Read reflections from Ryan Li Dahlstrom, Program Officer for the Fund for Trans Generations, and Julia Beatty, Program Officer for the Black-led Movement Fund and the Communities Transforming Policing Fund, on the Neighborhood Funders Group (NFG) 2018 National Convening, Raise Up: Moving Money for Justice.
In their blog posts, Ryan Li and Julia share insights from the convening, and how those learnings are impacting the way they think about their approach to grantmaking and philanthropy’s accountability to grassroots movements.
Read excerpts from their posts below, and visit the NFG site to read the full posts:
“The recognition of people’s multiple identities and centering of communities that are traditionally marginalized in philanthropy continued from the planning process into the convening. One highlight was how disability justice and accessibility were uplifted: at the opening of the convening, Sebastian Margaret, who served as an advisor to the conference to help ensure stronger accessibility within the space, provided a 10-minute overview of what disability justice is and why it matters, along with concrete ways that every participant could co-create an accessible space for people of all abilities. Making a space accessible means that more people can participate, and we have a more inclusive and democratic conference.” — Ryan Li Dahlstrom
Read Ryan Li’s full post, Bringing Our Whole Selves to Philanthropy and Our Grantmaking.
“We say knowledge is power, but that’s only true if we do something with that knowledge. The farther out we get from Ferguson, are we doing enough to support the people and organizations that have brought us this far? The Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity will share a report later this year showing that there were gains in funding for Black communities after Ferguson, the emergence of the Movement for Black Lives, and other movement activity in 2014. In fact, after almost a decade of relatively limited growth, giving to communities of color overall went up by 36% immediately after 2014—though this growth is uneven between communities of color. However, for these increases in funding to mean something, they must be not only sustained, but deepened. Funding for Black communities cannot just be a trend that we abandon.” — Julia Beatty
Read Julia Beatty’s full post, Answering the Call from Movement Leaders.