This week’s guest, Briana B. Franklin was the first member of her family to attend an Ivy League education. But after her first semester, she found herself struggling to find a career path and a financial plan that made sense. After school, loaded with debt, she struggled to find a fit in the traditional corporate model.

After years of trying to make it as an entrepreneur, Franklin had a revelation. In June 2020, after protests rocked the country calling for more racial equity, she decided to create a non-profit called The Prosp(A)rity Project whose goal is to pay off student loan debt for all black women. The hope is that this project would help to eliminate some of the disadvantages caused by systemic discrimination and the lower wages faced by the majority of black women in America.

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Transcript

Nikki Nolan: Welcome to the podcast. It is so good to have you here. Are you ready to get into it?

Briana B. Franklin: So ready.

Nikki Nolan: Alright. How much student debt do you have right now?

Briana B. Franklin: I graduated with $115k. Currently I have $109,000 in student loan debt.

Nikki Nolan: You’re actually chipping away at your debt.

Briana B. Franklin: Kind of. Courtesy of my dad, ’cause he’s been able to help for the last three years. But that kind of reaches an expiration point. So it now is all on my shoulders. So we’ll see how much more I can keep up. But yeah, comparatively having paid some of it down.

Nikki Nolan: So are your loans federal or are they private?

Briana B. Franklin: They’re a mix. The bulk of them are private. And then I would say about 30% to 35% are federal.

Nikki Nolan: Why did you decide to do federal versus private? Was there any decision-making in there?

Briana B. Franklin: There was no method to it at all. It was where I could find the funds because I was really misinformed and was frantic for being able to finance my education. So, whatever sources were willing to cover the bill, I was all over it.

Nikki Nolan: Do you know what your interest rates are?

Briana B. Franklin: Yeah, they are between 4% and 6%. So thankfully, because of the co-signer situation, that was able to keep them from being astronomical. But I think the highest that I’ve had one for It was 11% and I did actually end up paying it off. It was for like, just under a thousand bucks. Thankfully. It wasn’t that hard hitting in and of itself, but it certainly had potential to be.

Nikki Nolan: Eleven percent is significant. I don’t think people understand how it’s really, a lot of it, is the interest that is suffocating people.

Briana B. Franklin: Yes. Yeah, that is what’s getting people when they graduate. They’re astonished at the fact that even if they have been paying down, it’s not really making a dent because it just keeps filling back up past what they can afford because of interest alone.

Black women borrow the most at an average of about $33k and there’s one statistic that said that 12 years after graduating black women owed 13% more, whereas their white male counterparts had paid off 44%. So it’s like if they start at the same debt amount, like white men owe 44% less, black women actually owe more which is completely the by-product of interest rates. But also, being underpaid.

So it’s like they owe the most and they have the least means to pay it off. And so they spend longer. And the average lifetime network for black women as a result is between zero to $11,000. And that’s segmented by decade. So it’s like for their twenties at zero and then scaling all the way to $11k by the time that they should be thinking about retiring if they haven’t yet already. And that to me was really eye-opening because I’m like, you know, for all the people out here who just want to be so dismissive and say, Oh, just pay it off. There are women who spend their entire lives trying literally.

Nikki Nolan: It’s so ridiculous. That statement, the pull yourself up from your bootstraps does not take into account the system that has been set up to make sure certain people do not get ahead.

Briana B. Franklin: Yeah, that’s exactly it. A lot of people say this just can’t be right, the system’s broken. I think it has been done very intentionally, especially in this country. And I think that the gatekeepers and that certain percent of folks who like perpetually reside at the top, quote unquote, a lot of things are by design. And I feel it’s just not a coincidence that certain populations tend to get out unscathed while others are setback for decades because of going the same route in theory.

Nikki Nolan: It’s so wild. What has been the impact? Of student debt on your life.

