Welcome, everyone. The Council for Advancement and Support of Education is pleased to present this online webinar, Social Justice and Frontline Fundraising. My name is Anne Weller, and it's my pleasure to introduce our speaker today. Erin Capone serves as the Director of Development for Rutgers School of Social Work, overseeing the school's major and principal gifts, alumni relations, and special events. She also serves as the Adjunct Professor in the Graduate Social Work Program, teaching fundraising and marketing. Erin previously served as the Development Director of the Andrew Goodman Foundation and Executive Director of Overcoming Obstacles, which are both nonprofit organizations dedicated to developing critical skills in today's youth. Erin began her career as a children's social worker after graduating with an MSW from New York University and a BA in Social Work from Rutgers University. Her work explores the intersection of social work and philanthropy, which share a desire to promote the welfare of others. Erin is passionate about the power of both professions to advance social justice, and she has presented nationally on this and other topics, making media appearances on NBC, Fox, and the Solutions webcast hosted by Clemson University. Welcome, Erin. Thank you, Anne, so much for that welcome and hello everyone. I'm really glad to have this opportunity and this time with you to talk about frontline fundraising and how it has a unique opportunity to advance social justice. As Anne mentioned, it's been kind of a passion of mine, and I'm actually this fall about to pursue doctoral studies to look at that relationship between the two. So clearly I'm all bought in. And I'm excited to join with you this as you're watching this to have this conversation and to look at it together. As we dive in, I would really welcome you to reflect on why this session. So you have all kinds of opportunities and things to invest your time in and this today, you're choosing to invest your time in this session. Why? What is it about the title and the description that called to you? What are you seeing in your work that this resonates with? What are maybe some challenges or some gaps that you're thinking of? So as you're, you know, mulling those questions through your mind, let me share a little bit with you about how I came to conceptualize this session and to propose it and partner with CASE to get this content out to you. So, one thing is philanthropy's role in social justice has become front of mind for me recently. So, as Anne mentioned, in my own background of working in nonprofits, of having all of my education and training and social work. These two things of philanthropy and social work are all about promoting and addressing the welfare and well-being of others. And it was when I came to Rutgers School of Social Work a little over five years ago that these two worlds came together in a new way for me. So, I've been really passionate about that ever since. But then 2020 happened, right? And I think it's the only time in my life that I can think of describing a year as something that happened, but 2020 happened. And in the midst of a global pandemic, in the midst of new work toward a racial reckoning, that question of power became really central to me. Who has it? What do they use it for? And how do they keep it? And that's when I really started to think about the power that's involved in philanthropy and how that advances social justice. And really, again, it's kind of at the core of these two professions that these pieces came together. So, let's take a look and kind of ground ourselves in where kind of the next part of our session, which is a need for conversation and resources in this area. So, I was seeing lots of different pieces being written, but looking kind of for more resources and more support. So, this presentation is really with the goal of kind of getting you all acclimated to some key concepts, thinking and learning about the conversations you're having, and then finding ways we can partner together. So, what will we do? So, from 30,000 feet, I'm going to walk you through in this session, some social justice oriented theories and concepts and the parallels that they have to frontline fundraising. Throughout, I'll use examples from my own work in the field or some other well-known examples to kind of bring these concepts together. And then we'll look at a framework and some next steps that we can all take to ensure that our practice, our work with frontline fundraising actually advances social justice, as opposed to maybe thwarting it. But in order to know how your work relates to social justice, we need to also ground ourselves in a definition. So, what is social justice? So, you'll find a whole host of different definitions. I've chosen this one from the National Association of Social Workers. But no matter the definition you find, they will all center on the idea of everyone having access to their rights and opportunities. So, that's what the heart of social justice is, no matter the definition. So, here's our agenda for our conversation. So, we'll introduce some key concepts, as I mentioned. We're going to look at anti-oppressive practice, ethical storytelling, and asset-based practice. We're going to talk about social justice theory and pull out just a few concepts from each that relate more specifically to frontline fundraising. And we're going to look at systems theory, empowerment theory, and critical race theory. And then the framework that I'll