Viet Mai (Educator/ Artist/ Entrepreneur) kicks off our initial chat with insights and inspiration regarding his artistry and entrepreneurship as well as his approach to educating today's youth. Viet shares the influence of mentors and hip-hop as well as social innovation, adaptive leadership, and human-centered design on his life and work within the community. He speaks plainly about the reality of the state of education and the promising potential of young people emerging today and in the future.

In this episode, Viet continued to explain how his Masters in Social Innovation led to his exposure to adaptive leadership and human-centered design in an academic setting, eventually being applied in a nonprofit setting with his work with young adults through RISE San Diego and disadvantaged youth with Village of Promise in San Diego. His responses related to the potential of our youth today and the problem with our youth today fueled a great ending to our session on whether he has confidence in passing the baton to the next generation.

Viet Mai is highly recognized as a slam poet and spoken word artist. He works closely with RISE San Diego and Village of Promise in San Diego. His website www.vietmai.com offers greater insight into who he is and what he is up to overall. Also, his site vincii.net serves as an example of what collaborative work can produce.

Recorded 6/13/20 via live stream on YouTube and Facebook.