SPEAKER_00 0:12

You're listening to the Philanthropisms Podcast with Rodri Davis. This is the podcast where we try to put philanthropy in context. I'm your host, as ever, Rod Davis, and we're back after a short summer break with a new selection of interviews and deep dives into topics around philanthropy and civil society. And we're kicking things off with an interview. And this one is with Lorena Gonzalez and Jess Olvera from the Young Centre for Immigrant Children's Rights in the US. Now I met uh Lorena and Jess earlier this year, um, virtually rather than in person, because we're on uh different continents when they got in touch um to inquire about whether they could pitch a guest article uh for the website. Uh and in fact that ended up happening, and it was the first guest article we've done, and they wrote uh a great paper uh all about their work and about what that means in terms of issues around the relationship between philanthropy and and justice, which you can read uh on the website, and I'll put links in the show notes to that. Um but I thought it was such an interesting conversation I had with them that we should sit down and and record uh a chat for the podcast as well, which we did. Um so we had a really good conversation. We talked about the work that the Young Centre does and trying to represent the interests of unaccompanied child migrants in the US immigration system. Um we talked about what the kind of overall landscape of funding for that sort of issue is and where the young centre's work fits into that. We talked about some of the challenges that come with trying to fund in an area that's so inherently political and sort of divisive, particularly in the the current day and age when things are are so polarized in many areas and particularly around an issue like uh immigration. We also talked about the challenges of philanthropy sometimes being quite paternalistic and top-down, or there being sort of a saviour mindset amongst funders, and whether that's a particular challenge when you're talking about uh people funding children to who towards whom they often uh obviously have paternalistic attitudes, and also where there is a sort of racialized element, because uh lots of these children are obviously from minoritised communities and and the organisations funding them are sort of inherently white or come from um structures of of white power. Um we also uh talked about um the challenges of measuring the kind of work that they do at the Young Foundation, uh the Young Centre, sorry. Uh and you know, uh as with a lot of organisations now figuring out how you uh manage that balance of having enough measurement to know that what you're doing is having an impact but not uh also kind of imposing uh measures on uh grantees that simply make their lives more difficult. Uh we talked about the the idea of community-centric fundraising and some of the principles behind that movement and why the Young Centre had uh adopted them in its own work and and what those mean in terms of how they go about uh engaging with potential funders. Um we also talked about uh justice and solidarity, um a lot of the kind of things that that Jess and Lorrainer wrote about in the article that they did for why philanthropy matters and what it means to take a justice-centred uh approach to philanthropy and how that kind of uh potentially changes the dynamic between funder and grantee and how it might change how you go about funding. So without further ado, let's get into the conversation. Uh I hope you enjoy it. I will be back at the end for the usual little bit of housekeeping. Okay, great. Well, I'm here with Lorena Gonzalez and Jess Olvera from the Young Centre for Immigrant Children's Rights. Hi to both of you.

SPEAKER_02 4:20

Hi, Rodri.

SPEAKER_00 4:21

And yeah, actually, fans of the podcast and uh why philanthropy matters might recognise the name because you both wrote um a great guest article um about your experiences working at the organization and about some of your views on the kind of challenges of taking a justice-centred approach to philanthropy, which is really fascinating. And we're going to talk about all of that stuff today. Um, maybe the best place to start though is just if you know one or both of you wants to say a bit about what the Young Center for Immigrant Children's Rights actually is, what work you do and what roles you both play there.

SPEAKER_03 4:51

Sure. Thanks so much, Rodri. Um, I think to start us off, I'll I'll just introduce myself and then we can give a little overview of the Young Center. So this is Lorena Gonzalez, um, and I am the Young Center's grants officer. I've been working with the Young Center for about three and a half years, and my role is specifically to be in charge of all of the foundational funding, um, which has to do a lot with grants and reports and cultivating all of those relationships, etc.

SPEAKER_02 5:18

Yeah, and I'm Jess. I work with Lodina on our development team. I recently started as a grants writer not too long ago, and historically I have a direct service background. So that's a little bit about me.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

Great. And yeah, if you just tell us a bit more about the organization and what it does, because people, I mean, particularly here in the UK, might not have heard of it. So it'd be really interesting to hear a bit more about the work.

