About

Hi. I’m Evan.

Founder and CEO of Kredit Academy. Creator of The Life Credit Score. Co-founder of Black Men Talk Tech. Nine businesses in, and still the same argument: the number is not the person.

The record

Four thousand people watched five founders pitch. They voted for mine.

43North, Buffalo, November 2023. Five startups selected by the judges at a million dollars each. Then the room voted, and I took the People’s Choice and another twenty-five thousand. Kredit Academy moved to Buffalo the following year.

Before that, in 2019, Miami gave me a key to the city for community building. That was the year I co-founded the Black Men Talk Tech conference there, while running Kredit Academy.

Institutional partners

Equifax Foundation, on a city-wide credit score initiative. Edward Jones, Dade County Federal Credit Union, and Tech Knowledge, on a Miami savings match. M&T Bank, as 43North anchor partner.

In the trade press

I am a contributing author at CUInsight. If you work at a credit union, your team already reads me.

Bloomberg CUInsight AfroTech USC Annenberg Refresh Miami The Pitch Black Ambition 43North

The story

My credit score used to start with a four. I got a credit card at eighteen and used it the way an eighteen-year-old uses a credit card, and then I spent years paying for that in ways that had very little to do with money.

Before Kredit Academy there were eight other businesses. I built nine. Eight of them taught me what the ninth one needed to be.

There is a stretch of my life I describe as collections. Accounts I defaulted on that had nothing to do with money, and years of paying them back quietly. How much of it I tell depends on the room, but I do not pretend the season did not happen.

In 2019 Miami gave me a key to the city for community building, the year I co-founded the Black Men Talk Tech conference there while running Kredit Academy. Both of those came out of the same stretch. That is the argument, really: the season is not the story.

Today the score is in the 700s. Kredit Academy has raised over a million dollars, generated over a million, and grew four hundred percent in 2025. I tell you both halves on purpose. The first half is what makes the second half worth anything.

Currently

Running Kredit Academy from Buffalo with Mike Gross, my COO, head of education, and co-founder. We build financial literacy and credit access for financial institutions: Kredit Quest, The Kredit Card, and Kiddie Kredit.

Speaking to banks, credit unions, universities, and companies. Writing The Accountability Post.

Kredit Academy started as Kiddie Kredit. Earlier coverage uses that name; Kiddie Kredit is now one product inside the company.

The posture

What I believe.

Financial literacy without dignity is just financial shame in a nicer outfit.

A score is not a verdict. It is a mirror. The trick is choosing what you let it reflect.

Nobody changes because the truth was said loudly. They change because somebody went first.

Consistency, not intensity. It is slow, it is unflattering, and it is the only thing that compounds.

For organizers

Take what you need.

Three lengths of bio and a headshot. Copy the one that fits your program and do not wait on me for it.

Bio · 50 words

Evan Leaphart is the founder and CEO of Kredit Academy, a financial literacy and credit access company built for financial institutions, and the creator of The Life Credit Score. He won 43North’s one million dollar startup competition in 2023 and co-founded Black Men Talk Tech.

Bio · 100 words

Evan Leaphart is the founder and CEO of Kredit Academy, which builds financial literacy and credit access programs for banks, credit unions, and universities. He is the creator of The Life Credit Score, a framework that applies the logic of a credit report to how a person is actually living. He has built nine businesses. In November 2023 he won 43North’s startup competition in Buffalo, taking one million dollars from the judges and the People’s Choice award from a room of four thousand. He is a contributing author at CUInsight and a co-founder of Black Men Talk Tech, work for which Miami gave him a key to the city in 2019.

Bio · 200 words

Evan Leaphart is the founder and CEO of Kredit Academy, a company that builds financial literacy and credit access programs for financial institutions, and the creator of The Life Credit Score, a framework that takes the five factors behind a credit score and points them at how a person is actually living. Its products include Kredit Quest, The Kredit Card, and Kiddie Kredit, the children’s chore-tracking app the company was originally named for.

He has built nine businesses. His own credit score once started with a four. In November 2023 he won 43North’s startup competition in Buffalo, one of five founders selected for one million dollars each, and also took the People’s Choice award from an audience of four thousand. He relocated Kredit Academy to Buffalo the following year.

He received a key to the city of Miami in 2019 for community building, the year he co-founded the Black Men Talk Tech conference. He has partnered with the Equifax Foundation on a city-wide credit score initiative and with Edward Jones, Dade County Federal Credit Union, and Tech Knowledge on a Miami savings match. He is a contributing author at CUInsight and a co-founder of Black Men Talk Tech. He speaks to banks, credit unions, universities, HBCUs, and companies about money, dignity, and what a number is allowed to decide about a person.

Headshot.

Transparent PNG, 612 by 408. Fine for a web programme or an email. A print-resolution file is still worth having for anything that goes on paper.

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The number is not the person. The season is not the story.

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