Addressing injustices in our giving circles and in our communities is complex, challenging, yet necessary work — and we need each other to keep learning and growing, wherever we are in our journeys.
The Equity and Justice in Collective Giving Webinar Series offers monthly content to explore themes that deepen our field’s shared commitment to equity.
Democracy is not limited to political parties and voting. Together, we’ll collectively deepen our understanding of democracy and seek to answer the questions: What is democracy? and how can collective giving groups engage more intentionally a democratic process?
In part one of our Democracy season, we will ground ourselves in democracy. Participants can expect to learn and explore:
• Collective giving’s impact on democracy
• The intersection of philanthropy and democracy
• Cultivating advocacy skills to create change
Activate your collective giving group and join us!
Want to dig deeper with a smaller community? In addition to our monthly public Equity and Justice in Collective Giving webinars, we offer a closed Community of Practice discussion space for those seeking to dig deeper into the material and connect with those also working to further align themselves with equity and justice. We ask that those who sign up commit to attending at least 2 of the 3 60-minute discussions so we can build strong relationships. Sign up here by Friday, September 29.
September 27 at 3:30 ET / 12:30 PT (90 minutes)
Shari Davis, Participatory Budgeting Project, and Sudha Nandagopal, Social Venture Partners International
October 25 at 3:30 ET / 12:30 PT (90 minutes)
Haley Bash, Donor Organizing Hub, and Kyson Bunthuwong, Fundraising Consultant
Money is power, it’s a cliche for a reason. Join us as Kyson Bunthuwong, Fundraising Consultant and Former Development and Partnerships Director at Philanthropy Together, and Haley Bash, Founder and Executive Director of Donor Organizing Hub, answer the following questions about democracy and philanthropy:
Note: This Webinar will focus on the United States
How can you use your voice to be heard in the democratic process? What does it mean to share your thoughts with local community and elected officials to change hearts and minds? In this session, participants will learn the ins and outs of building community power and how writing can be a tool for advocacy. Join us as Ashlei Spivey-Arthur, Executive Director of I Be Black Girl, shares her expertise on advocacy.
Participants can expect to learn practices for writing op-eds, drafting legislative testimony, and the importance of building community power.
I Be Black Girl is a reproductive justice organization that leads with boldness, innovation and inspiration, actively creating a radical change-making culture that centers Black women, femmes and girls. Inspired by the work of bell hooks, Audre Lorde and other Black feminist and womanist, our organization provides transformational change at the intersections of gender and race.
Note: While this webinar is being presented from a US context, the skills learned can be applied beyond the US.
Democracy is so much more than voting. In this session, join Melissa Walker, Head of Giving Circles at The States Project, as we discuss how to really make your power known and voice heard by your local government. Together, we’ll explore:
The States Project connects the importance of state legislatures to every aspect of our lives and brings together communities to help build a healthy, sustainable, and prosperous future for all. They believe state legislatures are the strongest force for change in our communities.
Please complete the following form to register for one (or more!) of our upcoming webinars this season.
In this session, we’ll explore how we face and accept our bright and shadow sides more fully, more deeply and more honestly, as many of us have been harmed and have caused harm. We challenge ourselves into more wholeness by facing our grief and pain so that we may minimize hurting our pain unconsciously toward others.
We’ll each reflect on where we each are on the 12 dimensions of love, distinguish between ways to self-sooth and radically self-love as a rigorous and demanding constant practice, and explore how setting firm and clear boundaries is a practice that enables each of us to love ourselves and love each other in community.
The emphasis is on positive actions that we can do to ready ourselves and then practice love+power to bring more harmony to our own healing journey.
Join facilitator and community builder Nafasi Ferrell as we dig into the relationship between money, healing, and racial and economic equity. In this engaging session Nafasi will guide us through reflections on healing and using our giving as a tool for transformation and social justice. Come ready to reflect and begin to build a healing practice centered on your collective giving.
Nafasi is the founder Narratives Unbound LLC, a Consulting and Education Company dedicated to advancing racial and economic equity through financial coaching, community workshops and wealth redistribution. Additionally she is a Financial Coach certified in the Trauma of Money Method (TOM) where she proudly serves on faculty as a Racial Wealth Gap Educator and facilitator of Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) Affinity Spaces.
In this session, members of the Kindle Project Indigenous Women’s Flow Fund (IWFF) will share their experience within the participatory grantmaking/flow funding space. Through collective conversations, they will explore how participatory grantmaking models can be a site of empowerment, healing, and community-building. Join us as we learn from their wisdom of building and practicing decolonized people-powered giving models.
IWFF is an Indigenous-led grantmaking program that nourishes community-sourced initiatives and offers solutions and alternatives to systems in crisis. Grounded in trust-based philanthropic approaches, IWFF brings together five Indigenous women from across the United States, for a three-year period, to be decision-makers over grantmaking dollars and shape the program according to their vision.
At the heart of any giving circle is the value of bringing people together with shared values to collectively decide where to make a pooled gift. Who you bring together has a direct impact on what you might discuss and what decisions you make. No matter who is present in your circle, how can you make decisions that bring you closer to racial equity? This workshop will explore the tensions present when well-intentioned giving circle members make decisions on behalf of individuals and communities who are directly impacted. In this workshop, participants will consider case studies of decision-making structures that interrupt racism, anti-Blackness, and other oppressions by ceding control to those closer to the impacts. Attendees will be introduced to a range of options for practicing power shifts and considering which structures might support their aspirations toward racial justice.