SPEAKER_03 5:43

Yeah, of course, happy to. So the Young Center for Immigrant Children's Rights, it is a human rights organization that protects and advances the rights and best interests of immigrant children who are navigating the United States immigration system, oftentimes alone. And either this is because they've come to the US alone or were separated from their family when they got to the border. Ultimately, what the Young Center does is we advocate for immigrant children to be treated as children first within the immigration system. There are so many people that are making life-altering decisions when um, which affects these children. And oftentimes they do this without even considering what a child's hopes and wishes are, what's in their best interests, and what will keep them safe. And so that's kind of where we step in. And I'll let Jess talk a little bit about our biggest program.

SPEAKER_02 6:37

Yeah, so through our child advocate program, which is a national, which is a national program across our eight offices, we work directly with some of the most vulnerable children that are currently in government custody. Um, and typically when someone volunteers as a child advocate, they meet with a specific child that uh is in their vicinity, like their neighborhood, and really gets their story through a child-led manner. Uh, they meet with them for an hour and really try to understand their story, accompany and support them, and then work with our staff and social workers in order to really advocate for their best interests. And also for some folks who are not familiar with immigration in the US, we just wanted to also mention that there's currently no process where in the immigration system where children are differentiated from the adults. And so that's why the Young Center was founded in 2004 to really address that gap.

SPEAKER_03 7:40

Yeah, thanks, Jess. Um, and then I'll just briefly add, so that's that's our our biggest program, but I'll briefly add that we also have two other really important programs, um, which is why, um, which are built upon this program. So our first one is the technical assistance program, and they provide guidance to anyone working with an immigrant child in the domestic realm. And so if an immigration, if sorry, if an immigrant child gets caught in the child welfare system or the juvenile justice system, our technical assistance program can advise some of those stakeholders on the complexities of that child's case or how decisions will affect that child's immigration status or immigration case. And then our policy program, um, they take from the learnings from both our child advocate and our technical assistance program, and they um incorporate, they advocate, sorry, um on Capitol Hill to try and incorporate a best interest of the child standard into immigration law, along with so much more, but I'll I'll say that briefly.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

No, it's really interesting. And I think particularly that piece around um, as you say, a bit of context for people outside the US who might not really be aware of what that context is around unaccompanied child migrants. Um, from the point of view of the kind of philanthropy sector's involvement in these issues, what's can you give us a sense of what the landscape's like for philanthropic funding for for issues around unaccompanied child um immigrants in in the US from foundations and also individual donors? Is it is it an area that's well served or is it one where there are lots of gaps?

SPEAKER_03 9:11

Yeah, that's a that's a really great question, Rodre. Thank you so much. There was actually a study that came out called a Ripple, not a wave, in 2022 by the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy. And that study looked at foundation funding for migrant communities and movements over the last decade. It actually found that even as grantmakers have gotten richer and distribution to immigrant justice groups has actually increased dramatically, we saw an increase between 2016 and 2020. Unfortunately, the total share of foundation funding being given to the movement is proportionally smaller than it was a decade ago. And so, as some people might be aware, with the term like rage philanthropy, um, the Young Center, as many other immigrant justice groups, have experienced the ebbs and flows of this rage philanthropy over the last decade. And so that's the type of philanthropy where a donation donations increase significantly when horrific crises make the news, only to then be followed by fading support when it's no longer making headlines. So, for example, when zero tolerance and the parent-child separation crises was at its height, and that was during, you know, 2018, 2020, we received a record number of donations. But it's been really difficult actually to retain supporters for long term because the issue isn't front and center anymore. And then even in 2020, with COVID, we saw an increase of support again, somewhat. But to be honest, since 2021, we experienced an overall decline in the number of funders who had been supporting our work during the previous administration. Additionally, with the murder of George Floyd, we saw a lot of foundations shift their priorities to racial justice, which is absolutely wonderful. But what was sad to see on our end is that immigrant justice wasn't really incorporated into that portfolio. So while we are, of course, grateful that foundations are supporting Black, US Black populations and their needs, um, we do, we do wish that like immigrants would be included into the racial justice portfolio because the majority of immigrants are black, brown, indigenous, Asian. Um, and so it's it's yeah, it's it's been a little bit of a struggle.

SPEAKER_00 11:17

Yeah, absolutely. And and I guess the the bit from the outside that is apparent, even if people don't know a lot about the the specifics of the context, is it's clearly a very highly politicized issue in the US, as I mean, as it is in most countries, immigration, but particularly in the US over the last few years. You sort of said a bit about the the way in which that's driven some of the funding and this kind of rage philanthropy. What impact does it have on your work in terms of actually challenges it presents in for the context that you you operate in? I mean, I assume it it is a challenge.