Briana B. Franklin: Unfortunately I would say for the most part, it has been a net negative. It’s just been really tough to battle because it’s affected me in so many ways. It’s not purely financial. It spills very much over into my personal life and even, you know, familial and close relationships.

It’s affected me professionally. I tried to go the entrepreneurship route a couple of years ago and I ended up having to basically press pause and walk away just because entrepreneurship is very fickle and at least in the beginning, in most cases, very financially unstable. So yeah, it just put me in a really disadvantaged position because I was constantly having to make every decision based on my student debt. I feel like it truly has ruled my life for the last four years since I’ve graduated.

Nikki Nolan: It’s also projected you into what you’re doing right now?

Briana B. Franklin: So, yeah. I am currently President and CEO of The Prosp(a)rity Project, which is a nonprofit and we focus on empowering black women and girls specifically in the areas of financial, professional, and holistic wellbeing. So we’re doing that through our signature program, which is our economic empowerment initiative.

And that consists of awarding 100% student debt relief along with personalized financial coaching and a career accelerator to our Prosparettes, which are our beneficiaries. So, It’s been really fulfilling to see it come full circle and be able to lean on these years of setback and adversity and be able to create infrastructure that addresses it systemically.

Nikki Nolan: How would people find out more about this project?

Briana B. Franklin: We’re very active across the web. So we have our main social media presence on Instagram at @theprosparityproject. Prosp[a]rity spelled with an ‘a,’ because it’s a combination of the word prosperity and parity, which is a synonym for equity and equality. So, you know, there’s our social platforms and, let’s see, @prosparity_proj on Twitter.

We’re highly active also on LinkedIn. We have a Facebook, but it’s more of a formality. And then certainly our website is theprosparityproject.org. And, that’s the bulk of our online presence for the time being with a couple more channels, hopefully to be rolled out in the next couple of weeks.

Nikki Nolan: Something that’s really interesting to me is you have all this student debt and yet you’re helping people with student debt. I’m really curious about what’s happening with you internally?

Briana B. Franklin: Yeah. So I think that it’s what’s keeping me hungry. Because I think that if I didn’t have this, then I would lose touch. And obviously there are some ways that this will always stick with me. I certainly think that it is very equalizing. I think a lot of people assume that I personally had cleared my student loans because they’re like, no way could you start something like this.

So people have the misconception that I waited until getting student debt-free to start this. I am still very much in the thick of that struggle. It is very Interesting because we’ll be one minute creating content that talks about various issues of the crisis. And then I get an email from Sallie Mae about an interest rate update. It’s, it’s just all feeding into a cycle. And I think it’s interesting that I am in this really unique and almost ironic position.

But yeah, I’m just trying to use it as more fuel to keep digging deeper. When I get those emails that pissed me off and make me want to throw my phone, I’m just like, all right, I’m going to manifest that into a new development for the program. Or channel that energy into a positive outlet. And that just makes me more steadfast in this journey to erase the crisis.

Nikki Nolan: I would love to learn more about your story.

Briana B. Franklin: I first knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur around the age of eight. So in elementary school, that was when the seed was first planted. But then as I got older and went more through school, I completely got away from that. It just kind of fell off my radar. But then in college, I went to Dartmouth. Which being from Atlanta and also first generation Ivy league, it was a drastic learning curve. So basically the plan that I had conceived for myself got ripped to shreds after just my first term alone.

And so after freshman year, I went back to the drawing board to figure out like, okay, if I’m going to cut it at this institution, I need to reconfigure my major plan. So I decided I’ll study English because I knew I had a strong background as a writer, communicator, someone who’s just always been really artful with words.

At the same time though, the entrepreneurship bug. I don’t know what exactly triggered it, but I started thinking of all these visions and ideas of being able to start a business that revolved around black women specifically. And I ran that actually by my close relative and the reaction was, the market’s not big enough for that. That’s admirable, but there’s not a big enough market and I don’t think you’re going to do very well in business going that route. It has to appeal to all women.

