Rising Forward: Stories of Change

About Rising Forward: Stories of Change

Hosted by Shannon Sims, this podcast goes behind the headlines to explore the social entrepreneurs transforming Milwaukee and beyond. Shannon leverages her networks, resources and journalistic curiosity to uncover the stories of innovative changemakers who are building businesses that solve pressing community challenges. Each episode features authentic conversations with entrepreneurs who are rising from their communities, leaning into social concerns, and creating sustainable solutions that move Wisconsin forward — embodying our state's motto. From Milwaukee neighborhoods to communities across the region and eventually statewide, these are the stories of people who refuse to accept the status quo. Join Shannon as she discovers how business and social impact intersect to create lasting change.

Publisher

WUWM 89.7 FM - Milwaukee's NPR

Category

business

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

17 Mar 2026

Latest episode

29 Sept 2026

Latest episodes

16 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   29 Sept 2026

   Take What You Need

   Gina Sopa spent thirty-two years in the air, flying for Delta. When she came down to earth — retiring in 2020, in the middle of a pandemic, a few years after losing her husband — she didn't have a grocery background or a business plan. What she had was a habit of praying about what came next, and a conviction, built from years volunteering at food pantries and at Trickle B Cafe, that something was broken: good produce thrown in dumpsters, blocks from people who couldn't get to a grocery store. So on January 6, 2021, on a borrowed corner of Cloud Nine Workshop on North Avenue, she opened a folding table. The rule was simple: take what you need, pay what you can. Four years later, when that lease ended, the model found a second home at Concordia 27, near 27th and Wells — a stretch of Milwaukee where fresh food access has become hard to find. Milwaukee's county executive, mayor, and Near West Side Partners have all shown up to support it since. This conversation traces that arc — from a dumpster full of cauliflower, to a truck full of veggies that showed up the moment she ran out of produce, to her five-year vision of Greater Good(s) locations scattered across the city. It's a conversation about dignity, about a business that runs on faith and math at the same time, and about what it actually looks like to move Wisconsin forward — the state's own motto — one neighborhood at a time.

2. 

   22 Sept 2026

   Build the Table: What Five Women Taught Me This Season

   Five episodes into this stretch of the season, host Shannon Sims noticed something no single conversation could show her on its own: the same pattern, showing up in five completely different industries. A software founder. A real estate developer. A woman running five companies out of one purpose. A marketing consultant who helped build a statewide movement. A nonprofit director who'd spent twenty years learning the hard way what actually changes behavior around money. Every one of them had hit some version of a closed door — a boardroom, a zip code, a market that had written them off — and every one of them made the same first move: instead of asking for a seat, they built a new table. This episode is a pause, not a new interview. Shannon went into the season thinking she already knew the shape of this story — grit, hard work, somebody said no and they proved it wrong. That's not wrong, exactly. It's just not the whole story. What she actually found, laying these five conversations side by side, is that not one of these women stopped once she'd solved the problem for herself. Each one built something designed, from day one, to reach people she'd never met.

3. 

   15 Sept 2026

   Inside Uplifting Mansion

   Deanna Singh's father gave her one rule growing up: never measure your success by how well you're doing — measure it by how well the people around you are doing. She's spent her whole career trying to live up to that sentence, and along the way built not one business but five, all pointed at the same purpose: shifting power to marginalized communities. Her newest venture is the biggest test of that rule yet. Uplifting Mansion — an eight-thousand-square-foot, 125-year-old home on Milwaukee's west side — came into her life with, in her words, "total divine intervention": no business plan, no strategy, just a prayer about legacy and a listing her sister sent her. Then came the catch. The building's grand ballroom could only be reached by a staircase. Engineer after engineer told her a ramp wasn't possible in a building this old. She spent six figures and fought through more "no's" than most people could stomach until it was. A year in, Deanna says the thing she's proudest of isn't the building — it's what happens inside it. In a world she describes as full of "no after no after no," Uplifting Mansion is a place built to say yes.

4. 

