2007 – 2008 Grantmaking
FCYO's grantmaking has shifted from a general grantmaking pool to a strategic initiative-based model in order to target, maximize and leverage resources for youth organizing. Our main Grantmaking Program is called ReGenerations. Each of the initiatives under the ReGenerations umbrella focuses on the role that youth leadership and organizing plays in building and sustaining strong social justice movements. This shift allows us to garner resources and learning that will deepen and expand the impact of our grantmaking. Our first initiative under the ReGenerations umbrella is ReGenerations: Leadership Expansion for Environmental Justice (ReGen: EJ).

In addition to providing the second half of the two-year grants in our ReGenerations grantmaking, FCYO has renewed several grants for emerging youth organizing groups nationally.  We also administered the final grants in the New York City Opportunities Fund dedicated to providing small grants to address typically unmet technical assistance needs and/or collaboration projects defined by youth organizing groups in New York City.

ReGen:EJ Grants
Emerging Youth Organizing Groups - Renewals
NYC Opportunities Fund

ReGenerations:
Leadership Expansion for Environmental Justice (ReGen: EJ)
Launched in 2006, ReGen EJ is a multi-year initiative that supports environmental justice organizations’ increased effectiveness in youth leadership development; provides opportunities for strategy and model sharing between organizations; and documents effective models of multi-generational community organizing that contributes to the sustainability of effective leadership in the environmental justice movement.

2007 ReGen: EJ Grants - Second Year

TOTAL: $433,000

Black Mesa Water Coalition (BMWC) - Flagstaff, AZ
To support BMWC's work with Navajo and Hopi reservations around issues of environmental justice and climate justice. This grant also suppors BMWC’s annual youth summit which has three major goals: 1) to provide a space for rejuvenation and motivation of young people, 2) to provide skills for organizing and simply living in a more sustainable world, and 3) to support the development of young leaders.
$60,000 (additional $5,000 from Opportunities Fund)

Community Water Center - Vasalia, CA
To support the fulfillment of the following organizational goals for Community Water Center: to build the capacity of residents of disadvantaged communities in California’s San Joaquin Valley; to engage in water policy decision-making; and to act as a catalyst for community-driven solutions to immediate and long-term water challenges for disadvantaged communities in California’s San Joaquin Valley.
$30,000

Detroiters Working for Environmental Justice (DWEJ) - Detroit, MI
To support DWEJ to institutionalize environmental justice youth development in Detroit through building leadership capacity, advocacy, education and diversity by strengthening Youth on Patrol Against Pollution (YoPAP). DWEJ will focus on peer training, problem solving, intergenerational leadership mentoring, civic engagement, and community organizing through the development of YoPAP chapters in churches, elementary- high schools, neighborhood block clubs and civic organizations.
$60,000 (additional $5,000 from Opportunities Fund)

Little Village Environmental Justice Organizations (LVEJO) - Chicago, IL
To sustain and expand LVEJO’s youth Leadership Campaigns for Clean Air, Clean Land, Transit Justice, El Cilantro Newspaper, Immigrant Rights, Anti-Militarization of Our Youth and Our History Project.
$60,000 (additional $3,320 from Opportunities Fund)

Native Movement - Flagstaff, AZ
To support the sustainability of 12 projects within the collective which are organized into three areas: Bioregional Lifeways Network which will conduct three Youth in Sustainability Leadership Programs; the Youth Movement which will develop large scale public art projects that relate to indigenous land struggles, environmental justice, sacred sites and community sustainability; and Free Alaska which will produce educational and presentation materials to provoke dialogue and support solutions that are based in conservation, renewable energy, and sustainability.
$60,000 (additional $5,000 from Opportunities Fund)

Nollie's Citizens for Quality Education (CQE) - Lexington, MS
To support the Environment Education & the Arts program to promote the building and sustaining of healthy schools and residential communities. CQE seeks to identify and hold local governance bodies accountable for cleaning up illegal dumpsites and establishing legal places for the citizens in Holmes County rural communities’ to dispose of trash and white goods.
$60,000

Southwest Organizing Project (SWOP) - Albuquerque, NM
To support SWOP’s youth organizing component to develop young leaders and members by outreaching to high school and college students on civic participation, the summer internship program, and recruiting participants for curriculum workshops; and to conduct environmental justice tours.
$60,000

Southwest Workers Union (SWU) - San Antonio, TX
To support and foster new youth leadership to expand and sustain SWU and its youth component through the development of an art and culture program and a youth-led campaign for Energy and Climate Justice in Texas and the bi-national Gulf Coast region. SWU is building strategic linkages with organizations in the South following their Gulf Coast Justice & Solidarity Tour post-Katrina and Rita to overcome geographic, racial and political barriers between the south and southwest.
$60,000 (additional $5,000 from Opportunities Fund)

UPROSE - Brooklyn, NY
To support organizers' work to heighten community awareness, increase involvement, develop environmental remediation strategies and participatory community planning practices, and promote sustainable development, governmental accountability and environmental justice. The re-development of the Sunset Park waterfront, brownfield remediation, implementation of the community greenway design and alternative energy are the focal points of UPROSE’s work.
$60,000

Vietnamese American Young Leaders Association of New Orleans (VAYLA-NO) -
New Orleans, LA
To hire VAYLA-NO staff organizers who will continue to expand and develop membership and coordinate the process for refining their structure and organizing model. VAYLA-NO has been leading organizing efforts to stop the toxic dumping of Hurricane Katrina construction debris in a landfill located less than a mile away from heart of Versailles, historically an African American and Vietnamese American community.
$30,000