And so, I didn’t think to challenge it for one second though. I was just like, man, that’s really disappointing to hear, but I guess, you know, looking at the population, the numbers support that. So I just meandered through the rest of college, still wanting to explore entrepreneurship and not really knowing how so I finished. And then I graduated actually a term early in spring, 2017. nAnd I moved back to Atlanta, which is home for me. From there it was just like, okay, now what happens? Because I didn’t go the traditional recruitment route that a lot of my peers did, of going into management consulting, investment banking.

So it was really on me to figure out like from scratch. My first job was with a small PR firm and ended up being an incredibly toxic workplace so instead of renewing, I ran like the wind when it was up. But I didn’t have a backup plan. I know that I don’t need to stay there, but I don’t know where else to go from here.

I tapped for the first time into my alumni networks and also registered with a temp agency. And then I did a stint for a consulting firm for like six or so weeks. And then basically all of 2018 was just trial and error. So, long story short, couldn’t find stable, well-paying work to save my life. And I decided at the end of that year, I would try my luck with entrepreneurship.

And so I started my first venture. The English Major Takes Tech, which was geared towards communications for small to mid-sized tech companies. And that was when I first got the interest to move to the Bay Area. ‘Cause I was like, I know that Atlanta has its own blossoming ecosystem, but no one can do it like Silicon Valley.

So I really spent all of 2019 getting intentional and just really focused and zeroed in on what exactly I wanted to do. I pivoted into the fitness sphere at the second half of the year, just because, you know, like I mentioned, entrepreneurship as a startup is only so sustainable. So I ended up taking part-time jobs. I transferred to the Bay and stayed with a family friend in San Francisco proper. And then for the first two months of that year, it was, like day-in, day-out, go to work and just kind of give some general thought to other things I wanted to do.

But, I moved to where I am now, which is East Palo Alto, so South Bay, and it was like the tail end of February, like just in the nick of time before the P-word hit. And I actually was trying to transfer a second time but the day I was supposed to have my interview was when quarantine was announced. Well, clearly that road has run out and I had to just go back to the drawing board yet again.

Those first couple months were just like waffling, trying to go the blog route, trying to do the whole personal brand thing. I started, you know, my website, I called it Just Be Frank, which is a play on my name, of course. And I was trying to resurrect TMTT, but I realized that this might be beating a dead horse. I just don’t know that there’s really anything to get out of this anymore.

So it just was by the grace of God that June happened the way it did. I- a long time idol of mine at the time, she’s an influencer who started in fitness and then moved more into the digital branding space, and she was like, I’m looking to diversify my teams and bring on more black female talent. And having looked up to her for like 10 years at that point, I was like, Oh my gosh, this would be such a dream. So I shot my shot and I DMed her and she responded almost immediately. And she was like, send him, you know- look at your resume. And yeah we’ll definitely check it out.

That ended up being lip service, but I didn’t know it was at the time. So I was putting together a presentation to really knock her off her feet and no way that she would turn me down. But that involved a survey and in that data collection process, I was getting demographics – financially, professionally, in the sense of health and wellness, just general wellbeing. And when those data points started rolling in, I was like, Oh my gosh. we need to just take a moment of silence for all the black women who are really bearing the brunt and just in the worst positions in all categories. So I realized, okay, this needs to be its own independent venture.

And it was really tough because I was like, well, maybe if she does hire me, I can do this part-time but I was like, no, I need to stand up for my community. I need to lead the way and, yeah, within a matter of days, I put The Prosp(a)rity Project name to it. And within the first week, I think we had built out like our founding team.

Maybe it was a couple of weeks. But then by Juneteenth we had launched our first initiative, which was the EEI. So it was just like rapid-fire growth. And haven’t really been able to look back since .

Nikki Nolan: What a wild ride it sounds like you found that power within yourself, to push yourself, did I read that right?