   8 Sept 2026

   The Vessel: A Blueprint for Closing the Gap Between Zip Codes

   Two Milwaukee zip codes, a few minutes apart on the same freeway. One number between them: a twelve-year gap in life expectancy. That number is where Oby Nwabuzor's story turns — the moment a data analyst who'd loved basketball, lost the game to an injury, and found her way into public health decided she couldn't un-see what the numbers were telling her. Today she's the founder of Envision Growth, a Milwaukee development firm built on an idea most developers never consider: that real estate is a strategy to improve health outcomes. Her houses go up in the neighborhoods the market wrote off — homes that cost around a quarter-million dollars to build, sold to first-time buyers for roughly a hundred and five thousand, with mortgages lower than what many of her neighbors pay in rent. She's led more than four million dollars in development, and she's just getting started. But Oby will tell you this was never really about real estate. She calls herself a vessel — rooted in a Nigerian family line of hereditary chiefs, "stewards of the soil," tethered to the city that raised her. This is a conversation about who a building is really for, why growth doesn't have to mean displacement, and what it looks like to close a gap you can measure in years of a person's life — one block, one home, one set of keys at a time.

5. 

   1 Sept 2026

   Ahead of the Curve

   The B Side

6. 

   25 Aug 2026

   Jon Bishop: Microfinance & Patient Capital

   Jon Bishop wanted to be a biologist since he was nine years old — he spent his graduate years studying bees in the Alaskan backcountry, training to understand ecosystems well enough to protect them. Then he lived for a stretch in rural Panama, and watched farmers clear rainforest they didn't want to clear, just to grow enough corn to feed their families. That contradiction — protect the land, or feed your family became the question that eventually pulled him out of ecology and into finance. Today, Bishop is the founder and CEO of Envest Microfinance, a Madison-based fund that has spent twenty years lending capital into some of the smallest, hardest-to-fund microfinance institutions in the world — first across Latin America, and now in East Africa. His model leans on something most funds avoid: trusting local loan officers to make the calls he says he isn't equipped to make from thousands of miles away.

7. 

   18 Aug 2026

   Petals and Purpose: the B Side

   At nineteen years old, Steven Dyme was selling flowers out of a cart outside his own high school graduation — one year after he'd stood on that same stage and delivered the commencement speech. He didn't have a business plan. He didn't know anything about flowers. What he had was a friend with a truckload of surplus stems, a fanny pack full of cash, and an idea that would eventually turn into one of the first B Corps in the country. Today, Steven is the co-founder and CEO of Flowers for Dreams, a florist with locations in Chicago, Milwaukee and Detroit that's given away close to two million dollars to grassroots nonprofits since 2010. In this episode, host Shannon Sims traces how a summer hustle became a business built on a bar napkin — and what it actually took to turn "give away a quarter of everything we make" from a joke between friends into a permanent commitment. This episode is part of The B Side, Rising Forward's season-long look at Wisconsin's B Corp movement. For a primer on what a B Corp actually is and how certification works, check out our companion explainer episode, "The Whole Business."

8. 

   11 Aug 2026

   August 11, 2026

   August 11, 2026

9. 

   4 Aug 2026

   Season 2 Episode Compound: The Interest That Never Stops Paying Forward

   A phone call. Five overdraft fees. A five-dollar slice of pizza. That's the moment Brenda Campbell — executive director of Secure Futures — realized financial literacy was never really about knowledge. It's about access. For twenty years, Secure Futures has taught Wisconsin students the mechanics of money: debit cards vs. credit cards, compound interest, paying yourself first. But knowing the rules and actually using them turned out to be two very different things and the data proved it. So Brenda's team rebuilt the program around one-on-one mentoring instead of classroom lessons alone. Dejah Banister is what that rebuild looks like in practice. She signed up for Money Coach out of pure curiosity in high school. Today she's a homeowner, a landlord, and the person who broke a twenty-year silence around money in her own family. Now, she's teaching the same lessons to her students. Hosted by Shannon Sims Video & Audio Production: Dwight Cannon Audio Engineering & Video Editing: Story First Media Group Social Media: Brianna S. Rising Forward: Stories of Change is a weekly conversation with Wisconsin social entrepreneurs building businesses to solve real community problems.

10. 

