Last week I highlighted some of the major lessons I learned at PolicyLink’s Equity Summit. Below are a few additional insights that will inform my work with AFF in the year to come:

#3 Pathways for youth are critical and we are all in it for the long haul—for the youth we serve, organizations we support and the leaders who help make it happen.

To continue building movements, the young people need the space and opportunity to do so. Equity Summit 2015 hosted many conversations about establishing a pipeline of jobs for the next generation, particularly for young people of color. At AFF, we believe that this pipeline is vital to connecting 5.5 million opportunity youth^[1] ages 16-24 with careers.

Access to career and educational pathways are critical to preventing opportunity youth who are affected by systems we believe to be disruptive (i.e. youth exiting foster care and/or juvenile justice systems) from ending up homeless and/or incarcerated. That’s why we partner with organizations such as LeadersUp, Jobs for the Future, United Teen Equality Center and More Than Words, that are helping connect youth to sustainable career pathways and expanding opportunities for young people of color.

“An inclusive workforce leads to a competitive economy. We need to ensure that young people of color have access to the same employment pathways so that they can contribute to our economy.”
Jeffery Wallace
President, LeadersUp

Access to career pipelines in youth organizing are also important, given that social justice movements can last many lifetimes. How do we ensure that career growth is possible for youth in this field and enable them to potentially transition from member to executive director? Leadership development is a critical component of organizing. For example, preparing 10 youth organizers to engage 200 community members toward a positive solution justifies the time-intensive cultivation of young leaders and expands our grant impact. Grantee partner Dream Defenders shows us how organizational leadership development can be effective. They work with their members for more than a year, and offer youth organizing jobs within the organization to their cultivated youth leaders first.

“We stay away from traditional leadership because, we believe, it’s not an effective way to engage young people. Most movements are started and/or led by youth, so we have to find ways that bring out the potential in everyone.”
Rachel Gilmer
Chief of Strategy, Dream Defenders

It was evident that many of the more seasoned movement leaders at the Summit began their careers as young people. Fellowship and internship opportunities, funder collaboratives, programs by intermediaries and capacity builders like grantee Funders’ Collaborative on Youth Organizing are critical to building the pipeline and ensuring youth can grow into organizational leaders.

#4 Self-care is critical to sustain our ability to work toward social justice; It’s up to all of us to aid each other’s self-care.

As I mentioned in my previous blog post, intergenerationality was a reoccurring theme at the Summit. Although many of us would love to see the long-term engagement of youth in social justice organizations, we recognize the potential for burnout. Elders cautioned youth to pay attention to the other side of this work—self-care. Those of us who are engaged in social change need space to rest, reflect and collaborate in order to improve upon our practices and do our best work.

“We provide the only safe space specifically for LGBTQ youth of color in New Orleans. Our focus on healing justice and leadership development amplifies queer and trans youth voices to change the systems that criminalize them.”
Wes Ware
Founding Co-Director, BreakOUT!

AFF provides capacity building opportunities for executive directors because we are mindful of the wear and tear that organizational leaders undergo when trying to grow a small or mid-sized organization. An emphasis on self-care is evident within our grantmaking process, in which we listen and collaborate with our partners to help them implement more sustainable practices. By engaging with organizations in this way, we can shift their focus away from general operations and toward making a greater impact.

#5 Keep our eyes on the prize.

“We have watched the largest expansion of criminalization of black, brown and white poor people in this country in the last 100 years…We have to repent that we have not fought for our young people the way they deserve to be fought for. We obsess about their pants, their hair, their teeth, more than we obsess about their bodies and spirits being broken. Our focus is in the wrong place.”
Pastor Michael “Mike” McBride
National Director for Urban Strategies/LIVE FREE Campaign, PICO National Network

So where should we focus? Policylink’s Equity Manifesto provides a great compass.

“This is equity: just and fair inclusion into a society in which all can participate, prosper, and reach their full potential. Unlocking the promise of the nation by unleashing the promise in us all.”
Excerpt from Equity Manifesto

These words echo AFF’s core values and investment in youth-serving organizations. Herein lies the promise, and what a treat to have recognized it with so many peers dedicated to obliterating inequality.

Thank you for reading my reflections on Equity Summit 2015. I hope these lessons help to inspire more dialogue about the change we’re working toward. Please feel free to share this series on social media.

[1] Also referred to as “disconnected youth”, this population of young people are neither employed nor enrolled in school. According to the Opportunity Index, there are 5.5 million disconnected or opportunity youth currently living in the United States.

