Ashni Mohnot

2010

Ashni Mohnot

Enzi

http://www.enzi.org

Education & Youth Leadership

The Bold Idea:

Bold Idea: Enable people to invest in students’ higher education in exchange for a share in future income for a set time, to reduce the financial barrier to education and create a new asset class.

Most U.S. universities are not need-blind for international students, who have no access to federal loans. Private loan companies require them to get U.S. citizen co-signers, which is tough for many. Students are often unable to secure at home the large sums needed for U.S. education due to high interest rates and lack of collateral. They often burden themselves with several part time jobs to make ends meet. For millions of students around the world, pursuit of higher education even in their own countries is dampened by lack of funds. UNESCO estimates that only about 24% of all eligible individuals worldwide enroll in higher education, with the lowest rates in developing countries ex. India (10.5%) and China (7.5%). Lack of funding is often a major reason.  

 Enzi enables individuals to invest in the education of bright students in exchange for a share in their future income for a set period of time. They plan to use a Kiva.org-like open marketplace to connect students and investors directly. Enzi Fellows (students) receive education funding from several investors and commit to repaying a pre-determined percentage of their gross income for a fixed period of time after they begin working. Enzi Angels (investors) receive financial returns on the investment as well as have a tremendous social footprint by helping students attain educations they could not have afforded otherwise. Fellows also enjoy career assistance and mentorship from Angels, which helps them realize their full potential. A pioneer in people to people social investing, Enzi aims to remove the financial barrier to education, create a paradigm shift in education finance from debt to equity, and mainstream direct investments in people. By using students' future potential as collateral instead of their financial circumstances, they can more effectively nurture talent and unlock human potential. Though our initial focus is the high-need market of international students in the US, they plan to expand to U.S. students as well as the developing world. 

Biography:

Frustrated with the lack of funding options for international students and having faced difficulty funding her own education, Ashni Mohnot advocated for need blind international admission at Stanford when she was a student there, but to no avail. Stumbling upon a dissertation on income-collateralized loans, she decided to build a sustainable social business using this model to serve people facing a financial barrier to education, while simultaneously providing career assistance and mentorship to help them realize their full potential. Ashni has an undergraduate degree in Human Biology (International Health) and English and a graduate degree in International Education from Stanford. She directs the education program at Stanford's Martin Luther King Institute. She has worked with two other social ventures and has written on social innovation for PopTech.

Moment of Obligation: What experiences led to the desire to start your own organization?
As an international student from Bombay, I struggled to finance my higher education at Stanford, my expensive dream college that was not need-blind for international students. We used my parents’ life savings, private loans with two American relatives as grudging cosigners, and finally, grants and loans from Stanford (against their normal policies) when I was in danger of not completing my degree. I graduated with a heavy debt load and found that I was not alone. Many international students were in the same plight. I had fruitlessly advocated for international financial aid for years but to no avail.     My graduate degree in education brought home to me how the potential of millions around the world is tragically wasted because they lack access to education, often due to a financial barrier. Even within the US, the exorbitant cost of higher education compels students to take on significant debt. When I came across an intriguing dissertation Income-Collateralized Loans by Andy Carver, my deepening interest in social entrepreneurship helped me sense the tremendous opportunity to build a sustainable business to help remove this financial barrier through people making equity-like investments in students’ education. There were formidable legal challenges ahead, I had no formal finance experience, and the thought of offering a product no one had ever brought to scale before was nerve-wracking. But I had a moment of obligation – I just couldn’t let go an idea with such enormous, paradigm-shifting, world-changing potential.

Gall to Think Big: What has given you the ability to dream big and take on deeply entrenched social and difficult problems? (Such as experiences, skills, events, etc.)
Coming to Stanford was the best decision I ever made. Being accepted to this school quite literally changed my life and helped put me on the path to realizing my potential. I want other talented and passionate young people around the world to have similar access to transformational higher education so that they can realize their potential. I know I am privileged to have had the opportunity to participate in the Stanford experience. I believe it is therefore my responsibility to use the skills and experiences I now have to make a difference in the world. My work is my legacy – I need to leave behind me when I die, something that was larger than my life itself. I cannot live any other way.

