Grants Awarded |
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| In 2007, the Foundation awarded the following 20 grants: Cohort 1 Established Grants Cohort 2 Established Grants Emerging Grants Final Year Grants | |
| Established Grants- Cohort 2 (Year 1 of 5) Oakland Kids First, Oakland, CA $60,000. First year of a five year grant. Oakland Kids First organizes high schools students in Oakland public school to develop a "college bound culture" in which students, teachers, and administrators work together to advance the goal of increased college enrollment and a more supportive classroom climate. After seeing its policy victories fail to bring about meaningful improvement in student success rates, OKF developed an approach to organizing that is based on the belief that policy changes rarely succeed without a change in culture. OKF empowers all stakeholders to recognize their role in the success of students and the health of the school communities. | |
Oasis Center's Youth Leadership & Action, Nashville, TN $80,000. First year of a five year grant. Youth Leadership & Action (YLA) provides a wide range of opportunities for diverse youth across Nashville to impact their communities. Youth can serve on a philanthropic board supporting youth-led projects that improve local schools, on a citywide advisory board, or work on an organizing project that addresses predatory lending and school equity in Nashville's low-income neighborhoods. | |
Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition's Sistas and Brothas United, Bronx, NY $50,000 for one year. First year of a five year grant. Sistas and Brothas United (SBU) trains youth to lead campaigns on educational equity, community supports for youth, and youth involvement in decisions that affect them. SBU recently organized for the creation of a public charter school focused on leadership, social justice, and community involvement. Youth have been involved in every aspect of its implementation, from drafting the proposal to hiring the principal to developing curriculum. | |
Youth United for Change, Philadelphia, PA $60,000. First year of a five year grant. Youth United for Change is an organization dedicated to developing young leaders in Philadelphia and empowering them to improve the quality of education and services in their communities to better meet their needs. Through a process of institution-based community organizing, diverse young people come together to identify common concerns and take collective action to address issues such as improving college matriculation and examining the impact of school restructuring on students. (back to top) Established Grants-Cohort 1 (Year 2 of 5) Appalshop's Appalachian Media Institute, Whitesburg, KY $30,000. Second year of a five year grant. Appalachian Media Institute trains teenagers to bring attention to the culture, stories, and issues of the eastern coalfields of Appalachia as a way to support their communities' efforts to solve their own problems in a just and equitable way. Youth-produced films and recordings are aired locally and debriefed as a way to generate public dialogue about the issues raised. Participants' media have also been broadcast across the country through public radio outlets and have brought congressional attention to the epidemic of teenage prescription drug abuse in rural areas. | |
Global Action Project, New York, NY $90,000. Second year of a five year grant. Global Action Project (GAP) is a youth media production organization founded to address two problems: 1) the inability of low-income youth of color to access technology and media production in order to voice their perspectives as critical thinkers and activists; and 2) the need to infuse public debate, especially as it is framed by mainstream media outlets, with younger and more diverse perspectives. GAP provides youth with the knowledge, tools, and relationships they need to create powerful, thought-provoking media on local and international issues that concern them, and to use their media as a catalyst for dialogue and social change. | |
Ifetayo Cultural Arts Facility's Youth Ensemble, Brooklyn, NY $80,000. Second year of a five year grant. The Ifetayo Youth Ensemble is a leadership and performing arts organization for youth of African descent, in which participants discuss and research issues facing their community, and create original dance, theater, and spoken-word performances to address those issues. Ensemble topics have included domestic abuse, police brutality, and HIV/AIDS in the black teen community. A rites of passage program complements the performance component, with participants discussing their identity as youth, as people of color, and as witnesses, perpetrators, or victims of the social issues they address in their performances. | |
InnerCity Struggle's United Students, Los Angeles, CA $90,000. Second year of a five year grant. United Students is a youth organizing program that focuses on educational quality at four East Los Angeles high schools. Youth organizers undergo leadership and skills training in order to inform, listen to, and organize their peers in campaigns. Working in severely overcrowded schools, United Students was instrumental in securing funding for new construction for two new schools, and has also worked with school administration on increasing graduation and college-going rates. | |
Youth Together, Oakland, CA $100,000. Second year of a five year grant. Youth Together trains and supports diverse teams of youth organizers to address problems in East Bay high schools, such as inadequate and unsafe school conditions, lack of appropriate academic resources and materials, and racially and economically segregated classrooms and schools. It trains diverse youth organizers in five high schools and has identified four areas of impact along a social change continuum: individual support and leadership development for its youth organizers; multiracial team development in order to build empowered and cohesive groups of young people; youth-led base-building in order to mobilize large numbers of youth and advocates; and institutional/policy changes as a result of the previous three strategies. (back to top) Emerging Grants (Year 2 of 3) Close to Home, Dorchester, MA $40,000. Second year of a three year grant. Close to Home was founded by community residents in response to an increase in domestic violence in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood. It is based on the belief that institutions such as courts and law enforcement are the last to hear about, and poorly equipped to respond to, domestic violence. Citizens themselves need to address this problem at the community level. The Foundation supports its emerging Youth Team, founded by the son of a parent involved in Close to Home. The Youth Team researches the prevalence, perceptions, and impact of teen dating violence on the local community, creates media that addresses this issue, and facilitates follow-up educational workshops and informal discussions with their peers. | |