provide to you is going to be kind of based on two things. So, throughout our conversation today, I'll ask you a series of questions at the end of each new concept or theory that you might consider in your own practice. And at the end, we'll look at Bryan Stevenson's steps to change the world and how they relate to frontline fundraising. So, sit back, relax, and I'm excited to be here with you today. So, anti-oppressive practice, what is it? So, it's a framework. It is interdisciplinary. It's largely held in the field of social work. And really what it's looking at are what are the structural impediments to equal opportunity, equal access? And what work can we as social workers or we as other helping professions or we as frontline fundraisers, what work can we do to address those power differentials? And how are those power imbalances held in place? And so, one, as you see kind of in front of you, looking at those, how do we create those equal relationships? Looking at what those structural power imbalances are. But also, this last point, I think, is especially interesting to me and I think of our profession, frontline fundraising, which is how do we challenge the established truths that are keeping power imbalances in place? And so, I think a lot about this in terms of how philanthropy and maybe even the term charity are thought about in our society. And so, I kind of want to ground you with this quote. It comes from Darren Walker, who, as you likely know, is the president of the Ford Foundation. And he was quoted in an article that the Stanford Social Innovation Review is doing about proximate leaders. And we'll go on to define that term in a little bit. But he said about proximate leaders, which are, you know, people close to the issues, close to the communities being served and how they effectively lead and design solutions to local problems. He said, they are not objects of charity, but drivers of change. And I want to repeat that again for you. They are not objects of charity, but drivers of change. And so, when I read that, I thought a lot about the conversations I've had with donors, the conversations I've had as the leader of a nonprofit about the people we serve. And how often the language we used or the way we conceptualize the work we were doing had unfortunately placed people as objects of charity, as opposed to being drivers of the own change that they want to see in their lives, their communities, or our shared society. And so I would just kind of call you to think about that in your own work. Are you positioning the people that you serve that the philanthropy benefits? Are they objects of charity? Or are they partners and drivers in the change that we all want to see in our world? So that drives me to this concept of ethical storytelling. So you'll see as we go throughout that there are times where I note a source, usually kind of an article or a resource that you can access, you know, if you want to do some additional reading. So ethical storytelling is really about the idea of how, especially in nonprofits, how we use storytelling to do things like raise funds or awareness or gather support for the work we're doing. And what does it mean to do that ethically? So here are some key elements of ethical storytelling. So the first thing is really around celebrating the strengths and the hard work of the people who benefit from the work or from the philanthropy, as opposed to leaning on maybe deficits or traumas that they've experienced. So that's one piece, celebrating strengths and hard work. The other issue is around raising donor awareness of the societal issues that cause the need, right? So for instance, if we're looking at access to higher education, certainly one way that you could focus philanthropy would be on scholarship support for students. But another way to look at is what's going on structurally within a system of, let's say, higher education, that whether intentionally or unintentionally is blocking different people or different groups of people from accessing it. So how do we raise donor site to think not just about individual impact, but also larger structures and systems addressed? The other piece is how we think about our organization and how we position it in a story. So here the idea in ethical storytelling is you present your organization as a partner to the people being served or who benefit from the philanthropy, and not a savior, right? So even in working with students, let's say, for instance, they are doing all of this work, leveraging all of the assets and resources, being really resourceful to get their education, to get across that finish line of graduation. And we partner with them in that. We don't come across as kind of this knight in shining armor or this savior that comes in, swoops in, and makes everything right again. And then the other piece that I think is really important is clients get to choose if and how their stories are told. So again, if and how their stories are told. And so an example of that that I have is almost a decade ago, the organization I was with, we were having our annual fundraising dinner. And in the dinner, there usually was this opportunity where a student awardee who shared their story up front, you know, on a podium with the mic would then get to move around and talk with the donors, right? And so this all seems like great practice at the time. We worked with students on speeches, but I never got affirmative consent from the students or gave them a space to answer as to whether or