David and Mikel Blake were both raised in small-town Utah to families dedicated to service and education. The daughter of a public-school teacher, Mikel began setting her career goals in middle school. For David, it was the pre-college ACT test that ignited his obsession with improving American education – not by rewriting a test, but by taking on the educational system itself. Mikel and David met in a college economics class, fell in love and soon married and started a family, moving from Utah to Texas and eventually to San Francisco to pursue their shared goal of changing the world for the better. 

With a few thousand dollars in savings, in 2012 they each undertook big endeavors: David cofounded Degreed, a learning platform designed to help people build job skills and certify their expertise throughout their lives and careers. While David worked long hours at Degreed, Mikel taught herself computer programming and now works as a software developer at Degreed. 

Degreed is now a global company with millions of users and David is a leader on the future of education and the future of work. David and Mikel Blake’s commitment to positive, systems-level change has moved from the future of education and work to an even bigger state: the future of American democracy itself. David and Mikel cofounded vice.run, an effort to reclaim Americans’ right to a democratically elected vice president. Today, David and Mikel live in San Francisco, with their three children.