In October of 2015, I packed my bags and headed to sunny California to join over 3000 organizers, policy advocates, artists, academics, entrepreneurs, philanthropists and civic officials concerned with bringing equity to marginalized communities at Policy Link’s Equity Summit 2015. The summit was incredibly inspiring on a number of levels, and below are a few lessons that I’ll continue to reflect on over the next year:

#1 Building a movement is a multi-sensorial experience. It demands we bring our whole intellectual, emotional, and holistic self to collaborate in creating solutions that advance equity and social justice for marginalized communities.

“This is equity: just and fair inclusion into a society in which all can participate, prosper, and reach their full potential. Unlocking the promise of the nation by unleashing the promise in us all”
Excerpt from Equity Manifesto

Angela Glover Blackwell, President and CEO of Policy Link, inspired action when she read the organization’s Equity Manifesto aloud. Her soothing voice and clear, purposeful message magnetized everyone. She invited us to share innovative data and practices that could be used to overcome the gross inequalities adversely affecting marginalized communities of color. Hopes of realizing true equity and social justice in the communities we serve permeated the room.

Following Blackwell’s call to action, Dr. Raj Chetty, professor of economics at Stanford University, presented research findings from the Equality of Opportunity Project. This data proves that the neighborhood where a child is raised is critical for predicting long-term outcomes, including economic mobility. When children, especially boys, grow up in racially segregated “red regions,” as indicated in his report[1]—they face the least economic upward mobility and the most dire life outcomes. Our collective outrage at these disparities smoldered.

Understandably, inequity stirs up anger and frustration. But, it is this fire that inspires youth activists and captivates philanthropists and policymakers alike.

“Young people are right to be angry about the conditions of their communities. Youth organizing groups help them understand the root causes of the problems and process their emotions.”
Eric Braxton
Executive Director — The Funders’ Collaborative on Youth Organizing

This rage was emboldened and channeled into an overwhelming feeling of optimism when Policy Link aired “This is Our Moment,” featuring a poem by Mayra del Valle. When del Valle treated us to a live performance of “This is Our Moment,” it was met with a standing ovation. Her small frame and colossal message served as a rallying cry for the audience, demanding that we all bring our full selves to the task of creating equity by deepening our skillset, meaningfully networking and building unbreakable ties of solidarity. As a drummer and performer with an all-women’s Caribbean folk drum troupe, Legacy Women, I was heartened to see how social justice requires that we address culturally relevant ways of interacting with each other and of giving voice to our concerns and dreams.

It is through this interplay of poetry and dance performances, research, data sharing and candid conversations that we recognize each other’s humanity and learn to take care of it in holistic and dynamic ways. AFF recognizes that in order to best serve young people, we must be mindful of their lived experiences—taking into consideration the societal, personal, psychological, and material realities that impact their life—and engage in multi-sensory strategies that ignite movements.

“Due to the inclusive nature of youth organizing groups, there are so many ways youth can contribute—regardless of their skills, talents and interests.”
Eric Braxton
Executive Director — The Funders’ Collaborative on Youth Organizing

#2 Youth are leading us powerfully and building intergenerationality.

“This moment is not new. We’re not the first generation to fight back against racial injustice. Movements are generations-long.”
Rachel Gilmer
Chief of Strategy — Dream Defenders

Youth organizers from the Movement for Black Lives Matter, The Justice League, B.O.L.D.: Black Organizing for Leadership and Dignity, Thunder Valley Community Development Corporation (who work with Lakota Native American communities), Dream Defenders (AFF’s Florida-based youth organizing grantee partner) and a host of other youth-led movements captivated audiences throughout the summit. AFF actively supports youth organizing because we believe in the power of youth to direct their own lives and create the solutions they need to the obstacles they face. We also believe that youth organizing is an important component of a vibrant democracy. As a former youth organizer for environmental justice within the New York Environmental Justice Alliance and Sustainable South Bronx, I whole-heartedly understand the power of youth organizing and the importance of collaboration with older generations.

“In the Lakota culture we have a philosophy of 7 generations …honoring the 3 generations behind you and the 3 generations in front of you. The work we do is intergenerational. Elders are youth’s biggest advocates.”
Nick Tilsen
Executive Director — Thunder Valley Community Development Corporation

I thought these insights revealed both the hard-earned stripes youth movement leaders possess and their commitment to bringing everyone in the community along. It was refreshing to witness the candid conversations between senior executives, youth organizers and leaders. I also found it refreshing how humor played a role in the dialogues, which shows how youth and elders can conscientiously build a multi-generational framework that requires reckoning with the present and co-creating the future. They defied the myths that youth are not interested in multigenerational movements or that elders are not thinking about passing on the torch.