Native Movement, Flagstaff, AZ $25,000. Second year of a three year grant. Native Movement is a collective of youth leadership projects on the Hopi and Navajo nations of Northern Arizona. Their projects sit at the intersection of economic, environmental, and cultural development. Youth have started a revenue-generating organic gardening business in nearby Flagstaff, are working with community elders to bring back building and farming practices that will increase environmental sustainability and economic independence, and are trying to prevent the commercial development of sites that are sacred to many indigenous tribes in the Southwest. | |
On the Move, Napa, CA $40,000. Second year of a three year grant. On the Move builds and sustains the leadership of youth and young adults across the San Francisco Bay Area. The Foundation supports its V.O.I.C.E.S. project (Voice Our Independent Choices for Emancipation Support) in which foster care and emancipated youth advocate for policy changes that will improve the supports and opportunities that they receive, such as housing, education, and transportation. The project is run out of a youth-operated emancipation center, the first of its kind in the country. | |
Women & Girls Collective Action Network, Chicago, IL $30,000. Second year of a three year grant. Women & Girls CAN (Collective Action Network) is a citywide collaborative of organizations and individuals empowering women to address policy- and system-level decisions that affect women, such as reproductive rights, domestic abuse, sexual harassment in schools, and the portrayal of women in the media. The Foundation supports its youth organizing project, FUFA (Females United For Action), which is a coalition of diverse girls and young women from across Chicago focusing on the portrayal of females in the media. FUFA successfully organized opposition to a radio station's offensive and misogynistic billboard advertisement in a campaign that received national attention. | |
The Center for Court Innovation, New York, NY $40,000. Second year of a three year grant. The Center for Court Innovation acts as a think tank to help courts and criminal justice agencies aid victims, reduce crime, and improve public trust in the justice system. The Foundation supports its Youth Justice Board, a project in which youth study and propose solutions to juvenile justice and public safety challenges that most affect them, providing an important and credible voice of young people in the public debate about juvenile justice policy in New York City. In the first year-2004-members studied the challenges of youth returning home after confinement for juvenile delinquency. The second year, they focused on safety problems in local high schools. (back to top) Final Year Grants DreamYard's A.C.T.I.O.N. Project, Bronx, NY $40,000 for one year. The A.C.T.I.O.N. project was founded to address the lack of opportunities for high school students to develop the leadership and expressive skills needed to impact their communities and to succeed in life. High school participants use a range of artistic media such as film, performance, and poetry to address social issues, such as consumer culture and the power of the media. Last summer they partnered with a startup youth arts organization in Mississippi to tell the stories of those affected by Hurricane Katrina. | |
New WORLD Theater's Project 2050, Amherst, MA $30,000 for one year. Project 2050 is youth performing arts ensemble, named for the year in which people of color are expected to become the majority in the United States. Diverse participants come together with resident teaching artists and activists in a summer residency to challenge each other on issues of race, class, identity, and social change. Through their shared experience they develop a performance that they present to community audiences. | |
The Center for Teen Empowerment, Boston, MA $30,000 for one year. Teen Empowerment trains young people to think deeply about the most difficult social problems in their schools and communities, and gives them the tools they need to work with others to address those problems. At its school-based sites, it has worked with its partner schools to improve school climate and relationships between students, teachers, administration, and security guards. At community-based sites, youth have convened diverse community members, including rival gang members and police officers, to address race, class, and gang tension. | |
Youth Ministries for Peace & Justice, Bronx, NY $50,000 for one year. Youth Ministries for Peace & Justice is a Bronx-based community organization that trains young people to take action on issues that affect them. It integrates the arts, spirituality, and holistic wellness into all of its programs. Participants have spent many years working to improve local air quality and the Bronx River habitat, and advocating for increased river access for local residents. | |
Youth Communication, New York, NY $50,000 for one year. Youth Communication publishes newspapers and thematic anthologies that are written by youth participants. The content relates to the issues youth face, such as eating disorders, sexual orientation, and school reform. The publications are used by schools, youth programs, policy makers, and those who work with youth. | |
Youth United for Community Action, East Palo Alto, CA $50,000 for one year. Youth United for Community Action provides a safe space for young people of color to empower themselves and to work on environmental and social justice issues. Youth have organized their peers and other community members to raise awareness about toxic industries in their neighborhood and are working with the city to promote economic development that will improve the lives of local residents. | |
Photo Credit: Kauthar Umar. (back to top) | |
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