    28 Jul 2026

    Building a Galaxy of Possibility: Nadiyah Johnson

    Nadiyah Johnson dreamed of being a CNN correspondent. Instead, she became one of the go to figures in Wisconsin's technology landscape. In this episode of Rising Forward: Stories of Change, host Shannon Sims sits down with the founder and CEO of Jet Constellations and its social-impact arm, the Milky Way Tech Hub. What starts as a story about frustration — walking into a Milwaukee tech room where no one looked like her — becomes a blueprint for how one person builds an entire ecosystem. Nadiyah opens up about the moment her pastor told her that anger can reveal purpose, the 26% calc exam that nearly ended her computer science career, and the decision to persevere instead of pivot. She explains why she built a software company instead of a nonprofit, how the Milky Way Tech Hub connects "the puzzle pieces" for founders who can't code, and one of the most impactful programs of her life: going inside a correctional facility to teach justice-involved individuals to build AI-assisted business plans weeks before their release. This is a conversation about taking up space, closing the wealth gap, and why — when you drill all the way down — this isn't just a Wisconsin story. It's a Sherman Park story. "Lean less into fear, and lean more into possibility." - Nadiyah Johnson

11. 

    21 Apr 2026

    Fruition MKE: Tiffany Miller chose to Bloom on Milwaukee's Near West side

    Some business origin stories start with a pitch deck. Tiffany Miller's started with a seed. A word written on a chalkboard in a Near West Side Milwaukee classroom. A flower made for her mother's 60th birthday. A neighborhood that deserved a coffee shop someone could walk to and one woman who decided she was going to build it. Tiffany Miller is the owner of Fruition MKE — a 4,000 square foot cafe, co-working space and makerspace on Milwaukee's 27th Street. But Fruition is more than a business. It's the manifestation of everything Tiffany has ever built — Fly Blooms, Live in Bloom, the Bronzeville Collective rooted in one belief: that joy is a business model. And that belonging has a return on investment. In this episode, Tiffany talks about building a community institution from the ground up, losing a business partner three weeks after opening, and the ancestors who showed up when things got hard — including a grandmother who ran a restaurant in Cotton Plant, Arkansas, until someone burned it down because she was doing too good. This one is for every entrepreneur who has ever talked themselves out of the thing they were built to do. "I am not a transactional cafe. I want to know what your favorite drink is." Rising Forward: Stories of Change tells stories of Wisconsin social entrepreneurs who build businesses that solve real problems in their communities. New episodes drop every Tuesday. Subscribe so you never miss one. Credits: Shannon Sims, host Bryce Richards, graphic designer/ grip Brianna Sitkowski, producer Junction Box Production, Dwight Cannon, audio editor/videographer LionArts Media, Laura Dyan Kezma, audio/video editor William Howell, photographer/ assistant editor Mic’d & Ready Media

12. 

    14 Apr 2026

    The Milwaukee movement changing how folks see food as medicine: Kathy Koshgarian

    What if the prescription your doctor handed you wasn't the only option? That question led Kathy Koshgarian to build something Milwaukee had never seen before. Today she leads Food for Health, Wisconsin's first and only accredited medically-tailored meal program, delivering real results in the communities that need it most. A 43% reduction in health care costs. Fifty percent fewer diabetic ER visits. A high-risk pregnancy that became a healthy delivery. And a movement that now has the attention of the entire state of Wisconsin. In this episode, host Shannon Sims sits down with Kathy to talk about the moment she knew she had to act, what it took to launch and grow during a global pandemic, and how two recent Wisconsin policy wins are putting food as medicine on the map for every zip code in the state. If you have ever wondered whether food could actually change your health outcomes, this conversation is for you. In this episode: What medically tailored meals actually are and why they work How Food for Health launched and grew during a pandemic The social enterprise model built for long-term sustainability Wisconsin's Medicaid breakthrough and the new state food as medicine director Advice for social entrepreneurs ready to move from idea to impact Credits: Shannon Sims, host Bryce Richards, graphic designer/ grip Brianna Sitkowski, producer Junction Box Production, Dwight Cannon, audio editor/videographer LionArts Media, Laura Dyan Kezma, audio/video editor William Howell, photographer/ assistant editor Mic’d & Ready Media

13. 