SPEAKER_03 11:50

Yeah, I mean, the political context definitely challenges it in the sense that when immigration is politicized and it makes headline news, um, I guess in one sense, we get more donations, but in another sense, we um when it's not making the headline news or when it's being politicized in a way that's uh to our detriment, I suppose, we're seeing less donations. But um I do want to say that it's unfortunate really that this issue is politicized. So I'm sure, you know, in the current sociopolitical climate that we are in, um, as you know, and as many of these listeners know, both in the US and the UK, we are experiencing a climate of extreme polarization. And I think that it's felt deeply by the public. What I think at the Young Center we try to remind people of, regardless of where they land on the political spectrum, is that all children deserve to be treated like children. They deserve to have a childhood, they deserve to be safe, they deserve to be cared for and connected to their family. And at the end of the day, if that is too political of a statement or a desire, then I think we need to revisit our thoughts about what we consider political.

SPEAKER_00 13:11

Yeah, absolutely. And and one of the things I was really fascinated about in terms of your work is, you know, we hear a lot in philanthropy more broadly about uh the increasing recognition, which I think is healthy, that there are kind of power differentials in philanthropy between, you know, between donors and funders and between recipients. And it feels as though those power differentials are much more acute when we're talking about um, you know, potentially wealthy white donors on the one hand and kind of marginalized, often kind of poverty-stricken uh children from you know immigrant and minoritized communities on the other. The gap between the two is enormous. What are the challenges in your work and what do you try to do to try and kind of rebalance some of that power dynamic and to try and make it more equal?

SPEAKER_03 13:53

Yeah, I'll let Jess take this one actually.

SPEAKER_00 13:56

Yeah, Jess, that'd be great.

SPEAKER_02 13:57

Yeah, I think that um something that's really important to think about when we're redistributing the power dynamics is really taking it into account that the immigration system has been created in a way that it is not just and it's not equitable. And so really having those tough conversations is something that's important to the Young Center. Um, and I think that's the first step to really creating that power change.

SPEAKER_00 14:26

And do you find in your work? I mean, obviously, one of the things about shifting power is it requires those who currently have power to let go control over it, and that can be a difficult process. In your conversations with funders, how have you helped them to kind of get to the point where they genuinely are happy to let go of power or to take approaches which mean that they don't necessarily have as much control as they might have traditionally?

SPEAKER_02 14:51

Yeah, I think naming the something that I'd like to ground us in is naming the white supremacy uh characteristics. One of them is right to comfort and fear of conflict. And I think that that is something we really do see, unfortunately, when we are bringing those tough conversations up. But I think something that the Young Center is doing is really looking at who we stand for and what we're standing for and taking the action that we think is aligned with our mission.

SPEAKER_03 15:23

Yeah, and I'll just I'll just go ahead and add to that, Roger. I think your question is interesting because you're assuming that we've succeeded in getting funders to relinquish power. That is, I would say until funders completely redistribute their wealth, they're not going to be relinquishing their power, right? I think there's ways that we can try to have conversations about unrestricting funding and trying to be more equal partners or even challenging them. For example, when they ask about our demographics and are we representing the directly impacted communities? There's conversations that we can say, well, are you, are you representing your directly impacted communities? Is your board representing directly impacted communities? Because it's a double standard for you to be asking us that and not holding a mirror to yourself. So yeah, I mean, there's conversations that we definitely have with funders in regards to that. We ask them about unrestricted funding. We ask them about their own standards and their own board makeup. We ask them as much as possible to show up in an equal manner and try and get away from the savior lens of kind of that that idea that we talked about in the article of that charity, you know, like let's move to solidarity. But but yeah, I think we have a long way to go until funders completely relinquish their power because having money is power. And so if you're still holding all the money, you're still holding the power.

SPEAKER_00 16:52

And and is that, I mean, it's not a problem that's particular to the cause area that you're working in. But do you think there's an additional dimension to it in that funders are always reluctant to some extent or find it difficult often to give up power? But because we're talking about the end recipients being children, there's there's a kind of people naturally act more paternalistically or maternalistically towards children and disempower them. So you have that alongside the the classic funder recipient dynamic as well. Do you find you have to kind of re-educate donors about actually genuinely taking the voices of children seriously?