Briana B. Franklin: I would definitely say so. It was a moment of empowerment because especially majoring in English- I actually was just talking to someone an hour ago. She’s a senior at Dartmouth and she was just like, I majored in sociology and people expect me to cower when they ask, what are you going to do with that? And she’s like, I chose it because I like it. And because I really feel this is where my impact potential lies. And I’m like, good on you for just being able to claim that because I played the game of appeasement. People would ask me and they’d be like, oh, so do you want to teach English?

You’re going to be a kindergarten teacher. Is that the game plan? And it’s like, most respectfully, no, it’s not. And it’s no shade to teachers. I come from a long line of educators on both sides of my family and I have nothing but respect for people that are in that profession. It’s not that I’m looking down on it in any way. It’s just, no, that is not the path that I was meant to take. But just because of those comments, I was like, well maybe that is my place in life. So I actually did attempt to move to China. This was like around that same time of starting TMTT at the end of 2018, my partner and I both decided to move to China to teach English and the program ended up being a scam.

So we came back after a month. It was such a mess. It was just like the most poorly-organized thing. And in retrospect, yeah. we should have known better from the beginning, but we both felt like there weren’t any better job prospects on the table at that point. And also, feeding into that whole rhetoric, aren’t you going to teach English? So I was like, well, it is what everyone expects of me. I guess I may as well.

But no, it’s like this whole journey has just been about finding my own voice and being empowered and just being able to define success on my own terms and not use the mainstream societal benchmarks for it.

Nikki Nolan: What are some of the tactics that you have found to be really beneficial for breaking through?

Briana B. Franklin: Yeah, that came down to just getting clear with what I wanted out of life, because, you know, it really had just been a game of survival for like my first year and a half after graduating. And I was just really, I didn’t have the luxury of being able to, like, sit and reflect. ‘Cause it was just like, I need to be focused on making money, making these student debt payments, keeping everything afloat. But once things did level out for a small bit in 2019 .

And when I say level out, I mean, like I just made peace with going late on my student debt payments because I felt, they’re so crushing and they’re robbing me of the joys in life. I did take some time and I read a lot of books and just turned to a lot of resources, podcasts, you know, just wherever I could get knowledge and new information and just hit reset. Because I had to do a lot of unlearning and just strip away limiting beliefs and false narratives, and just projections of what other people wanted for me or thought was in my best interest, even if it went up against what I truly wanted.

So there’s this book called So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport, which is just honestly like, you know, a Bible of mine. I think that it is so critical because it talks about why ‘follow your passion’ just doesn’t really check out. Because it’s like a good idea and it’s a good thought, but in practice it’s bad advice. And that’s because you have to be able to back up that passion with talent and do it again, and have it be perceived as unique and valuable and rare. So just really turning to the right sources of knowledge and then becoming a minimalist.

That was a great reset because it allowed me to part ways with distractions and both physical, mental and digital clutter that was clouding my judgment and driving my focus to the wrong areas. So once it just became me, myself and I, and just like, okay, where do I fit in? What is my purpose? What do I feel I’m truly meant to do on this earth? And what impact do I feel I’m meant to make for others? And my personal philosophy is, do everything you can with everything available to you, to the best of your ability. And so just adapting that and living it out every day.

Nikki Nolan: Is there anything that we didn’t touch upon that you sort of want to talk about?

Briana B. Franklin: I think, yeah, for the most part, the statistics are a big focal point of mine. But I guess just like general attitudes. I’m seeing like, just that student loan debt is something that’s highly polarizing because I think that there are people who, whether they are impacted by it directly or not, they still get the importance and they still are empathetic to it.

And although, I will say, I think that the most empathy truly comes from people who have been in that boat, because I haven’t met anyone as passionate about this crisis as those that have been affected by it. Also, there’s that camp that is just like, suck it up. You took out the loans. The haters and the naysayers, I guess, of the bunch.

