This week, we continue introducing you to the incredible organizations we’ve given grants to this year by spotlighting those that focus on socioeconomic empowerment. This group of organizations understands the importance of creating opportunities for people to claim their own power in the world. Breaking barriers and addressing unjust systems that marginalize women and young people of color often means simply creating space for people to live into their own unique greatness. There are not enough spaces in our society like that – spaces in which people from marginalized communities can dream and grow and build together and have a place to land if they fall. For those of us who grew up outside of the cycles of poverty and exclusion in our society, it can be difficult to imagine all that it takes to break those cycles.
We hope that as you read about these organizations in their own words, you are inspired to see gaps in your own communities where you can create space for people to harness their power and break these cycles. Socioeconomic power is often the vehicle through which people are seen, acknowledged and affirmed by our society, and that acknowledgement opens the door to brighter futures. Imagine brighter futures with us and pledge to #LiveInclusively.
BUILD Metro DC
BUILD envisions a world where our educational system ensures all students have the opportunity to develop the skills necessary for personal and professional success. Through entrepreneurship-based, experiential learning, BUILD’s mission is to ignite the potential of youth in under-resourced communities and equip them for high school, college, and career success.
BUILD’s four-year program promotes entrepreneurship among Washington, DC high school students at the highest risk of dropping out of school through the practice of launching and running a licensed business while providing high-touch mentoring, extensive academic support, and college readiness training, while providing them with resources and training to start their own businesses and succeed in a future career.
The impact of BUILD’s programming on the achievement of low-income students is notable even after only one year: In the lowest performing schools in which BUILD serves students, BUILDers who complete just one year of the program graduate at a rate up to 56% higher than their peers. In higher-performing schools, BUILDers’ graduation attainment is 12-15% above the average for their low-income school peers. BUILD’s expanding pilot programs are an extension of this targeted exposure and aim to show even more students the connection between school and the “real world.”
Downtown Women’s Center
The mission of the Downtown Women’s Center (DWC) is ending women’s homelessness in greater Los Angeles through housing, wellness, and advocacy. Holding a unique position in the service field, DWC has been instrumental in galvanizing a national movement to end women’s homelessness, providing a rare gendered view of housing, homelessness, and related issues.
We envision a Los Angeles with every woman is housed and on a path to personal stability. In Los Angeles, the number of women experiencing homelessness has increased by 55% since 2013 and by 16% over the last year alone. Los Angeles’ homelessness crisis is most visible in Skid Row, which has a concentration of poverty unlike any other in the developed world; approximately 2,500 people sleep in nightly shelters or on the streets of Skid Row on any given night. Historically, services in Skid Row were designed to meet the needs of single, adult men. Today, though women comprise nearly one third of the homeless population, there remains a serious lack of services specifically designed for women.
Founded in 1978, DWC remains the only local organization in Los Angeles that is exclusively dedicated to addressing the immediate and long-term needs of women overcoming homelessness and poverty in Skid Row. Today, through our on-site and off-site housing models, co-located women’s health center, drop-in day shelter, social enterprise, and vocational education and job readiness program, we serve more than 3,000 women each year.
El Centro AMISTAD
El Centro AMISTAD has been working with Latinos in Boulder County for over fifteen years. No other agency in Boulder County is led by Latinos for Latinos to strengthen and improve the resiliency of the Latino community on issues of health, wellness, and education. We offer bi-lingual, culturally appropriate, holistic programs and services that are driven by the unique needs of the Latino community. Operating with the theory that systemic change is most effective when it is locally led by families and communities with innovative bottom-up solutions, AMISTAD provides bi-lingual, bi-cultural Latino(a) led programs by and for Latino children, youth, women and families.
El Centro AMISTAD was formed in 2001 when Latino immigrants gathered weekly to discuss immigrant rights in Boulder County. AMISTAD’s work has evolved based on needs expressed by program participants. We support education, health and wellness in the Latino population (especially immigrants) in Boulder County with evidence-based, holistic, community supported, culturally appropriate activities and programs over the entire life course. AMISTAD currently provides three programs: Goals for Your Health, Compañeras and Health Equity.
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