Collective Leadership Principle Learned: How to listen deeply to work across racial barriers and appropriately engage people of color in establishing agendas to address racial equity across issues.
Outcome: Community members in Buffalo created unprecedented collaboration across racial and ethnic boundaries and between community-based organizations and the schools to attract $1.5 million in funding for after school programs.
Outcome: Your Voice, Your Choice campaign helped re-engage Buffalo voters who went to the polls in large numbers and elected an almost entirely new slate of school board members, including the first Latino elected to the Board.
Collective Leadership Principle Learned: How to listen deeply to work across racial barriers and appropriately engage people of color in establishing agendas to address racial equity across issues.
Citizen Action of New York is a grassroots membership organization that takes on big issues that are at the center of transforming American society – issues like:
• quality education and after-school programs for all our kids;
• guaranteed quality, affordable health care;
• public financing of election campaigns;
• dismantling racism and promoting racial justice;
• a more progressive tax system;
• an end to the War in Iraq.
Citizen Action of New York has eight chapters and affiliates in major cities across New York State, including one in Buffalo.
How did they improve quality education and after-school programs for kids?
At the time that the KLCC fellowship in Buffalo was formed, the school district was in financial crisis and the community had been denied federal funding for after-school programs. Buffalo had a history of being divided by race and ethnicities in various neighborhoods, so the Public Policy and Education Fund of New York/Citizen Action of New York intentionally formed a group of 25 people who represented the diversity of the city. The Buffalo Fellows coordinated a collaboration of after-school program providers, the school district, labor unions, and the mayor’s office to prepare a proposal that increased Buffalo’s allocation of 21st Century Fund grants from $150,000 to $1.5 million.
When the entire school board came up for election, the Fellowship created “Your Voice, Your Choice,” (see article below) a voter participation campaign and community process for identifying and articulating attributes the community desired in its school board members. The resulting checklist provided a reference for voters to use in evaluating school board candidates. The following election had an increased number of voters and resulted in a dramatic change in the School Board, including electing the first Latino board member.
Creating Collective Leadership Capacity: When the fellowship first formed, they quickly moved from a space of enthusiastically coming together into confronting each other over their different ideas. The group used Gracious Space to focus on their shared purpose and how they could work together with a deeper appreciation of each other. They had difficult conversations about race in Gracious Space. Based on this learning that was an integral part of their outcomes, the Buffalo project lead brought Gracious Space to the State organization in order to raise the question of whether agendas were being set with appropriate involvement of those they were intending to serve. As a result of this reflection, the statewide organization adopted a new approach to analyzing and selecting issues based on racial equity. They shared their approach in the summer 2009 Community Learning Exchange on Racial Equity.
Outcome: Community members in Buffalo created unprecedented collaboration across racial and ethnic boundaries and between community-based organizations and the schools to attract $1.5 million in funding for after school programs.
Outcome: Your Voice, Your Choice campaign helped re-engage Buffalo voters who went to the polls in large numbers and elected an almost entirely new slate of school board members, including the first Latino elected to the Board.
Collective Leadership Principle Learned: How to listen deeply to work across racial barriers and appropriately engage people of color in establishing agendas to address racial equity across issues.
Citizen Action of New York is a grassroots membership organization that takes on big issues that are at the center of transforming American society – issues like:
• quality education and after-school programs for all our kids;
• guaranteed quality, affordable health care;
• public financing of election campaigns;
• dismantling racism and promoting racial justice;
• a more progressive tax system;
• an end to the War in Iraq.
Citizen Action of New York has eight chapters and affiliates in major cities across New York State, including one in Buffalo.
How did they improve quality education and after-school programs for kids?
At the time that the KLCC fellowship in Buffalo was formed, the school district was in financial crisis and the community had been denied federal funding for after-school programs. Buffalo had a history of being divided by race and ethnicities in various neighborhoods, so the Public Policy and Education Fund of New York/Citizen Action of New York intentionally formed a group of 25 people who represented the diversity of the city. The Buffalo Fellows coordinated a collaboration of after-school program providers, the school district, labor unions, and the mayor’s office to prepare a proposal that increased Buffalo’s allocation of 21st Century Fund grants from $150,000 to $1.5 million.
When the entire school board came up for election, the Fellowship created “Your Voice, Your Choice,” (see article below) a voter participation campaign and community process for identifying and articulating attributes the community desired in its school board members. The resulting checklist provided a reference for voters to use in evaluating school board candidates. The following election had an increased number of voters and resulted in a dramatic change in the School Board, including electing the first Latino board member.
Creating Collective Leadership Capacity: When the fellowship first formed, they quickly moved from a space of enthusiastically coming together into confronting each other over their different ideas. The group used Gracious Space to focus on their shared purpose and how they could work together with a deeper appreciation of each other. They had difficult conversations about race in Gracious Space. Based on this learning that was an integral part of their outcomes, the Buffalo project lead brought Gracious Space to the State organization in order to raise the question of whether agendas were being set with appropriate involvement of those they were intending to serve. As a result of this reflection, the statewide organization adopted a new approach to analyzing and selecting issues based on racial equity. They shared their approach in the summer 2009 Community Learning Exchange on Racial Equity.