not they wanted to talk with donors. This was just kind of one of the expectations of receiving this award. And so I went to go introduce a student to one of our donors, who's this really savvy entrepreneur, a well-known entrepreneur. And I said to the student, could you share with the donor, you know, kind of a little bit about what life was like growing up and then how our program really helped. And the donor held their hand up, like literally held her hand up, which of course sends like kind of worry and anxiety, like right straight through my body. And she held her hand up and she said, don't tell me where you've been. Tell me where you're going and how this will help you along your way. And I thought, wow, how powerful. And it was in that moment that I realized I was in a way making a commodity out of this student's challenges earlier in the student's life. I was using it in what I thought was a good thing, which was to show this donor the impact of her support and the need that so many students have. But I was unintentionally kind of objectifying and then shifting the focus on what would be actually a more productive conversation, which what's the student's dream, vision, and then how are they equipped? How are we helping equip them along the way and partnering with them in this work? So I think in terms of a framework for your own practice, here's some questions you might think through or ask of yourself. So what do your communications convey about your constituents, about the people who benefit? Is that something that if they read it themselves, do you think they'd be proud of it? And would they have any feedback or change? That's one piece. Is there a place in your communications where you see deficit-based language? And we're going to talk in a bit about asset-based practice, but deficit-based being like any kind of, again, challenges or trauma. So where in your communications do you see that? And then how do you obtain consent from clients to share their stories? So in that case, for instance, where I was talking about the student, one thing that I might share is while these expectations were clear to students, that is not consent, but also there are power differentials, right? So I'm leading this organization that provides support to this student. So how likely would the student have been at that point in time to feel comfortable saying, no, I don't want my story shared, or no, I don't want it shared this way, or this is how I want it shared? Likely they would have not felt so comfortable. So those are some places to kind of ground you in your thinking around ethical storytelling. So, okay, so I mentioned asset-based. So what is asset-based? So asset-based practice is essentially the idea that all of us, and this is going to seem pretty intuitive, but as we've just talked about, it's easy to get away from. But the idea that everyone has their own sets of skills, solutions, knowledge, things, and resources that they bring to the table. And we need to get out of the practice of defining communities, groups of people by deficits or traumas or things that have happened to them. And so this is where that idea of how are we partnering with folks comes into play, because if we truly adopt an asset-based practice, we see people as equally resourced in the work as we are. So philanthropists and other groups or communities, they partner together through that philanthropic process to affect the change that they want to see in the world. So again, earlier in this section, we had talked about the quote from Darren Walker, and that's coming out of that Stanford Social Innovation Review article I mentioned. So I just want to kind of call your attention that at the foot of this screen appears the information, the citation for that article, if you want to go ahead and read it and kind of take a deeper look at it. So if we're thinking about asset-based practice, what are some questions or what's a framework where we consider that in our work? So when donors speak about their philanthropic goals, one thing you could do is listen out. Are they using asset or deficit-based language in their description of what they want their philanthropy to accomplish? And is there an opportunity for us to help model to donors and in conversations with donors, for instance, different ways of thinking about or talking about the groups that they want to partner with? So that's one piece. The other place is how are you defining and describing the communities you serve? Do you have a good sense of what assets those communities have and are utilizing, right? With or without you, I can promise you that individuals, communities, groups of people are doing amazing things with the assets that they have. So are you aware of them and are you bearing correct kind of witness to that and sharing that story? Or are you leaning more on deficit-based language or kind of storytelling? Because maybe that's what we've done for so long, right? Like so long kind of in storytelling, in fundraising has been a little bit more deficit-based language or storytelling involved. So those are some pieces that you can ask yourself and work. So we've talked a little bit about anti-oppressive practice. We've talked about ethical storytelling. We just talked about asset-based practice. So those three things really fall under the idea of how are we engaging one-to-one with the community served by philanthropy. Now we're going to shift gears and look a little bit more broadly at systems and larger scale pieces of the