Thanks for reading! I’ll continue my reflections on my experience at PolicyLink’s Equity Summit 2015 in my next blog post. Stay tuned.

[1] Refer to map of affected areas on page 99 of The Impacts of Neighborhoods on Intergenerational Mobility: Childhood Exposure Effects and County-Level Estimates by Raj Chetty and Nathaniel Hendren.

In our last blog series, we saw how our grantee partners are working together to disrupt inequity in New Orleans in order to create a more just city for its youth. We know that many of the challenges that affect opportunity youth in New Orleans—such as criminal justice system involvement and lack of good educational and employment opportunities—are the same issues keeping youth across the country out of work and school.

This population of young people is commonly referred to as disconnected youth or opportunity youth[1]. According to this year’s Opportunity Nation Index Report, opportunity youth make up 16 percent, or 5.5 million of the more than 38 million youth ages 16-24 in the U.S. To put that figure into perspective, there are more disconnected youth in our country than the entire population of Minnesota.

As the likelihood of these young people not being in school or working increases, “the cost of inaction is high.” In 2011, taxpayers shouldered more than $93 billion to compensate for lost taxes and direct costs to support young people disengaged from both education and work. The research suggests that over the lifetime of this group, the cost to society is estimated to be $4.7 trillion. (Belfield et al., 2012)

Some believe that one of the root causes of youth unemployment—which is more than double the national average—is a skills gap. Concerns about a widening skills gap has even brought together politicians from both sides of the aisle, such as former Congressmen Tom Harkin (D) and Tom Latham (R) of Iowa:

“America’s future is at risk if we are not able to build a workforce that can compete. Providing equal access to opportunity for all Americans is the defining issue of our time. Without opportunity, this country cannot thrive, cannot innovate and cannot survive.”

At Andrus Family Fund, we believe that when our youth do well, our communities are revitalized and we all benefit. We believe that not only is there a skills gap but also the well-being of our country’s youth is declining and the racial disparity of those negatively impacted by this gap is widening. Black and Hispanic children and youth continue to be overrepresented in the child welfare and juvenile justice systems and—even though both systems are meant to be temporary—they create long-term outcomes that negatively impact the ability of these young people to be productive in the workforce and economy. That is why supporting organizations that create opportunities for young people, specifically young people of color, is critical to realizing our mission. An example of this work can be found within the program model of grantee partner LeadersUp.

LeadersUp is responding to youth unemployment through direct partnerships with some of world’s biggest companies. They utilize a supply-chain engagement model that leverages companies within robust supply-chains across the United States to hire and retain Opportunity Youth as part of their workforce. Their employer-led initiative, The Future at Work, has launched several successful pilots programs in test markets across the country.

By creating a customized recruitment and retention strategy for employers that identifies the skills necessary to develop qualified applicants, LeadersUp is helping bridge the “talent divide”. The strategy behind The Future at Work pilots includes sourcing talent from local workforce development organizations that teach these young adults “power skills”[2] prior to interviewing with employer partners. The result is a sustainable millennial talent pipeline for businesses and access to real job opportunities for ready-to-work youth.

LeadersUp’s partnership with SK Food Group in Ohio led to the direct hire of more than 160 opportunity youth in 2014. One year later, more than 60 percent of those youth are still employed by the company. LeadersUp spearheaded employer pilots and city-wide youth hiring events in both Los Angeles and Chicago this year, that connected hundreds of youth to career pathways through public-private partnerships with Starbucks, the Los Angeles Workforce and Economic Development Department and the 100,000 Opportunities Initiative.

Access to job opportunities is just the beginning. LeadersUp is focused on ensuring businesses and communities are able to thrive from the contributions of a highly skilled, prepared and dedicated millennial talent pool. LeadersUp employer partners rise to the challenge of addressing the youth unemployment crisis by viewing it as a solution to their talent needs. They are interested in creating the workforce of the future and know that starts with the ingenuity and diversity of opportunity youth.

To see the impact of LeadersUp work in action, watch the videos below:

As we continue our career pathways blog series, we will see the power of collaboration amongst our grantee partners to build a more inclusive workforce.

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