And, it’s really important that people, if they do share that second view, challenge themselves to be more open-minded, and more outcome-based in their thinking because a lot of what you get from a college degree nowadays, you can find those courses online through those institutions. I know Harvard has made several of them free.

Nikki Nolan: Yeah.

Briana B. Franklin: You don’t have to be, even be a student. Like you can get them for free: the material, the coursework, everything. There’s companies like Google that are now making a dent in the space through their six month career certificates. And it’s like, you know, not even a full year. It’s just under $300.

And the education you get in their eyes is equivalent to a four year degree from an accredited institution. And they go the extra mile to match graduates or those who complete the program, whatever the term is for them, with opportunities like in that field, in the company, or even at their partner companies like best buy. And some others were in that network.

So I mean, just the fact that they figured it out and the fact that they were able to put together a model that is disrupting traditional education. I just think it’s going to be important that people allow themselves to be open to alternatives because a large reason for why we continue to be in this major issue is the pressure that students feel. Like I personally – so there was like a familiar situation that actually happened my sophomore year of college that ended up requiring me to take out tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt and end up with that, that six-figure number at the end.

And, I remember doing the math on that and being like, hell no, like there’s no way. Like, no. I can’t afford to stay here, literally. But I had all this pressure, like from family, people texting me. ‘I hear you’re considering not going back to school. Like whatever you need to do, like, no matter the cost, it’s going to be worth it and you need to get that education.’

And I just remember like, feeling like that just doesn’t feel right. And it goes against everything. And I feel like it flies in the face of good financial sense. But I was terrified of going another route because I was like, number one, I might get disowned. But two, there’s no other path that’s as certain as a four year degree in most cases. And to young people, because people might know that it’s not for them, but they’re like, I don’t know what else I could turn to. I don’t know what other option there is other than just picking up a job and just working.

That’s the two things that our organization and our values push, is outcome-based thinking and generosity.

We’re calling it generational generosity because a lot of people can’t get past the idea of wiping out someone else’s burden because they’re like, well you make them think that they can just get a handout in life and they don’t have to work for anything. I’m like, no, all our Prosparettes know that to whom much is given, much is expected.

So it’s like we do that and we don’t ask them for a thing in return except that they pay it forward. They have the choice to do that though. We don’t demand. Now you must sponsor a Prosparette, like that’s one option. But also you can mentor a Prosparette or you can volunteer with our organization because it’s ultimately about us giving them the resources and the foundation to broaden their impact and touch more people.

I challenge people who say that. Think of anyone who’s been impactful in your life, whether it was a surgery that saved your life, whether it was a teacher that really inspired you at a young age, whomever it was. And imagine if they couldn’t do that because they were drowning in debt and they were like, I can’t get into my field of interest or I can’t do the things I really want to help others because I have tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars that I just can’t get rid of. So I feel like when we reframe it like that, it does make people more open to it. Which you know, is encouraging, but I think that has to be scaled tremendously for us to begin to even make the slightest dent.

Nikki Nolan: The thing is, is that if you can separate out like the debt you accrue and like the college experience, which is impossible to do, but college itself may fundamentally be worth it, but the debt is not worth it.

Briana B. Franklin: Right. Exactly. It’s like, you have to be able to divorce the two to just use common sense, like, get any experience being on campus. Like sure, that’s fun. And it might be considered character building, but if it’s at your own expense and if- you know, talking to that current senior this morning was just really great perspective and just a great reminder of what it’s like to be in those years, because she was like, I’m really nervous about transitioning into the workforce.

And I’m really scared just honestly, about, you know, having that safety net completely eliminated. And a lot of people use school as a remedy for that, because they’ll accrue more debt. They’re like, I’ll just go get another degree to buy time, but it’s like, you can’t stay in college forever. Like you can’t just perpetually be getting a degree because- you have to get out and live eventually and you have to do something with that.

