Pioneering Ideas for An Equitable Future
What can we do today to create a healthier, more equitable tomorrow?
New technologies, scientific discoveries and cultural shifts are redefining our future. We work with pioneering scientists, anthropologists, engineers, artists, and other creative thinkers across the nation to help us explore and accelerate cutting edge ideas and emerging trends that could advance health equity. It is through their ingenuity that we will build a healthier future for all.
While we are always on the lookout for any pioneering ideas that could help us live our healthiest lives, we are particularly interested in learning how we can influence the future in these four areas:
- The Future of Food...where all have access to food that is healthier for our families, our workers, and our planet.
- The Future of Social Interaction...where we have found healthier ways to connect with one another, regardless of the beliefs we hold or the technologies we use.
- The Future of Work...where all jobs in every way possible, support our efforts to live our healthiest lives.
- The Future of Evidence...where trusted information is collected, shared, and used ethically and equitably to advance wellbeing.
The equitable future we all deserve won’t simply arrive—we must create it together.
Related Initiatives
We support unconventional approaches and breakthrough ideas that help anticipate, adapt to, and influence a future where everyone in the United States has the opportunity to live their healthiest life possible. The initiatives featured here are examples of projects that are pioneering in one or more ways.
Challenge Assumptions
Rather than leading to bad decisions, "crowdsourcing" can actually improve medical decisionmaking.
Upend the Status Quo
Gig work can be made more equitable with fair pay, stable hours, and safe working conditions.
Explore Emerging Trends
Could generative AI pomote collaboration, compassion, and other behaviors in online communities?
Expand Thinking
Often overlooked as a health issue, noise can trigger stress and heart-related conditions.
Offer New Perspectives
Nurses with a "maker" mindset are improving care at the bedside.
Ideas from Other Fields
Using Afrofuturism, high school kids are imagining a healthier future where Black and Brown people thrive.
Related Content
How the Future of Work May Impact Our Wellbeing
6-min read
How the Maker Movement is Innovating Healthcare
3-min read
Featured Resources
Hunches
A hunch is an inkling, a possibility, a sneaking suspicion about the future. We don’t often share our hunches, but when we do, amazing things can happen. Share yours!
What’s Next Health
Our publication explores a range of signals, emerging trends, and pioneering ideas that can help us all anticipate and influence a more equitable future.
Take Us to a Better Place: Stories
Using the power of fiction, this collection of 10 short stories published by RWJF helps readers imagine possible pathways to a Culture of Health.
5-min read