When we named racial equity as a priority in our strategic plan, we also named it a value to start our own internal learning journey as an organization and as individuals. Starting in 2019, each month, we feature a "What We're Reading" section in our Member News that highlights what people in the Funders Together network are reading to expand their understanding of racial equity. This page is an archive of past articles, blog posts, and books that were featured in past editions of the FTEH Member News. We hope this will spur inspiration for your personal or organizational racial equity work and that you'll learn alongside us.

What We're Reading in: 2021 | 2020

2019

What We're Reading: Philanthropists Bench Women of Color, the M.V.P.s of Social Change
Who's Reading It: Funders Together Staff

In this New York Times Opinion piece, Vanessa Daniel, executive director of Groundswell, calls out the vast inequity in funding practices when it comes to supporting women of color who lead grassroots organizations. She outlines why and how women of color are shut out from funding and how philanthropy can change it's grantmaking to support these organizations in order to produce the greatest impact. 

What We're Reading: C4 Innovations'sCoordinated Entry Systems Racial Equity Analysis of Assessment Data Report
Who's Reading It: Stephanie Chan, Funders Together Director of Membership and Programs

This latest report from C4 Innovations build on previous work from their SPARC Phase One Study Findings and looks at how coordinated entry systems currently contribute and perpetuate racial inequities. It also provides recommendations and actionable next steps communities can take to transform the assessment and prioritization process. Reading it was a reminder that we need to actively incorporate an antiracist approach into designing all our tools. As we hear about more and more communities starting to examine their own coordinated entry system assessments, I am also passionate about making sure that there is coordination between communities as we embark on this work together. Let me know what your thoughts are about the report and if your community is looking at its own coordinated entry system.

What We're Reading: How to Be an Antiracistby Ibram X. Kendi
Who's Reading It: Funders Together Staff

Funders Together staff is diving into bestselling author Ibram X. Kendi's How to Be an Antiracist as part of an all-staff book club. In this book, Kendi challenges readers to see and name all the forms racism takes and helps us to understand how we can dismantle racism in both the system and ourselves. Over the next few months, we're holding discussions about how racism shows up not only in our personal lives, but in efforts to end homelessness, and how we can work, individually and collectively, to become antiracist.