A national network of funders supporting strategic, innovative, and effective solutions to homelessness

What to Expect From Funders Together Programming in 2019

Posted by 77sc on January 16, 2019

The new year is often a time when people set new goals or resolutions for the next twelve months. At Funders Together, we’re using the start of 2019 to make some commitments to all our members about the programming they can expect from us this year.

Monthly webinars and online resources on important topics

We’re committed to providing at least three online programs or resources per month on a range of topics related to homelessness and housing stability. These programs or resources will include webinars on emerging work being done on unsheltered homelessness, education, criminal justice, affordable housing, and more. We have two active communities of practice, Foundations for Employment and Housing and Foundations for Racial Equity, that are doing deep dives on these topics, so we are also dedicated to making sure to share with what these cohorts are learning and how to apply it to your own work.  

For our members who are newer to the housing and homelessness field, we are also designing programming and resources specifically for you. Many have asked for a “Homelessness 101” guide to help you navigate how to deepen your learning, and we want to make sure that you have that resource in 2019.

We’re also working to update several resources pages on our website to make them “one-stop shops” for our members. We’ll be revamping these pages to include a brief overview of a topic, links to the latest research, and a list of experts that our members can reach out to directly. Two of the topics we’re creating these resource pages for in 2019 include affordable housing and advocacy.

 

Quarterly programming on youth homelessness

Many of our members work deeply in ending youth homelessness. After Foundations for Youth Success (FYS) concluded, the Youth Funder Network Leadership Committee formed to continue the energy of FYS. In partnership with this committee, we’ll be providing programming on youth homelessness on a quarterly basis to keep of the momentum to prevent and end youth homelessness.

 

Quarterly advocacy and policy updates or programs

The field is constantly changing, and our members turn to us for the latest policy updates and best practices in engaging in advocacy and policy work. To this end, we’ll be providing at least quarterly updates or programs on advocacy and policy. These resources will range from policy briefs to Advocacy 101 guidelines to creative ways funders can engage in advocacy work. Tell us what your biggest questions related to policy and advocacy are.

 

Tell us what you want to see!

We will be gathering feedback on what we’re doing and how we’re doing it throughout the year. You can help us get started by taking this 2019 Programming Feedback Survey or by emailing Stephanie Chan, Director of Membership and Programs, with your thoughts and feedback.

We joined Funders Together because we believe in the power of philanthropy to play a major role in ending homelessness, and we know we have much to learn from funders across the country.

-Christine Marge, Director of Housing and Financial Stability at United Way of Greater Los Angeles

I am thankful for the local partnerships here in the Pacific Northwest that we’ve been able to create and nurture thanks to the work of Funders Together. Having so many of the right players at the table makes our conversations – and all of our efforts – all the richer and more effective.

-David Wertheimer, Deputy Director at Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Very often a lack of jobs and money is not the cause of poverty, but the symptom. The cause may lie deeper in our failure to give our fellow citizens a fair chance to develop their own capacities, in a lack of education and training, in a lack of medical care and housing, in a lack of decent communities in which to live and bring up their children.

-President Lyndon B. Johnson, 1964 State of the Union Address

Funders Together has given me a platform to engage the other funders in my community. Our local funding community has improved greatly to support housing first models and align of resources towards ending homelessness.

-Leslie Strnisha, Vice President at Sisters of Charity Foundation of Cleveland

Our family foundation convenes local funders and key community stakeholders around strategies to end homelessness in Houston. Funders Together members have been invaluable mentors to us in this effort, traveling to our community to share their expertise and examples of best practices from around the nation.

-Nancy Frees Fountain, Managing Director at The Frees Foundation


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