2022 Black Well-being Final w links for Web 11.29.22 - Flipbook - Page 23
BLACK WELL-BEING REPORT 2022
BLACK FUTURE CO-OP FUND
Increase and enhance civic readiness
Youth have always been catalysts of change, today is no different. And their
feelings about civics are shaped early. Beyond reading, writing, math, and science,
our youth should understand the dynamics of power and how it is expressed
through laws and policy. Formal education is only one way we learn. We want
forums, spaces, and organic opportunities for conversation for and by Black people
to learn about the ideas on which people are acting.
• Prioritize intergenerational dialogue about civics, starting at the
earliest of ages.
• Utilize integrated curricula that connect the “issues” to a person’s
everyday life.
• Rework the curriculum in all educational spaces to include
hands-on, racially attuned learning about how societies are
constructed and shaped.
• Teach the totality of Black history from Black perspectives.
• Invest in community-led spaces to discuss politics: places of
worship, schools, dinner parties, community organizations and
centers, and block parties.
Center the arts because they are foundational to civic engagement and
therefore social change
Art is essential to our being. It’s an important way for us to make sense of the
world and express ideas and concepts that have yet to conjure words. It is the
language of evolution and self actualization, bringing together all our senses,
including our intuition. We need the holders and shapers of culture to successfully
move anything strategically.
• Pay Black artists well. On top of already low pay, during the
pandemic, they were hit especially hard.
• Make sure artists retain rights to their work.
• Seek out artists early to shape strategy work — as the saying
goes, culture eats strategy for breakfast.
• Bring arts back to educational, healing, civic, and work spaces.
Community plans and leads, governments and systems fund our plans
Much research has studied the limited effectiveness of solutions born from
government agencies. It isn’t only that we often are not represented at the
decision-making tables, it’s also that government structures are not conducive to
making effective decisions. They are siloed and force solutions into funding boxes
that usually aren’t tailored to community needs and result in inflexible tools or
programming to get the job done.
• Fund community to organize, plan, and architect the solutions.
• Re-envision governments and large institutions’ roles in
implementing community-directed strategies.
• Break down silos and work across systems.
• Build timelines and write contracts that speak to the capacity
and strengths of organizations.
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