I feel like it’s also really telling that majors are really obsolete at the end of the day. Like how people major in something, and then they end up taking on a completely different profession. And it’s like, you pay all this money for something to just be negligible and a formality. That’s just doing it wrong. That doesn’t make any sense. That’s not an investment in any sense, because as you’re doing it really just to check a box, and I feel really strongly about it. I’m like, I would go so far as to say, if my children end up in the position that I am in, it will be because I was a bad parent. And I’m gonna just leave it at that.

‘Cause I’m like, I see what it can do and how it can hold people back. And I- it really fires me up because there’s so many feelings that I have, but, yeah. It’s just, it’s irresponsible at a certain point to subject someone to that and put pressure on them to go that route and not really consider the realm of consequences that come as a result.

Nikki Nolan: Yeah. Especially if your parents aren’t paying for it, really their information which, you know, parents are so fallible and it’s so hard to understand that, especially when you’re like young and in high school thinking they maybe have the information that you lack because they’re older and they’re people that are close to you. But, it really seems like we need to focus on parental education in this country, which I’m sure they don’t want people to do, because it would mean that there’s less money going to the banks.

Briana B. Franklin: Yeah, it would. And I can’t wait to see them crumble honestly, because I’ve realized that there are industries devoted to keeping people in student loan debt because they underwrite it and they make a crap ton of money off the interest. And, you know, it funds their salaries if they’re affiliated with the school. So it’s been really interesting to see how people are like quaking at the thought that we’re out here doing the work we are. And they’re just like, wait, so you eliminate all of the debt? Like yes we do. And we don’t apologize for it.

Nikki Nolan: What advice would you give your younger self, knowing what you know now?

Briana B. Franklin: I think about that quite a bit, because I’m like, man, there’s just so many things that I felt like I had to do when I was younger. I was very much a people pleaser, typical type of goody-two-shoes. So, I was really just concerned with appeasement and doing what was expected of me. So I think the first piece of advice was get out of that mindset and like, focus on what you truly want to get out of life. And don’t let other people cloud your judgment. You know, be more confident and willing to stand your ground. That might be perceived as controversial or unconventional, whatever people want to call it. But yeah, just being willing to take a stand and go against the grain and know that it will be okay. And that there are people who do think like you, you just have to give yourself enough time to go along that journey to meet them.

Nikki Nolan: Is there anything that you want to pitch ?

Briana B. Franklin: So I know you mentioned that the last episode Prosp[a]rity was pitched. I will say that one certainly, but, there’s so many other adjacent initiatives that are focused on educating people on the crisis. There’s so many, it’s really hard to name.

Just one, I guess, perhaps Goodly. So, yeah, Goodly from what I understand, works with different employers to make student debt relief a benefit, like in the way that vacation or sick leave or paid leave, you know- just basically making it so that companies can have an easier time of eliminating their employee, student loan debt.

Nikki Nolan: So if people would like to contribute to your project, is there any way that they can do that?

Briana B. Franklin: They can. So they can go to our website and for February, we actually are doing a fundraising campaign. So, just trying to, you know, make a dent in our efforts to award student debt relief to our Prosparettes ASAP. So, yes, just go to the prosparityproject.org/donations and you’ll find all the information there to make a contribution if able .

Nikki Nolan: That’s awesome. Okay. Well, thank you so much for being on the show. It was so wonderful talking with you today.

Briana B. Franklin: Oh my gosh. I appreciate you making time and space in the schedule for this.

Nikki Nolan: Matter of Life and Debt is produced by me Nikki Nolan.

Special thanks to Efe Akmen for creating the music and mastering the audio.

Additional support and thanks to Sarah Thibault  who writes the information and transcripts about each episode.

This podcast would not have been possible without them.

Visit our website for more information matteroflifeanddebt.com, where you can listen, read transcripts, get additional context of the subjects you just heard about, and subscribe- absolutely for free. That website again, matteroflifeanddebt.com. Thanks again for listening.

 

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