    7 Apr 2026

    He paid $1 for a lot nobody wanted, then he got to work: Derrick Cainion

    Derrick Cainion spent 20 years helping people understand each other as a sign language interpreter. Then COVID-19 hit, his son turned three, and a vacant lot on Milwaukee's north side sat waiting. This week on Rising Forward, Derrick walks us through what he built at 35th and Vliet — ART Intersection MKE (https://www.artintersectionmke.com/) — a living outdoor gallery where art, sustainability and community healing don't just coexist. They're the same thing. We talk about the night a street shut down for art instead of sirens. The mural of his mother watching over the neighborhood. A bio-swale that literally holds water for a community that's been drained. Solar panels that keep the lights on when the city goes dark. And international artists from Tunisia, Dubai and the UK — all landing on one lot in Washington Park. Derrick also gets into what it took to raise nearly a million dollars without being independently wealthy — and what funders actually responded to. If you've ever driven past a vacant lot and wondered what it could be — this episode is the answer. Credits: Shannon Sims, host Bryce Richards, graphic designer/ grip Brianna Sitkowski, producer Junction Box Production, Dwight Cannon, audio editor/videographer LionArts Media, Laura Dyan Kezma, audio/video editor William Howell, photographer/ assistant editor Mic’d & Ready Media

14. 

    31 Mar 2026

    Funding the dream, how mission-driven business actually get funded: Nina Johnson & Tony Shields

    There's money in Wisconsin right now looking for the right people to fund. Most social entrepreneurs don't know how to find it — or how to be ready when it finds them. In this episode, Shannon Sims sits down with Tony Shields, CEO of Wisconsin Philanthropy Network, and Nina Johnson, senior vice president at U.S. Bank, to break down exactly how mission-driven businesses get funded. They cover the full capital stack — from CRA investment and community development financial institutions to grant funding and impact investing. They talk about what separates the entrepreneurs who get funded from the ones who get delayed. And they share what the funder relationship actually looks like once you're in. This is the episode for the social entrepreneur who has the idea, believes in the mission, and is ready to stop waiting. What you'll hear: Why passion and preparation are not the same thing. How to stack CRA investment, foundation grants and CDFIs on a single project. What trust-based philanthropy looks like in practice and why it matters. Why Milwaukee is a destination city right now, and what that means for you. The one thing most entrepreneurs get wrong when they walk into a funder meeting. Credits: Shannon Sims, host Bryce Richards, graphic designer/ grip Brianna Sitkowski, producer Junction Box Production, Dwight Cannon, audio editor/videographer LionArts Media, Laura Dyan Kezma, audio/video editor William Howell, photographer/ assistant editor Mic’d & Ready Media

15. 

    24 Mar 2026

    Stephanie Melnick helping women entrepreneurs break barriers and make an impact

    Women are breaking barriers and rewriting the rules of entrepreneurship often in systems that weren’t built for them. Stephanie Melnick has been practicing law in Milwaukee for over 30 years. But in 2017, she realized her clients needed more than legal advice. They needed each other. So she founded She Stands Tall — a community for women entrepreneurs. Stephanie has highlighted dozens of women entrepreneurs and created events that teach marketing, brand protection, financial literacy and inspire the next generation of women leaders. In this episode of Rising Forward stories of change she shares what she’s learned about women building together instead of going it alone—and how that collective momentum is moving Wisconsin forward. Credits: Shannon Sims, host Bryce Richards, graphic designer/ grip Brianna Sitkowski, producer Junction Box Production, Dwight Cannon, audio editor/videographer LionArts Media, Laura Dyan Kezma, audio/video editor William Howell, photographer/ assistant editor Mic’d & Ready Media

16. 

    17 Mar 2026

    From 14 Moves to $1 Billion: Kevin Newell's Rising Forward Story

    Kevin Newell moved fourteen times before he went to college. Today, he's transforming that instability into solutions — as founder and CEO of Royal Capital Group, Newell has built a billion-dollar portfolio proving that the people who lived the problem are the ones who can solve it. From redeveloping Phillis Wheatley School — the grade school he once attended — to creating the Good Hope Library, to building ThriveOn King, a $105 million "lifestyle campus" in the heart of Bronzeville, Newell is rewriting what's possible. He's the first African American to build and own multi-family commercial properties in downtown Milwaukee and Madison, and the first to partner with an NBA team on a commercial entertainment district. Now he's taking the Wisconsin model to Fort Worth, Texas. In this inaugural episode of Rising Forward, Shannon Sims sits down with Newell to explore how his mother's sacrifice, his aunt and uncle's sanctuary, and even his biggest setbacks became the foundation for a new model of community-centered development. Credits: Shannon Sims, host LionArts Media, Laura Dyan Kezma, audio/video editor Dwight Cannon, Junction Box Production, assistant editor/videographer

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Contact Rising Forward: Stories of Change

Guest appearances

Books guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.