Youth United for Community Action - East Palo Alto, CA
To support Higher Learning East Palo Alto (HL EPA), a program which provides East Palo Alto high school aged youth with a space and vehicle to create positive community change and develop productive life skills through community organizing. HL EPA youth are organizing around two campaigns: the Environmental Justice Accountability Campaign and the Anti-Gentrification Campaign.
$60,000 (additional $5,000 from Opportunities Fund)

EMERGING YOUTH ORGANIZING GROUPS - RENEWALS

TOTAL: $100,000

2007 Grants Awarded:

Baltimore Algebra Project (BAP) - Baltimore, MD
To expand BAP’s successful model of paid tutoring as an organizing platform for student advocacy and activism; to create crucial after school jobs; and to help students become more engaged in learning. BAP organizes for better schools, increased educational funding, and increased equity for all students.
$10,000

Community IMPACT! (CI!) - Nashville, TN
To support Oasis CI! To continue its community-based economics work and increase the scope of its financial education work through organizing for curricular changes to make economics classes more relevant to low-income students. Oasis CI! Works in partnership with other organizations to improve economic education for all youth and to use art/video/film as a strategy to support their organizing efforts, in particular around higher education issues.
$10,000

Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM) - Jackson Heights, NY
To support DRUM to develop the organizing capacity of low-income South Asian and Muslim immigrant youth to address immigrant and education issues.
$10,000

Idaho Community Action Network (ICAN) - Boise, ID
To support the development of youth leadership teams across the state and coordinating youth/community in support of immigrant and health care justice campaigns.
$10,000

Padres Unidos/ Jovenes Unidos - Denver, CO
To support Jovenes Unidos to end the racial disparities and harsh and punitive disciplinary codes of Denver Public Schools by creating alternative disciplinary programs, radically lowering issuance of police tickets, and building supportive school cultures; to provide academic support and guidance to youth leaders.
$10,000

Providence Youth Student Movement (PrYSM) - Providence, RI
To support PrYSM’s research and analysis; campaign development; base-building and overall program and operational capacity. .
$10,000

Sistas on the Rise - New York, NY
To support Sistas on the Rise to increase the number of teen mothers in NYC that receive a high school diploma, GED or non-traditional work training; to increase teen mother’s participation in organizing/social justice work; and to bring their perspectives to tables where their voices aren’t heard. Young women advocate within the schools to increase opportunities, stop school closings that provide spaces for young mothers, and work to build community awareness around this issue.
$10,000

Urban Underground - Milwaukee, WI
To support the Youth Empowerment Project, comprised of over 60 high school students from around the city of Milwaukee. The program offers political education and academic support to the youth members.
$10,000

Youth Education Alliance (YEA) - Washington, DC
To support youth-driven organizing campaigns that improve the quality of public education in the District of Columbia – to increase funding, programming, and support for students within the schools. They are looking to build a base of adult allies to strengthen and support their organizing efforts.
$10,000

Youth Justice Coalition (YJC) - Los Angeles, CA
To support YJC’s work in building a youth-led movement to challenge race, gender and class inequality in the Los Angeles County juvenile justice system through coalition- building, direct action organizing, advocacy and activist arts to mobilize youth and their allies. Core issue work involves YJC’s co-sponsorship of a state-level bill to end life sentences without parole for youth in California as well as seeking formal recognition by the county board of supervisors for the YJC juvenile justice task force
$10,000

NEW YORK CITY OPPORTUNITIES FUND GRANTMAKING
(Includes all grants disbursed in 2007.)

AWAAM: Arab women Active in the Arts and Media

To support a board, staff, and youth retreat to assess the organization’s programs, organizing plans, and a shift toward more intentional youth leadership.

$2000

 

Brotherhood Sistersol

To send youth to the Education for Liberation/Free Minds, Free People Conference in Chicago, and to support the youth to participate in organizing the conference.

$2000

 

Critical Resistance

To cover the costs of sending youth leaders and staff to the United States Social Forum in Atlanta in collaboration with Justice Works Fighters 4 Justice.

$2500

 

Girls for Gender Equity

To train staff in participatory action research skills to look at the gender-based oppression that is embedded in the school system and create strategies for community residents to monitor the New York City public schools in moving toward compliance with existing legislation.

$2700

 

Make the Road by Walking

To send youth and adults from Youth Power, the organization’s youth program, to attend the Education for Liberation/Free Minds, Free People Conference in Chicago, to learn models of integrating political education trainings and workshops into their organizing work on a more consistent basis.

$2700

 

Malcolm X Grassroots Movement

To engage in a strategic planning retreat for a collaborative project with Girls for Gender Equity, focusing on an Anti-Street Harassment Campaign with low-income, young women of color.

$2550

 

Movement for El Barrio

To send youth and staff to the United States Social Forum in Atlanta, in order to lead a session on their local organizing against gentrification and for immigrant rights.

$2000

 

Sistas on the Rise

To cover food and travel costs to send youth from the following groups to the United States Social Forum: Sistas on the Rise, Sista II Sista, Center for Immigrant Families, Haitian Women for Haitian Refugees, Incite Women of Color Against Violence NYC, Dominican Women's Development Center, Damayan Migrant Workers Association, Brotherhood/Sister Sol, May First Collective, and Ladies on the Mic.

$5,000

 

Youth Ministries for Peace and Justice

To send Youth Organizers-in-Training to attend the Education for Liberation/Free Minds, Free People Conference in Chicago, to share their South Bronx youth organizing campaigns.

$3,700