work that we do. So to kind of ground us, I was reading a piece talking about William Russell Easterly, right? And he is an economist and a professor out of New York University. And one of the things he looks at is how aid from the West has had sometimes been ineffective or had unintended consequences throughout the rest of the world. So that idea that you can be trying to help, but actually not help or do unfortunately do harm in that process. And so he talks about in a recent book, the difference between planners and searchers. And so for our conversation, kind of what you need to know is his idea of a searcher is somebody who goes to an issue without having a sense of the answers in hand and looking to the people who are experiencing the issue to help kind of grassroots, kind of from the ground up, understand the issue and come up with the solutions and that philanthropists can help kind of drive or fund the solutions that the community came up with. So Easterly here is talking about the idea that poverty, for instance, is this really complicated tangle of political, social, historical, institutional and technological factors. So here, the reason why I like that is it really does show that the idea that something as complex as poverty could be solved from kind of a top down solution that's removed from the people experiencing it just not only doesn't make sense, but then the data would bear out that the solutions are not actually effective. So, to get us started there. I want to introduce you to systems theory. So systems theory, at, at its most basic level is the idea that, you know, systems complex kind of organisms or things have all of these different pieces that interact and influence with one another. And so the idea that you could make a change here and that it not be influenced by these other pieces or that those other pieces don't influence this piece, but that's not accurate that actually these pieces are all working in concert with each other affecting and being influenced by each other. And so for our purposes, the pieces that I want to pull out from systems theory is that when you think about things holistically and you look at all of the systems at play, you'll find and you'll be able to recognize the interacting processes that influence each other. And because of that, there will be greater nuance in how you see issues, but also you'll be able to look at multiple root causes. And then that will mean that any solutions you come up with will address the different parts of the system and then be more effective because of it. And so I have a graphic organizer because we feel like that could be a lot to take in. So I just wanted to pull this up and show you. So in this image, you see kind of the circles within each other. And so you see what we first think of as micro-level, right? So this is individuals and families. Then you see the mezzo-level, which are communities, organizations, right? So they affect individuals and then individuals and families can affect them. And then you see this larger level around macro-level practice, which is things like social policy and systemic change. And so what you would know then is that the work happening, again, from individuals and families, that's going to affect their communities, which then affects the policies and change that we have in place. But also that the policies that we have in our country or any country then affect communities and organizations, which then affect individuals and families. And so I think about this in my conversations with donors, how do I help them see this and to understand how all of these factors come together? So let's talk through what are some questions we might ask ourselves in practice. So as I just mentioned, what if part of the conversation with donors was not just whom they were helping, but what systems of oppression were they able to challenge and how were they able to affect change in their philanthropy? That would not only add a dimension of what their philanthropy was making possible, but again, if we think about keeping things out of deficit-based language and also out of, you know, from only kind of looking at things in a really narrow lens, it would help donors see the larger factors at play for the people with whom they wanted to partner. What assumptions are being made in your funding priorities, right? So when you think about the work that you're seeking funding for and the work you're engaging with donors in, is there an assumption about the problem that's there? And do we know if that assumption has been tested? Do we know if the proposed change or intervention will actually be effective? And I think these are really important conversations to have, whether it's with academic partners or other partners to make sure that we know that because it would not only be in terms of donor stewardship, a loss to have in a philanthropic investment and it not yield the change that we wanna see, but it would also be even more so harmful to kind of unleash an ineffective solution onto people whom we're trying to partner with to address an issue. And the other thing to think about is in our field of professional fundraising, in the world of conversation about philanthropy, is there a favor of one kind of system level over another? And so I would say that at least in my own practice, I see more conversation from donors about individuals. So if you think about those concentric circles, we see favor to kind of individuals and families, and I see maybe less conversation about