Doug Parker’s Post

Notwithstanding my clumsy physics analogy, what do you think? How is this affecting your work? How would you like to see Sustainable Agriculture & Food Systems Funders (SAFSF) hold space for conversation and action on this topic? "Newton’s Third Law of Motion says that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. This immutable relationship between physical objects makes productive activity like forward motion by walking, swimming, tires rolling or wings flapping possible. Depending on the makeup of the two objects that are interacting with each other, it can also have destructive results, like a wrecking ball meeting a wall of bricks and mortar, a windshield meeting a flying bug, or much worse. (I was definitely not a science major, by the way.) Does this law hold for society and our interactions as people? It seems like some actions get no reaction at all, while others get reactions that are wildly out of proportion. Maybe some of the action/reaction dynamic is tied up in the long arc of the moral universe that Martin Luther King Jr spoke of. Maybe with each action/reaction event over time, the moves toward justice go just a little farther than the moves away from justice, bending that arc whether we can see it from our current vantage point or not. Philanthropy and the nonprofits you support are grappling with the implications of this summer’s Supreme Court decision limiting the use of race-based factors to achieve greater racial equity in college admissions. The effects of this decision will reach every area of society where affirmative action policies have begun to disrupt, if not repair, structural inequities. I wonder whether the USDA anticipated this decision when it evaded the efforts of groups like the Federation of Southern Cooperatives to fight the legal challenges to the Black farmer debt relief program in court last year, when they swapped it for a race-neutral debt relief provision in the Inflation Reduction Act. It makes me think about the way the Third Law of Motion, the equal and opposite reaction, operates with the First Law of Motion, which most of us know as inertia, that says an object will keep moving until a force works on it to stop it. In the action of a pendulum, the swing in one direction is countered by the reaction of the force of gravity to bring the pendulum back towards the center, eventually slowing the back-and-forth movement to smaller and smaller increments until the pendulum is still. The distance of reaction swing stops a little bit short of fully matching the previous one, slowly bringing the forces into equilibrium, unless a new force pushes the swing further. How far will the actions of society, of nonprofits, of philanthropy, of your organization, go to counter this most recent reaction? How far will our actions go to dampen the counterattack, the reaction swing, and, despite what feels like a setback, continue pushing that arc just a little bit more towards justice?"

Today is THE day. #Give828 is the only giving day uniquely dedicated to supporting Black-led organizations that do vital work to uplift Black communities. Support Black-led Nonprofits tomorrow and give what you can. Visit https://buff.ly/2VQaJRs for more information. #BPM2023 #Give828 #GivingBlack #BlackGiving #Donation #BlackPhilanthropy #Philanthropy #BlackLed #Organizations #Community #Grassrootsorganizations #Donors #RacialJustice"

Join me in making a real difference this Women’s History Month! Donate to the Junior League of Los Angeles - a 98-year-old women's nonprofit with a mission to advance women’s leadership for the greater good. https://lnkd.in/dipYwiGj Can you believe that: -Women make up 73% of the U.S. nonprofit workforce, yet around 45% have women among their executives. -And of those nonprofits with an annual budget of $50 million only 17% had a female CEO. -And it’s also important to note that women of color, in particular, are least likely to hold leadership positions at nonprofits. Invest in the Junior League of Los Angeles and invest in more women in nonprofit leadership!

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* HBCUs make up only 3% of the country's colleges and universities, but enroll 10% of all African American students. * HBCUs confer 24% of Bachelor's degrees earned by African Americans. * 80% of all African American judges graduated from an HBCU * More than 50% of African-American professionals (doctors, lawyers, engineers) graduated from HBCUs. * 70% of African American physicians graduated from an HBCU. * There are 100+ HBCUs located in 19 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. Virgin Islands. * HBCUs' economic impact is $14.8 billion dollars annually. * 1 in 4 African American STEM graduates come from HBCUs. * More than 50% of African American public school teachers graduated from an HBCU. However, the the Racial Inequity Wealth Gap affects African American students and their ability to pay for college. Ninety percent of all undergraduate students at HBCUs received some type of financial aid in 2019–20. True Blue 1881, Inc. seeks to close the gap by removing food, shelter, and economic insecurities that prohibit students from graduating. Currently, we are fundraising for our Save Our Seniors initiative and we are less than $1000 away from meeting our fundraising goal! Please click on the link and watch the video of one of our graduating Seniors, Jeremiah - Morehouse Senior and future astrophysicist- who faced homelessness but is now able to graduate with his balance paid! Please donate to help us reach our goal of helping more students! We humbly thank you for your support. https://lnkd.in/edP8XiUj

My next chapter! Be sure to follow Matriculate for the latest in our work to support high-achieving low-income high school students in their journey toward the best education possible.

What will it take for institutional philanthropy in MN and beyond to move at the speed of courage and invest wholly in Black lives? This report from CEI, Black Collective Foundation MN and the Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity provides five tangible actions philanthropy can take to invest in Black lives year-round and long-term to build community power and support thriving individuals and families. https://lnkd.in/gj55tP5K

ArtsHERE Statement of Interest Closes: January 19, 2024!! https://lnkd.in/g_z2mw_8 FUNDED ORGANIZATIONS WILL RECEIVE: Investment: Managed by South Arts, ArtsHERE will award approximately 95 nonprofit organizations with nonmatching grants of $65,000 to $130,000. Grants are for specific projects that will strengthen each organization’s capacity to sustain meaningful community engagement and increase arts participation for underserved groups/communities. Learning: ArtsHERE will offer grantees peer-learning and technical assistance opportunities, designed to share knowledge and build networks. Evaluation: As a pilot program, ArtsHERE will be documented and evaluated by the National Endowment for the Arts to better understand the project activities supported through this program and how grantees approached the work, and to inspire others. The evaluation will result in a summary of lessons learned and may inform the future of ArtsHERE and other similar funding programs and practices.

Members of the public have special opportunity to learn from and engage with scholar Lila Corwin Berman about the history and practice of American Jewish philanthropy. Who benefits from philanthropy? Who gets to decide how dollars are spent? Do good intentions lead to good results? Does philanthropy advance democracy? The lecture, titled, “Power to Which People? American Jewish Philanthropy & American Democracy,” will take place on Zoom at 11:10 a.m. EDT March 13. . Read all about it and register. https://loom.ly/1UDxTE4

Members of the public have special opportunity to learn from and engage with scholar Lila Corwin Berman about the history and practice of American Jewish philanthropy. Who benefits from philanthropy? Who gets to decide how dollars are spent? Do good intentions lead to good results? Does philanthropy advance democracy? The lecture, titled, “Power to Which People? American Jewish Philanthropy & American Democracy,” will take place on Zoom at 11:10 a.m. EDT March 13. . Read all about it and register. https://loom.ly/1UDxTE4