SPEAKER_02 17:28

Absolutely. I'll let Jess take this one. Definitely. I think that is a challenge that we see in this dynamic. And I think something that is important is to name that philanthropy historically does have a very paternalistic and saviorist uh view. And so when we're talking about immigrant children in particular, we want to name that they have unique and disproportionate harms as a result of our immigration system. Um, and so we do want to name that we're needing to adjust our biases and our missteps by taking away children's autonomy, their voices, and their experiences when addressing harms that they're directly facing. I think it is important that we look at the unintentional harms that we're causing.

SPEAKER_03 18:21

Yeah, and if I can just add, um, as part of the young center, we we also have to check our own biases and our own paternalistic tendencies. And so I think for us, what grounds the Young Center work to work away from that and also to educate our funders and educate our partners to work away from that lens is by keeping our own stereotypes and subjective values guided or maybe at bay by using what we have called a child rights paradigm at the forefront of all our work. And that paradigm is so crucial. Um, it takes into account widely accepted best interest principles of safeguarding a child's safety and expressed interests front and center. And then it also includes the child's rights to family integrity, their right to liberty, the right to healthy development, and their right to identity. And identity could be LGBTQ identity, it could be their family identity, their cultural identity, their racial identity. So taking into account all of these things is really important. But kind of adding on to what Jess was saying about this paternalistic mindset that we definitely, definitely encounter with funders, especially when it comes to children, I think, I think it is heightened, right? Because as children, we tend to view all of ourselves more as paternalistic of like, I know what's right for you mentality. But that's that's actually what we're trying to work away from. And so we do have conversations with our funders about the importance of listening to what the children want, the importance of even the way that we work when we show up with kids and our volunteers, we want to give the children as much autonomy as possible. So if we're supposed to be meeting with the child for one hour, we ask them, what do you want to do for this hour? What do you want to talk about? Or do you even want to meet? You know, like maybe they don't want to and they feel like they're already in the system where they can't make any decisions. And for someone to just say, like, do you want to meet with me today? And then and then say, you know what, I don't really feel like talking, or I don't really feel like doing this, and you acknowledging that and giving them that autonomy, that's so powerful. That's, I mean, like, it's it's so important.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

And I want to come on in a minute to pick pick up, you meant made reference both of you before to um the idea of rights and sort of brings you on to the the idea of justice and the distinction there that's important, I think, between that and charity. But I I just wanted to to ask on that question of funders, in terms of trying to convince them of the the need or the value of of kind of actually genuinely listening to the voices of of children and acting more in solidarity. Uh there's obviously a strong moral case for that being the right thing to do. But it is there also sort of a practical case to be made to funders that it just makes them better at funding and more effective if they actually listen to the voices that people are funding. And and would, you know, is that the case that you would make, or would you try to make the moral one, or do you try to sort of make a combination of the two?

SPEAKER_02 21:12

Yeah, Jess, do you want to take this one and I can add on if yeah, I think that's a very interesting question. I think that's a tough question. I think personally, I do believe everyone just deserves the right to safety. And so when we're talking about immigration rights, I think it is easy to say, hey, this is the right thing to do, but we have, like we've talked about before, folks who are using this as a political conversation to fear monger. And so I think if we want to call upon other folks who are not seeing this as a moral issue or as right or wrong as, and more of this as like this is going to be more effective for your work, I think that that also can hold true because I think we have a Uh, we do have a funder who brings together different organizations. And there is a lot of innovation that freeds from that, from collaborating. And so I think I believe it could be both.

SPEAKER_03 22:13

Yeah. And I would also say, like, just to build on what Jess was saying, on a aside from a moral perspective and ethical obligation that we have to giving each and every human being a voice, um, I think it's practically worthwhile because as I'm sure some of you have heard listening, and I'm sure maybe Roger, you've heard this, that that idea that like those who are closest to the plain to the pain are closest to the solution. So even the Young Center, we have a lot to learn from the kids that we serve, right? And so, say we weren't working with these kids, and maybe there was another funder working with kids, like ultimately any population that we're working with or that the nonprofit sector, grassroots sectors are working with, um, the solutions and the answers are for them to be sustainable, they need to come from the directly impacted communities. And if a funder is not listening to a directly impacted community, whether it's a child or an adult, they're not, their efforts and their investments aren't going to be sustainable. So it's just like you're just throwing money to other organizations doing work that it's, I don't know, to me, it just seems like a waste.