activism or other advocacy and community organizing work that needs to happen at that macro level. And so is part of that, that donors are more interested in micro level work, or is it that we as frontline fundraisers need to have a broader conversation with donors about how different places where they can invest in order to affect change on an issue. So those are good places and conversations to have. So that takes us to empowerment theory. So empowerment theory, so far we've been talking about how, again, not objects of charity, drivers of change. So how can we work to ensure that people are not seen as objects of charity, but are seen as drivers of their own change, of the change that they wanna see in their communities and related systems? And one way is to empower them. So what does that mean? And why is that important? So one piece of why it's important is the greater sense of control you can instill in somebody is then that idea of social justice, right? Giving them full access or ensuring that people have full access to all of the opportunities and resources that others have. And so agency, self-control, effectiveness, that is a really important piece. Can I actually do the things I want to do in the world? Can I actually affect the change that I wanna see in my life and around me? So that's one piece. The other piece that happens is when there is oppression, it creates a sense of helplessness, of hopelessness, and it allows the oppression to continue. So the more we can empower people and we can partner with them to address and challenge oppression, the better chance we have at actually eradicating that oppression. And then the other pieces we've been talking along is really about then actually challenging the systems that thwart people, that hinder them, right? So it's one thing to be aware of it and its impact, but then we need to take that extra step of actually challenging the systems and being aware of it. So what would that look like in conversation about practice? So here are some questions that you could ask yourself, to look at how you could empower the different groups that you're looking to serve and work with. So one thing to think about is how is power exerted in the life cycle of a gift? Again, back to that original call of why this session, who has the power? How did they get it? How are they using it? What do they want to accomplish with it? And so for frontline fundraisers, I think you could reflect for a moment, maybe about a particularly challenging gift or situation, and you can see where there are likely power differentials and struggles along that line. So one place to look at is how is power exerted in that life cycle? The other piece is whose voices are at the table when deciding on solutions to issues? I know I've certainly been at conversations or tables where it's me and maybe a donor, and they'll have a pretty formulated concept of what they want to do. And then it's my job, I have the opportunity to pull in our academic partners, to pull in our community members, to ensure that those voices are present at the table. And another piece to look at in terms of empowerment is when we celebrate philanthropy, when there are communications pieces, maybe celebratory events, is that done in a way that excludes or hinders other donors? And so when I think about philanthropy, I think about it more broadly than I think other folks might, not all folks, but definitely in terms of like the common person, when they think of the term philanthropist, what do they conjure up in their mind? So I think about philanthropy is certainly, we've always talked about time, talent, and treasure, but also testimony, right? So the ability of someone who's gone through something, who's kind of found their way on the other side of an issue to share that and to give testimony, maybe in front of others experiencing the issue, in front of lawmakers, a whole host of ways. And so sometimes we tend to celebrate philanthropists as only those giving money and those giving large amounts of money. And so could we empower other donors and other philanthropists if we had a broader view and kind of broader celebration and recognition of philanthropy? So those are one kind of piece to think as you're going along in your work and wanting to empower people. So to tie these pieces together, I wanna share with you a story. And so it's been out kind of in the news and kind of common conversations, you may be aware of it, but it's the issue around the Gates Foundation and their work to address malaria. So they did this really, one of the kind of prongs of their intervention was to give out these mosquito nets, right? And the nets have saved millions of lives, prevented billions of cases of malaria. So by all kind of intents and purposes would have been deemed successful, right? At the same time though, one of the unintended consequences of these nets was that they actually make really, what is a really effective net at blocking mosquitoes is also a really effective net at catching fish. So one of the things that they found is that communities that were in crisis for food were using the nets to fish. And one of the challenges with that is kind of a couple of things, which is one, these nets were chemically treated in order to kill mosquitoes. So now these chemicals are getting into water supplies. So making polluting drinking water. The other thing is that because these nets were given out for free and pretty expansively, there were also a lot more people who now had a