Michelle Culver is the founder of the Rithm Project and has spent over two decades working at the intersection of education, leadership, and human flourishing. She began her career as a 5th-grade teacher in Compton before going on to shape Teach For America’s first national program and later serve as EVP of Regional Operations, leading 14 regions, 300 staff, and a $68M budget impacting more than 200,000 students.
She later founded Teach For America’s Reinvention Lab, an R&D hub rethinking how education systems serve young people. That work cemented her belief that students don’t thrive through tools or policy alone, but through meaningful community. The Rithm Project was born from that conviction, creating space for honest conversations about AI, values, and what it means to stay human in a rapidly changing world. Outside of work, Michelle and her husband, a Salesforce futurist, explore possible futures for their daughters and for the next generation.