SPEAKER_00 23:27

Absolutely. And and coming back to that point about charity and justice, I mean, one of the things that you mentioned in your in the article that you wrote, you referenced um a great quote from Marshall Gantz about saying, you know, the difference being that charity asks what's wrong, how can I help? Whereas justice asks, why is it happening now and how can I change it? And how important is that distinction in your work between seeing things as a matter of charity, seeing it kind of as a choice and benevolence versus one of rights and things that people are able to demand as a matter of rights? Does that kind of frame the way that you go about doing your work?

SPEAKER_03 24:02

Yeah. Um, so first of all, just for those who are listening who might not be familiar with Marshall Gans, he was a Harvard professor who worked alongside Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, and has just a wealth of experience when it comes to organizing. And I think the quote um about like the difference between charity and justice, I think it highlights more than anything the systemic racism, capitalism, and exploitation from which philanthropy originates. Um, I think philanthropy through an equity and justice center-centered lens really requires a paradigm shift whereby donors see themselves not just as givers, not just as banks or financial institutions, but as partners, allies, actors who should leverage their resources in ways that directly impacted communities' share that they need, right? That they say they need. But I also think that philanthropy's resistance to change, to unrestricted funding, to redistribute redistributing of funds and trusting their grantees shows us that there's a lot of work to be done in having conversations with the grant makers about what their best role could be in this space. And so at least at the Young Center and on our philanthropy and grants team, we do try and take that justice-centered approach to lead philanthropists in helping them, like maybe change their paradigm or change their way of thinking so that so that they are a little bit kind of going back to that other question, so that they might be a little bit less resistance to redistributing their power and their wealth.

SPEAKER_00 25:35

Yeah. And is this tied in, you mentioned in the article as well about you know your adherence to some of the principles around community-centric fundraising. Maybe you could say a bit about, you know, for people who aren't aware kind of what what those principles are, what the movement is around community-centric fundraising, and how it how it kind of informs your work there at the Young Center.

SPEAKER_02 25:53

Yes, definitely. Um so for folks who aren't aware of community-centric fundraising, they are a movement and they have intentionally stated they want to be a movement and not an organization that evolves how fundraising is done in the nonprofit sector. Uh, its goal is to support fundraisers and other nonprofit professionals to re-examine fundraising philosophies that have been in practice and explore different ways that we can reduce harm and further social justice. And I think for the Young Center as an organization that works with immigrant children, inherently there has always been a need for us to work in a community-centric approach. I think, too, like we've mentioned earlier, there has been a national and also global push for accountability when it comes to race and other social issues. And so the Young Center started to think about ways that we can be held accountable. Uh, and recently last year, we started a values working group to identify core organizational values that the Young Center holds dear. And I can mention those that we've solidified. It is child-centered, accompaniment, equity and justice, courage, and community. And I encourage folks to read a little bit more about those on our website if you're curious. But once those four values were identified, the development team started to ask itself what are ways that we are internally and externally living out those values? And so that's where the conversation around community-centric fundraising uh blossomed.

SPEAKER_00 27:42

And and one of the things about community-centric fundraising, I'm guessing does it just extend to the approach or does it go as far as, you know, from your point of view, are there certain funders in terms of their thinking, their behaviors that you you would actually, there would be a red line and you would say, we don't want to accept your money because you're not willing to kind of sign up to these principles that that we think are an important part of you know, making sure that money is distributed in the right way, not just that it is distributed.

SPEAKER_03 28:10

Yeah. So that's that's definitely one way that we are starting to look at community-centric fundraising is like coming up with a gift acceptance policy and and reconsidering like who we're gonna accept money from and who we're not gonna accept money from. So um while we haven't quite figured that out just yet, we are definitely working on that. Um, I think it's safe to say that this idea of not accepting money from certain organizations is a bit radical and scary for especially for a lot of small nonprofits, grassroots orgs that need the money at least as a starting off point to get them to move forward far enough so they can get funding from other funders that are more aligned with their work and their mission. But definitely, like if you are the NRA, which is like the National Rifle Association, I don't think the Young Center would take money from you, right? Because like you're providing guns to probably fueling civil unrest in countries where a lot of these kids come from. Not that the NRA has ever donated this one. I was gonna say, but um yeah, I mean, like definitely we at this at this moment in time, we haven't come up with that yet, but we do definitely try and engage in conversations with our donors, at least the ones that have a person on the other side that we can talk to and say, like, hey, this is this is what we're looking at. These are our values, these are the new ways that we're trying to work and think about how we accept money. And so maybe they're not quite aligned with that just yet. But even if it means that they're open to listening and learning about the values of community-centric fundraising, I would take that as a win, right? So, like, better to have an audience or a philanthropy partner that maybe they're not quite aligned yet, but they're open to changing. And so I think like that's also part of the community-centric principles is like, how can we how can we engage everyone and like make everyone see themselves as a part of a community?