net that they could fish with. And so there became kind of an over fishing of local regions fishing supplies. So like different bodies of water now didn't have the amount of fish that they needed. The nets also don't allow younger fish to pass through. So there was not kind of like a replenishing of the stock. And at some point in time, local government had to get involved because of the impact of the nets. And some people were actually jailed for using the nets to fish with. So I mentioned this because I think that this is one of the places where philanthropy has the power and the opportunity to affect social change and to advance social justice. But we also have to be thoughtful and careful because there can be unintended consequences. And so this is a good example of something that again, has saved millions of lives and did this really important thing. And at the same time had these unintended consequences that now communities are looking to deal with. So if you rewind earlier in our conversation about that idea of approximate leader, could some of this have been prevented or anticipated if more conversation had been done with the people who were to receive the nets about what they might actually do with them or what would be more helpful in solving the problem. They might have learned for instance, that the shortage of food trumped the risk of getting malaria for people in the region. So I share this just as kind of like, again, a current example of some of the pieces that we're talking through. So the last theory that I wanna walk you through is critical race theory and what parallels we can draw to frontline fundraising. So critical race theory is just about, you kind of trace back its origins, is about 50 years old and it really came out of the work of civil activists, civil rights activists and scholars in the 70s who were trying to understand how the gains of the civil rights era gains, how they had been thwarted and what was going on. And at first it starts in looking at the legal system and then all kinds of people like Kimberly Crenshaw, people who've been since its beginning up until current day have been evolving the theory. And so kind of the key pieces of critical race theory that we'll talk about for our purposes is the idea that racism exists in systems and policies. It's not just what individuals do think or believe. And also that the emphasis is on outcomes, not individual beliefs or intentions, right? So just because maybe it's not the specific intention or purpose of a system to be racist, doesn't mean that there aren't actual outcomes that perpetuate racism. So I've left you some resources below around a kind of a definition of critical race theory and some understanding of the current conversation. But also I really liked this piece that the Stanford Social Innovation Review did around looking at the racial bias and philanthropic funding. So I'll talk a little bit more about that now as we look through what are some questions we could ask ourselves in practice. So for applying critical race theory to frontline fundraising, here are a couple of things you could look at. So how are donors at your institution or your organization treated differently based on race? And it could be that it's unintentional, right? So it could be that there isn't a desire to treat donors differently based on race, but functionally that's happening. So that would be one piece. The other piece is what policies or kind of processes do you have in place that are concentrating resources in a way that they are not equitably distributed? And again, I really wanna kind of emphasize the distinction between intentional and unintentional, right? So it could very well be that there is inequity and there's likely inequity in how the resources are distributed. And it doesn't mean that that was the intention. And at the same time, just because it wasn't the intention doesn't mean that it's not the actual outcome. And so that's really important is to look at the outcome. How are policies actually having the impact, the outcome that resources aren't distributed equitably, but also who has access to funding? So in that SSIR article that I just mentioned, one of the things that they were looking at is how significantly underfunded organizations are if they have leaders who are people of color. And then the other piece that they were looking at is the disproportionate number of foundation leaders who are predominantly white, predominantly white male. And what does that mean? So how is that disconnect where we're seeing underfunding of organizations with leaders of color by foundations with leaders who are predominantly white? And that brings up the idea of implicit bias. So certainly there could be intentionally doing that. But then if you think about implicit bias, how are these funding decisions made? Who's at the table? Where are the conversations having? So that it's not intentional, but again, the outcome is that it's not equitable and there's racism happening out and who actually accesses funding. So I think that's really important for us as we think about our own work and social and advancing social justice is to understand the systems and infrastructure that we do our work within and how that could have unintended consequences that we need to pay attention to and help challenge. So we've talked about ways to advance social justice in the people we partner with and serve. We've talked about ways to advance social justice and how we think about philanthropy's impact on