New and Untested: What's innovative about your new idea for social change?
What if anyone anywhere could monetarily invest in life-changing education for future generations and enjoy a proportional share in the tangible bounty of their success? What if such ‘returns’ on higher education benefitted not only students but also offered a form of ‘social security’ to older generations? Enzi is building a scalable, replicable system to pioneer this very concept of people to people investing, a revolutionary idea that will disrupt education finance.     Economist Milton Friedman proposed in Capitalism and Freedom (1962) that ‘equity-like instruments’ in education promoted equality of opportunity. Traditional education finance is fixed amount loans that students repay, often over 15-20 years, no matter what circumstances befall them. Crippling debt dictates career choices – students pick high paying jobs just to pay off loans quickly. Enzi ruffles the status quo by having students repay a percent of future income for a set period. Students have no fixed amount to repay, no matter what life circumstances befall them; payments are always affordable because they are income-aligned. Students can choose careers they love without worrying about money with repayment periods typically less than private loan terms.     Traditional education finance uses credit scores and assets for collateral to determine whether or not people get credit. This approach excludes millions of deserving students who are poor or lack resources deemed acceptable collateral. Enzi creates a paradigm shift by valuing students’ future potential or talent as collateral, instead of their financial circumstances. We aim to create a new social asset class with the power to unlock human potential and move financial markets.

Seeing Possibilities: What are the most important qualities to be a successful social entrepreneur?
If you believe your idea has remarkable potential, don’t give up. Of course, there will be challenges, risks, and naysayers, but you owe it to yourself and to the world to realize your dream. I think being a successful social entrepreneur involves: having enough self-confidence to know that you can change the world but also letting go of your ego so you can actually execute, not being afraid to ask for help when you need it, and always remembering with gratitude those who helped you become successful. It involves understanding that things won’t always go as planned, learning how to adapt quickly, listening to your customers, and always keeping in mind that your raison d’etre is to help improve their lives. Never forget why you got into this business in the first place.

Which musical artists/albums get you going and keep you inspired?
I have eclectic music tastes – everything from Bollywood to rock to country. Some all time favorites are: Coldplay, Radiohead, Counting Crows, Jack Johnson, A.R. Rahman, Kishore Kumar, and the Beatles. Recently, I’ve started enjoying Owl City, The Postal Service, Sigur Ros, and other Icelandic music.

What books do you recommend (pleasure, work and anything in between)?
Disgrace – J.M. Coetzee  Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte  Eat, Pray, Love – Elizabeth Gilbert  Banker to the Poor – Muhammad Yunus  Maximum City – Suketu Mehta  The Collected Works of Rumi (trans: Coleman Barks)  Washington Square – Henry James  Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen  How to Change the World – David Bornstein
 
Which websites do you visit often (work and/or personal)?

• Techcrunch.com 
• Inquisitr.com
• Zenhabits.net 
• 101cookbooks.com
  
• Smittenkitchen.com 
• Socialedge.org 
• Kiva.org  
• Enzi.org  
• Nextbillion.net 
• Nytimes.com
• Gmail.com
• Twitter.com (and the wonderful social-e related links I find with #socent)

What advice or quote do you keep close to your heart as a social change leader?

Here are some (of many!) quotes that really inspire me:   Stephen Jay Gould: “I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in the cotton fields and sweatshops.”  Kurt Hahn: “There is more in us than we know. If we can be made to see it, perhaps, for the rest of our lives we will be unwilling to settle for less.”  Thomas Edison: “Just because something doesn't do what you planned it to do doesn't mean it's useless.”  Louis D. Brandeis: “Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done.”  One of the best pieces of advice I have ever received: If you believe you are lucky, good things start to happen. If you ask people for help, they will help you. The world is a reflection of what we believe it to be.