The Pay It Forward Fund
It is not money. It is time.
I give hours to students, founders and community projects with no strings and no expectation of return. Every time I do it I leave with more than I brought. This page is the ledger.
| Date | Engagement | Role |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | CSEA Innovation Challenge, University of Cincinnati24 teams, full-semester projects, hardware and software | Judge |
| 2026 | Engineer-a-thon, Rose-Hulman Institute of TechnologySecond year. Saturday kickoff, then mentored teams through a two-day build for three local companies | Keynote and mentor |
| 2025 | Engineer-a-thon, Rose-Hulman Institute of TechnologyFirst year. Spoke on the design and development process | Guest speaker and mentor |
| 2025 | Flywheel Social Enterprise Hub, 1819 Innovation LabSocial enterprise, the double bottom line, and the Cincinnati ecosystem | Podcast guest |
| 2023–2025 | Cincinnati Parks Foundation24 committed cleanup events, roughly monthly for two years | Program partner |
| 2025 | Mount St. Joseph University, School of BusinessStudent venture teams | Mentor |
| Ongoing | Square OneDesign thinking workshops across Cincinnati high schools, with follow-up coaching | Proposed |
Finding your ikigai, and defining your own version of success
The opener for student teams.
Design thinking under a real deadline
Human-centred design run through a two-day build, ending in a PRD, a bill of materials and a folder of technical assets rather than a mood board.
From idea to shelf
How a product actually gets made.
The double bottom line
Why profit cannot be the north star, told through Cleanup Collective.
I keep time open for students and early founders working on physical products. No cost, no equity, no pitch. If you are building something and stuck, write to me.
A rentable litter cart, started at a city hackathon, funded by a Main Street Ventures grant, run with the Cincinnati Parks Foundation for two years, and deliberately sunset. The full story, including why it ended, is in the case study.