Power
February 2023
Maheen Kaleem, Grantmakers for Girls of Color, and Cidra Sebastien, Black Girl Freedom Fund
Black girls, femmes, and gender-expansive youth are at the forefront of every social justice movement, and yet their contributions and their leadership continue to be erased from public discourse. That is why in 2020, a group of Black women movement leaders launched the #1Billion4BlackGirls campaign and the Black Girl Freedom Fund. This workshop will cover the framework and context of philanthropic giving directed at Black girls, femmes, and gender-expansive youth, highlight the importance of resourcing organizations led by and centering them, and offer strategies to directly engage them in the co-construction of giving priorities.
Failure often happens in secret, particularly in philanthropy. The Kataly Foundation — an organization dedicated to moving resources to support the economic, political and cultural power of Black and Indigenous communities, and all communities of color — engaged in a process of examining failures and defining learnings in 2022. Join Zaineb Mohammed from Kataly to learn more about this exercise and their failure blog series.
Carrying the belief that funding can be activism, the Asian Women Giving Circle (AWGC) invests in emerging and cutting-edge changemakers/artists and has used their giving circle’s power to root themselves in community. Join AWGC Founder Hali Lee and a grantee partner as they share what they have learned about power over the last 16 years
In Right Relation: Rooting Ourselves in Relationship to Each Other
October 2022
Akilah Wallace and Tyeshia Wilson, HERitage Giving Fund
Giving circles support and represent work in every aspect of our social fabric, providing essential support, enriching our communities and cultural life, and taking action where change is needed. However, individuals with first-hand experience often have lots of ideas and solutions, but are not always positioned to share those on a path to impact which can reinforce patterns of power and privilege that uphold systemic racism.
Join giving circle leaders Akilah Wallace, Founder and Chair and Tyeshia Wilson, Chair-Elect of HERitage Giving Fund for a two-part series where you’ll learn how to recognize and utilize community voice and lived experience as a tool for racial equity. Participants will discuss patterns that perpetuate inequities, how to thoughtfully center community voices and lived experiences into the grant-making and decision-making processes, which ultimately when designed well, can be a part of supporting an end to racial inequity and social injustice.
In Right Relation: Rooting Ourselves in Relationship to Each Other
November 2022
Seiji Carpenter, Social Justice Giving Circle Project
The Social Justice Giving Circle Project works to support individuals (including those who are part of or interested in giving circles and/or resource organizing) in their journey to connect with and participate in social justice movements.
In their most recent research, the Social justice Giving Circle Project studied the relationships between movement organizations, movement leaders, and giving circles. Their learnings highlight the key ways donors and giving circles alike can better support movement work. In this session, participants will learn from Seiji Carpenter about how their collective giving work can best align with social justice movements.
In Right Relation: Rooting Ourselves in Relationship to Each Other
December 2022
Yichen Feng and Sabrina Wu, The LUNAR Project
LUNAR launched their inaugural giving circle in July 2021. For twelve weeks 11 Asian American women and gender non-conforming folks came together to engage in deep learning on their relationship to race and racism, resource needs in Black and Indigenous communities, and to collectively imagine new ways of flowing resources that shift and share power, build authentic relationship, and embody solidarity.
In Right Relation: Rooting Ourselves in Relationship to Each Other
December 2022
Akilah Wallace and Tyeshia Wilson, HERitage Giving Fund
Giving circles support and represent work in every aspect of our social fabric, providing essential support, enriching our communities and cultural life, and taking action where change is needed. However, individuals with first-hand experience often have lots of ideas and solutions, but are not always positioned to share those on a path to impact which can reinforce patterns of power and privilege that uphold systemic racism.
Join giving circle leaders Akilah Wallace, Founder and Chair and Tyeshia Wilson, Chair-Elect of HERitage Giving Fund for a two-part series where you’ll learn how to recognize and utilize your members’ lived experiences as a tool for racial equity. Participants will explore volunteer activities and patterns that perpetuate inequities, how to thoughtfully center member voices and lived experiences, and ultimately, how member engagement, when designed well, can be a part of supporting an end to racial inequity and social injustice.
Although the road is long, we believe we all have the ability to practice a lifelong commitment to equity. To do so, we must collectively share in the responsibility to continue on a journey towards liberation.
In our collective giving movement, we look to upend white supremacist colonial structures that have used philanthropy to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of few, and elevate the deep wisdom and experience of community-based and collective philanthropy.
Our Racial Equity Community of Practice launched in 2020, in partnership with Community Investment Network and CommunityBuild Ventures, convening giving circle leaders looking to deepen their commitment and practice of racial equity through webinars and small group discussions. With our fall 2022 relaunch, we encourage collective giving groups to think deeply about how they can be equitable in all aspects of giving.
A special thank you to the W.K. Kellogg Foundation for their support of the Equity and Justice in Collective Giving Webinar Series and Community of Practice!
Learn how to start your own giving circle, help your institution host giving circles, and more!