SPEAKER_00 30:06

Yeah, and I guess that being committed to learning as opposed to you know, assuming that you have to have all the answers from the outset is is always uh a sensible approach. Um one thing I wanted to ask actually, because we mentioned in the course of saying about switching from a mindset of um charity to one of justice, that it's necessary to not necessarily see yourself as a as a giver or donor, but as a partner. One thing I'd wonder, you know, in all the conversation about funders and donors um trying to shift power and to kind of give money to grassroots organizations and to social movements and so it sometimes seems as though the conversation is saying they just they just need to totally get out of the way and kind of get out of the picture. But actually, you know, in in reality, is there something that funders can bring to the table if they do so with sort of humility and seeing themselves as partners? And from your point of view, you know, what would that be? Can it do they actually bring value above and beyond the money in your your experience?

SPEAKER_03 31:02

Yes. Yes, they do. They can if if they use their power in a meaningful way, right? So I think as I alluded to earlier, a funder, one that's not just giving out money, but is a thought partner in uplifting our work, understanding our work and the complex systems within which we work, understanding the issues of the directly impacted community, creating platforms for the directly impacted communities to have voices, um, signing on to petitions, um, lifting up their grantees' work on social media, connecting them to other funders, you know, taking advantage of the vast network of other funders that they know, um, and kind of sharing, sharing that network with their grantees. I mean, like they they have so much power that they could be so helpful and impactful with their grantees in ways that like don't don't just have to do with funding, right?

SPEAKER_00 32:02

And um just one thing, yeah, linked to that that I wanted to ask as well in that in that conversation. I mean, we've touched on it a little bit, it'd be good to just just uh pull it out explicitly, is around funding practices and how they relate to to the kind of the need the desire to make philanthropy more more justice serving. And a lot of that conversation seems to focus around shifting more towards uh funding core costs or giving unrestricted grants and kind of funding over longer um time frames and giving multi-year uh funding. When you're seeking funding or kind of working with with funders to to get money that you can then distribute, you know, I are you able at the moment to kind of make that case? And is a lot of the money that you get core cost funding and over multiple uh years, or are you still kind of struggling with that yourselves?

SPEAKER_03 32:50

Yeah, I can let Jess start this, start us off here.

SPEAKER_02 32:53

Yeah, like Lorena mentioned earlier at the top of the hour, we are seeing an incredible growth in funders having more revenue and the ability to support us. And unfortunately, it is hard to make the case. And we have seen and have had one-on-one conversations with funders who it's a hard sell. I think to them, it's not effective to give money to overhead costs, but we truly do see that there is a need. There's just a lot of nuance and overlaying problems that non-sector or I'm sorry, that the nonprofit sector has. I'm sure you all experience the um secondhand trauma. There's a lot that we could argue for, but unfortunately, some funders still don't see that as a good enough reason to to support and giving unrestricted funds.

SPEAKER_03 33:50

Yeah, I mean, definitely I would say that we are getting the Young Center's been around for a long time and we are building up our funder base in a way that allows us to have those conversations, probably more so than if we were smaller. But I do, I do think that the question that you bring up is one that a lot of organizations face. And I think it it hints at the historical, just like the nonprofit industrial complex, how we've like seen the trends within that complex over the years where funders just want to focus on covering costs that go directly to the impacted communities, right? And they don't take into account that offering the services or doing the background work to make sure those communities get the services that they need takes work, you know, and that um the people who are providing that work are putting in their time and their efforts and their labor. And by not covering overhead costs or by not covering core costs or not by not doing multi-year grants, you know, we're basically accepting the fact that like that it's okay to exploit nonprofit workers. It's okay to say, like, oh, you know what, these people are overworked and underpaid. And but that's what they want because they're passionate about the issue. Like, it's fine. Well, you know what? It's not. It's a load of bollocks. And um, it feeds into that cycle of exploitation, especially, especially as we see more and more nonprofits starting to be led by people who are part of the directly impacted communities, right? So, like, that's even more essential to make sure that we get them those core costs so that they can continue the work and still be able to like provide for their families and make a long-lasting impact and like grow that portfolio of work that they're doing and grow their programs. And so, yeah, I mean, I definitely we're having those conversations with funders, but I also think that one of the reasons why Jess and I and the Young Center are kind of on this community-centric fundraising mission to educate all funders is because, you know, we're privileged, we're grown enough, we have a big budget and we have a big development team. Not a lot of organizations do, you know, and just because we have a bigger team that can advocate for this doesn't mean that like we're more deserving of it, right? So um, I guess I just this is my shout out to philanthropy partners to say provide more core costs and more multi-year funding to all your grantees, not just the ones that are more developed, quote unquote developed, right? And like not just the ones with the bigger budgets and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 36:28

