(Coatesville, Pennsylvania) - On February 1st 2022, The Alliance for Health Equity (The AHE) launched the Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute, a series of learning sessions designed to support the nonprofit sector in its commitment to recognize and mitigate the deeply rooted inequities experienced by its most marginalized community members, including those experienced by the Black and Brown communities. Designed as a learning cohort, eight participating organizations will spend six months advancing their understanding about systemic inequities and creating an accountable plan focused on helping them work to solve complex community issues with an equity lens that seeks to produce sustainable solutions.
The Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute, co-created and facilitated by the Tammy Dowley-Blackman Group, LLC (TBD Group), will assist eight local nonprofit institutions in their commitment to further transform their organizational culture and practices by assessing their institutional programming and practices to determine short and long-term changes and resources required.
The Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute believes in the importance of responding to people and society justly and equitably through strategies that build communities for long-term success. The goal of the Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute is to build the local nonprofit sectors’ capacity to embed social justice and racial equity throughout its decision-making and operations.
Strategies include:
- Understanding the historical context of racial and social inequities and the impact on the community
- Participating in capacity building coaching to advance justice and equity learning and action
- Creating an organization blueprint that centers justice and equity to sustain learning and accountability of the organization and the community
Word cloud created during the first session of the Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute on February 1st, 2022.
Over the next six months, eight nonprofit organizations across Chester County will work together as the cohort of the Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute begins (names listed below). These organizations will attend six sessions, as well as participate in six hours of capacity building coaching. To prepare for the Institute, each organization will complete a readiness assessment to determine the stage in equitable practices and programs currently implemented. The nonprofits will use learning sessions focused on justice and equity leadership, why race and justice matter, the intersectionality of social, health, and economic factors, and accountability to the community. The final component of the learning sessions provides an opportunity for each nonprofit to draft a customized Justice and Equity blueprint that will help each organization address internal and external systemic inequities.
Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute participants include: Brandywine Valley Active Aging, ChesPenn Health Services, Coatesville Youth Initiative, Maternal and Child Health Consortium, Open Hearth, Inc., Phoenixville Area Community Services, The Public Library of Phoenixville, and the Youth Mentoring Partnership. The impactful work that The Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute is doing to alleviate inequities and community health disparities in the sector is made possible because of the understanding and investment by these Chester County funders: CCCF Grantmaking Fund for Chester County Social Justice, Phoenixville Community Health Foundation, The 25th Century Foundation, The Alliance for Health Equity, The Barra Foundation, The Fund for Women and Girls, and United Way of Chester County/Chester County Partnership to End Homelessness.
For more information about the Nonprofit Justice and Equity Institute, please visit our website at alliancehealthequity.org. Keep up to date with this important work and the outcomes by following The Alliance for Health Equity on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.