s leading thinkers around the future of the PFS field. Our Santa Clara County Project Welcome Home project received special praise from the panel in recognition of its ‘RCT Overlay’: with its Randomized Control Trial evaluation implemented independently of the payment structure, the project will inform the County’s future policy decisions.

Other highlights included speeches from:

Dave Wilkinson, Director of the White House Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation, on the need for data-driven solutions across all parties.

J.B. Pritzker, on the incredible return on investment of early childhood development programs. His latest report, “Achieving Kindergarten Readiness for All Our Children” tells us about the critical role of philanthropists in improving outcomes for young children.

Dr. DJ Patil, the Chief Data Scientist of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, on how we can use data to think collectively and critically about our social issues.

Jim Sorenson, on the need for outcomes to drive time and money into programs that work, backed by rigorous research and evaluation.

Code for America, on its work with the U.S. Digital Service to use innovation, technology, and design to increase the success of government digital services.

My Brother’s Keeper representatives, Roy Austin, Jr. and Michael Smith, on the impact of a broken criminal justice system on families. This was part of a film screening called “VICE Special Report: Fixing the System.”

Louisville, Kentucky’s Office of Performance Improvement and Innovation, on the new “CityStat” program that help its departments and agencies share and access data in order to meet their mission.