On a summer morning in July 2025, floodwaters swept through Burnet and Llano counties in Central Texas, turning quiet roads into rivers. Homes were lost. Families displaced. Older adults had to be rescued from a HUD apartment complex. An RV park was destroyed. Over the chaotic weeks that followed, Community Resource Centers of Texas, working with the Texas Housing Foundation, mobilized to help people find more stable housing, rebuild connections, and restore a sense of hope.

Our guest for this episode is Dawn Capra of Community Resource Centers of Texas, an organization that provides essential services and disaster relief in rural Central Texas communities. Though Dawn may not use the phrase mutual aid to describe her work, the organization’s story perfectly captures the spirit of community solidarity that mutual aid represents.

Related Links:

• Climate Anxiety and Young People
• Southern Smoke: Mental Health in the Restaurant Industry
• Relieving Holiday Stress and Hurricane Trauma

All across Texas, people are showing that you don’t have to wait for change from the top down — you can build it from the ground up. And when local efforts succeed, they don’t just transform a workplace, a neighborhood, a classroom — they offer a template for reimagining the system itself.

In this episode Larissa Minner, an expert on disability research and universal design, joins us for an exploration of how small-scale changes to everyday practice can catalyze deeper change not only to lives, but to systems.

Related Links:

• Designing for Mental Health
• Shared Inquiry: A Better Way to Learn
• Community-Based Participatory Research

Every system of care — whether it’s education, health, or justice — is built on trust. Trust that when we reach out for help, we’ll be treated with respect and fairness. But for too many Texans, that hasn’t always been the case.

People with disabilities and those living in poverty have too often been left out or let down by systems that were meant to support them. Just as obviously, there are people working to change that — to repair relationships, rebuild credibility, and make care systems worthy of the people they serve. Andrew Hairston, Education Justice Director at Texas Appleseed, and Yulissa Chavez, Public Policy Specialist Fellow with the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities, join us to take a hard look at what it means to confront inadequacies and repair harm within the very systems designed to help us.

Related Links:

• Building Access with Intention: Reflecting on National Disability Employment Awareness Month

• Public Policy for Building a Resilient Future

• Mind of Texas: Mental Health in Texas Public Schools

Today’s episode was recorded as part of the Robert Lee Sutherland Seminar, an event the Hogg Foundation hosts every two years to explore urgent issues in mental health and well-being. This year’s seminar included a screening of Humanly Possible, a new documentary produced with support from the Hogg Foundation. The film shares deeply personal stories of substance use recovery. In this episode, we go behind the scenes of the film and talk about why recovery stories matter—for individuals, for families, and for the systems that shape our communities. Our two guests are Jason Howell, CEO of RecoveryPeople, and John McIver, editor of Humanly Possible.

Related Links:

• From Struggle to Strength: Exploring Journeys to Recovery
• Rhythms of Resilience: An Early Look at the Robert Lee Sutherland Seminar

Since 1978, The Hogg Foundation’s biennial Robert Lee Sutherland Seminar (RLS) has been held to increase awareness about mental health concepts such as recovery, integrated health, and barriers to well-being. This year’s event offers a chance for Texans to promote innovation and collaboration among mental health care providers, advocates, consumers, and their families. Taking place September 8 & 9, in San Antonio, it will feature a keynote experience unlike any other—a powerful blend of rhythm, connection, and healing led by Grammy Award–winning percussionist Nina Rodriguez.

The theme for RLS 2025, Growing Together: Building Capacity for Collective Wellness, invites participants to explore what it truly means to build capacity through connecting. Joining Nina in conversation on the Into the Fold podcast is Dr. Kelley Glover, postdoctoral research fellow at the Hogg Foundation and a lifelong music educator.

Related Links:

• Robert Lee Sutherland Seminar 2025
• Mental Health and the Musician's Life
• 2019 Robert Lee Sutherland Seminar: Working Together for Rural Well-Being

When it comes to supporting rural communities, especially around mental health, success often starts not with answers, but with questions—and a deep commitment to listening.

In our latest episode of Into the Fold, host Ike Evans speaks with Tammy Heinz, senior program officer and consumer and family liaison at the Hogg Foundation, Rick Ybarra, senior program officer at the Hogg Foundation, Brian Dabson, rural policy analyst and researcher, and Allen Smart, advisor to philanthropy and nonprofits and Hogg Foundation National Advisory Council member. Together, they reflect on years of work in rural communities across Texas and beyond, revealing key lessons for philanthropic funders who want to make a meaningful, sustainable difference.

Related Links:

• Strengthening the Mental Health of Rural and Rural Border Communities

• Transforming Community Through Collaboration

• Hogg Foundation to Award $3.75 Million in Grants to Strengthen the Mental Health of Rural and Rural Border Communities
• Funding Mental Health: Inovations and Opportunities
• Reflections from the Working Together for Rural Well-Being Seminar

In this timely and heartfelt episode of Into the Fold, co-hosts Vicky Coffee and Ike Evans sit down with Shawn Kent, therapist and director at the Amala Foundation, to explore the mental health challenges—and sources of resilience—facing youth in today’s rapidly shifting world. Together, they unpack the pressures of social media, family stress, school systems, and the profound need for belonging and connection. Shawn offers insights drawn from his work with youth, especially young men, and shares how programs like peer mentorship, creative expression, and third spaces can foster healing and growth.

This conversation is a call to rethink how we design environments—at home, in school, and across society—to better support youth and families. Whether you're a parent, educator, or community member, you’ll come away with ideas and inspiration for helping the next generation thrive.

Related Links:

• Amala Foundation
• Into the Fold: Digital Well-being for Youth

Today’s conversation is about the promises—and the pitfalls—of technology. Specifically, we’re exploring how artificial intelligence is reshaping mental health care and what it means for equity, access, and privacy. While AI has the potential to increase access to mental health tools and improve outcomes, it also raises urgent ethical questions: Who is being left out? Who has control over their data? And how do we ensure that innovation doesn’t deepen existing disparities?

To help us make sense of it all, we're joined by Kenneth Fleischmann, professor at the UT Austin School of Information, where he studies the ethical and societal implications of emerging technologies.

Related Links:

• Ethical AI
• Good Systems
• University of Texas at Austin Undergraduate Informatics Program
• University of Texas at Austin Master of Science in A.I.
• Into the Fold: Digital Well-being for Youth