July 21, 2026

A Collective of Heroes

Matthew Rodreick

This past February, our founder, Marilyn Smith, spoke at our 20th Annual Symposium. During her talk she pushed back against a common refrain we hear too often in the SCI community: "If only Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk or some other famous billionaire were injured, then we’d get to a cure more quickly!"

Marilyn Smith, left, speaking at our 20th Annual Symposium this past February.

Marilyn emphasized that U2FP was founded upon the belief that all positive meaningful social historical change arises from the bottom up, not the top down. U2FP’s current staff and board continue to build upon that foundation. And we continue to grow, deepening our community connections and leveraging them to accelerate lasting change. 

Meanwhile, I am increasingly troubled by our over-reliance on the traditional narrative of a lone hero. We seem continually fixated on the singular protagonist in whom we imbue so much faith (of which the Bezos/Musk refrain is one version). 

We forget the everyday heroism of our own stories - both individually and collectively - that reflect the reality of Marilyn’s statement. So instead of taking action, we sit back and put too much of our faith in too few of our leaders.

U2FP attempts to lead by listening to the collective voices of our community and pushing for their priorities. We also recognize that we are part of a larger team of scientists, researchers, advocates, foundations, regulators, and industry representatives whose shared aim is to accelerate functional recovery therapies. And sure, we have leaders and followers. But sometimes the leaders follow and the followers lead. This is how effective teams work. 

A collective of heroes at our Capital Roll in Washington, D.C. this past February.

You are a significant part of this team. Which is why we are grateful for your ongoing support and engagement. You have helped us accomplish some great things this past year, as you will read in our Annual Report, which is out now and linked below. Thank you - everything U2FP has accomplished this past year is because of so many of you!

U2FP continues to play a significant role in facilitating emerging therapies, and that gives us some hope. But what treatments arise, how quickly and how meaningful they prove to be for everyone is still a team game. We need you to stay on the team, and help us continue to get more individuals off the sidelines and actively into the race.

Thank for all you do for this movement!
 

PS - We've recently launched a campaign to add 33 monthly donors in honor of the $33M we helped restore to the Federal Government's Spinal Cord Injury Research Program (which was eliminated at the beginning of 2025)! We've already added 3 new monthly donors - consider giving monthly to help us reach our goal.