systems, but now like what else could we do about it and how do we operationalize this? So we've talked to some questions for practice, but I wanna share with you now, Bryan Stevenson's steps for changing the world and how we might think about those steps in our own work. So Bryan Stevenson outlines these four pieces to being able to affect change, to change the world, to advance any progress on any social issue. And the first piece he talks about is being proximate, which means you have to be near and do your best to understand and to have empathy for the people with whom you're trying to partner and work to affect the change, the people that you want to help. And so, as we were talking before about the Darren Falker quote, that idea that if you're not close to the people who you want to help, you can't possibly understand what's needed, then their voices aren't represented in the process or the solution and the work will ultimately very likely be ineffective because of that. So that's the first thing is be proximate. The other thing is to change the narrative. And so to think about how are stories told? How are the issues presented? And what are maybe some outdated or archaic ways of thinking that we've been passing along? And is there an opportunity to update the narrative to make it more accurate to what the situation is on the ground? The other piece in this, I think can sound simple, but there's something very complex sometimes in things that seem simple. But he talks about the importance of being hopeful. And one of the things that I like most about what Bryan Stevenson said about being hopeful is it's hope that gets the person to stand up in the face of somebody who's just told them to sit down. It's hope that gets us to work really hard and push against systems and decades, centuries long atrocities and wrongs because we have hope for change and hope for progress and hope for a better tomorrow. So being hopeful. And then he talks about being uncomfortable. And one of my favorite things about social work, and as I shared, I'm about to pursue my third degree in social work. So clearly I've bought in. But one of the things that I love most about social work is it teaches you how to be comfortable being uncomfortable, right? Like you can't work with people, you can't advance social justice if you can't deal with discomfort. And so sitting in the mess and the muck and being comfortable and being comfortable with uncertainty and figuring pathways forward, that's very much ingrained in social justice work. And so he talks about that idea because if you look at any great change, any great civil rights achievement, any great advancement in human rights, it was never comfortable to do it, right? Because systems seek stasis and change is very difficult. And especially when you're talking about power differential. And so when you're talking about how do you help get power to the masses, there's discomfort there. And so we have to be comfortable being uncomfortable. So how I would think about Bryan Stevenson's steps into being our steps would look a little bit like this. So being proximate, know your constituents, know how they conceptualize the problems, change the narrative. So engage in that ethical storytelling, to see how they're thinking about systems level issues, how they're thinking about asset-based work. Being hopeful and I think to be hopeful and to stand up and to challenge things means that you have to recognize your own power and to be comfortable in that power. So understanding where we as frontline fundraisers not only have a role, but also where we have agency, where we can exert our power. And then being uncomfortable and really challenging assumptions, whether they're the assumptions of colleagues, of donors, of academic or other institutional organizational partners, how do we challenge the assumptions that are being made to create space and to kind of usher in project and change? Those are some next steps that we can take. And so with that, that is the content that I'm glad to have shared with you. And I just kind of wanna leave you with this reflection that we as frontline fundraisers have this really wonderful and unique opportunity to advance social justice because we can help facilitate the relationships between donors and the people whom they want to partner with, whom they want to help and help donors and these partners conceptualize and think about how philanthropy can help resource the change that they wanna see on the most pressing issues in our world. And so I can think of nothing more amazing or more important to do with our time as frontline fundraisers and to help facilitate those conversations. And it's why to me, I feel very fulfilled as a frontline fundraiser because it takes very much my love for social work and my love for philanthropy and brings them together. So I thank you for sharing this time with me and I hope, and please feel free to reach out to have continued conversations and to share resources and to ensure that all of us have what we need to advance social justice in our frontline fundraising work. Thank you. Thank you so much, Erin. This concludes the webinar. Today's program is copyright 2021 by the Council for Advancement and Supportive Education with all rights reserved. For additional CASE OnDemand webinars, please visit www.case.org slash OnDemand.

Social Justice

Frontline Fundraising

Erin Capone

Rutgers School of Social Work

Ethical Storytelling

Empowerment Theory

Critical Race Theory

Systemic Change