And and just one word is mentioned in the in the course of that I thought was really interesting, is is effectiveness, which I guess brings to something that's often linked to this, which is the question of how you measure things. Because that's obviously, I mean, it's tied into you know all of your the questions around whether or not you're willing to meaningfully give power away and whether you as a donor kind of want to to direct things or you're willing to kind of listen to the recipient communities and often the the most tangible place that's felt is in the kind of measurement requirements that are placed on on recipients. In terms of your role at the Young Center, do you find yourself in the middle of that with funders? Do you still have to kind of conform to their systems of measurement? And does that place an additional burden on you, or are you able to kind of advocate that actually they need to adjust their perspective on measurement to kind of meet the needs of the communities that they want to be getting the money out to?

SPEAKER_03 37:21

I love this question so much, Audrey. Thank you. Um, so I'm gonna have some multi, multi- multi-pronged answer here. So um, yes, we are still working with our funders when it comes to what they require of us for measurement. Sometimes we can challenge them, especially if they're bigger, more progressive funders. We can have, you know, like a lot of our work has to do with healing and mitigating trauma, and that's very difficult to measure. And so we can we can explain that kind of work in quantitative and qualitative measures, but they're not, it's just it's a very hard thing to measure. However, that being said, I do think that there is there is value to data, especially um if it's collected in an equitable manner, and there's data equity, um, there's looking at also like involving, again, the directly impacted communities to decide what data will be collected. And so that brings me back to well, I haven't had these conversations with that many funders, but um I do think it's a really important thing to bring up and kind of goes back to this idea of providing core funding and multi-year funding is the fact that our if we, if our funders want data to inform impact, or success at meeting a goal or an outcome, then they should also be not only funding monitoring and evaluation costs, but they should be funding their grantees in such a way that their grantees have enough startup funding to be able to involve the communities that are directly impacted to design the program, to design the monitoring and evaluation, to design the implementation, to like do the needs assessment and have them be the ones that say, This is what I want to change. This is the solution that we propose, and this is how we're gonna measure it because this is what we've identified. And so if we could do that, if funding could do that, that to me would be radical. Like I've never, I you know, it's always that like you need money to get money. So there's there's so in my line of work of 15 years, there's so many times that I've seen organizations have to upfront the cost of doing a needs assessment or you know, doing um focus group discussions and interviews with the key directly impacted communities to even identify what the program looks like. And then they're submitting a proposal. But who's covering all those initial costs? Okay, I digress. I am ranting now. I don't know if Jess has anything to add.

SPEAKER_02 40:09

Yes, actually, I um would love to pull from Edgar Viennueva and the decolonizing philanthropy podcast or episode that you all had, and he talked about shifting the language in questions to instead of asking for those quantitative numbers, asking how are you seeing success? What to you is a successful outcome? And I think that is very important to like Lorena was saying, we're doing the work, it is hard to measure hope, and it's hard to measure making sure that these individuals that we're serving are feeling heard and that their best interests and uh expressed wishes are being taken into consideration. And so I think just having that narrative shift is so important. I'd also like to add that I just had a moment of like, oh yes, and it is so interconnected. We've talked about the white supremacy characteristics, and one of them is progress is more wanting quantity versus quality. And so I think these are very important uh things to take into consideration.

SPEAKER_00 41:27

Yeah, no, I think I mean that's a really good point. I think that particularly around uh progress, and I guess particularly because a lot of funders get characterized as progressive funders, but if that just means uh ever expanding, doing more and more stuff, that in itself kind of uh embodies a particular view of the world that isn't necessarily in tune with the needs of the communities that that they're supporting. I guess I I don't want to take up too much of your time. So I just want to ask, I mean, one last thing, kind of looking ahead to the future, really, which is what it is that you hope to see more of from philanthropy and from your funders in the future that would make it easier for you to do your work and you know, kind of what's your utopian vision of of how things could look in five, 10 years?

SPEAKER_03 42:08

Oh, yeah. Um, so I'll say a few things, then I'll pass it to Jess. Um, I think my hope is that in the future we can see, right, and I'll say this over time because I don't expect this to be like that. And I just snap my fingers for those not being able to see me, is that we can see more unrestricted funding, more intersectional funding, especially in an equitable, in a way that like partners show up in an equitable relationship with their grantees and view themselves as part of the community that can learn from us and and like that need us just as much as we need them, but also eventually to see those redistribution of funding to giving back to those communities where that funding or that money probably was stolen from in the first place, right? So that would be amazing. And then I'd also just love to like have funders keep in the forefront of their mind the that quote that I said earlier those who are closest to the pain and the problem are the ones who are closest to the solution and the answers. You know, we must always be students when we are working with directly impacted communities, especially if we are not, if we ourselves do not identify as as one of those um directly impacted community members, you know, like we always must keep our hearts and minds open to learn from them and see them as the experts. Like that is just absolutely imperative. And no matter what age, right? No matter what gender, no matter what race, they they know what they need.

SPEAKER_02 43:43

Yeah, and I'd echo all of those sentiments. Um, and I'd also say that my hope for the future is for funders also to ensure that their leadership is representative of those communities that they're serving so that there isn't any unintentional harm being continued. Along the way. And I'd say that my one request or invitation to listeners as like a key takeaway is that we all look at these white supremacy characteristics and really interrogate where they're showing up in ourselves and in our core beliefs and really challenge them.

SPEAKER_00 44:20

Yeah, I mean absolutely. I think that's a great series of hopes and you know challenges for all of us to bear in mind. Um listen just remains to say thanks ever so much to both of you for finding the time to come on the podcast. It's great to have a chance to talk and to kind of follow up on some of what you you wrote in in the article. Just before I finally let you go, is there anything that you want to point people towards? Obviously, I'll put links in the show notes to the article and links to to the Young Center website so people can find out more about your work. But if you've got any reports coming out or events coming up that you want to give a shout out to, now's the time.

SPEAKER_03 44:52

Um great question. Um I was gonna say we don't actually, we just had a webinar, but um we don't have anything in the in the pipeline just yet. Um I'm happy to share some recent reports we've come out with that are really important with you, Roger. So you can put links on there. And then just kind of to Jess's invitation invitation, excuse me, um, there's a really wonderful website about wet white supremacy. And it kind of helps people figure out what are those characteristics and the antidotes for those characteristics. So if you're open to it, we can share a link to that website, which is super informative and um and it can serve as a guide to like help us do our own internal work.

SPEAKER_00 45:36

Yeah, great. I'll I'll make sure we get all of those links and put them in the show notes. So uh just say thanks ever so much and uh yeah, hope to speak to you both again soon.

SPEAKER_02 45:44

Thank you so much, Roger. Thanks, Roger.

SPEAKER_00 45:56

Okay, great. Well, my thanks again to Lorena and Jess for uh coming on the podcast. It was great to have a chance to talk to them about their work and some of their thoughts about uh lots of really interesting issues. Uh-huh. I will put links in the show notes to where you can find uh the article that they wrote for why philanthropy matters, but also more on their work um at the Young Centre and also some kind of uh interesting pieces linked to lots of the things that we were talking about. If you're interested more broadly in work around philanthropy and civil society and kind of big meaty questions about those topics, then obviously do check out the website at www.why philanthropy matters.com. Uh you can follow me on social media, you can certainly still find me on Twitter, at least for now, uh at Rodery underscore H underscore Davis. You can also find me at Philiteracy, uh, I'm there on LinkedIn. Uh uh I signed up for a whole load of other social media uh platforms that I'm probably not really ever going to get around to engaging with properly, but I'm there on threads and Mastodon and all that kind of thing, so you know, do uh do have a look for me. Um if you've got ideas for people that we can talk to on the podcast or topics that we cover, do drop me a line. You can find the email addressed in the contact section of the website. Other than that, you know, please do like, subscribe, tell all your friends about it, leave a nice review because that kind of thing helps. Um, and other than that, we'll see you next time. Bye.