Strengthen Resident Leadership & Learning: Systems Approach 

This opportunity is open to agencies that are working towards strengthening resident leadership and learning, and meet one or more of the following descriptions:  

• Grassroots agencies, those agencies that use the power and lived experience of the people in the community as the change agents; includes attributes of base building, has a clear identity, integrity, legacy or work and relationships. 
• Agencies that amplify the voice of residents through storytelling. Storytelling can be written, audio/visual, etc. 
• Networks and coalitions, defined as alliance or partnering of groups to achieve a common purpose. Groups have similar values, interests, and goals and allows the members to combine their resources and be more powerful than if they acted alone. 

Community Organizing & Civic Engagement: Capacity Building Approach

This opportunity is open to agencies that :

• have youth leaders (ages 18-24), are cultivating youth leaders, or are a trusted partner of youth residents.  
• serve or target parents/caregivers or cultivating them, with the goal of creating resident leaders, parent/caregiver advocates, etc. 

Agencies should be located and/or working on a project within the geographic priority of Clayton County, mainly Forest Park ZIP Codes.  

Within the Brighter Future Investment Priority area, Community Capacity Building is a vital lever of a long-term place-based strategy implementation. Place-based initiatives can use a wide range of activities to build capacities in individuals, organizations and communities considered necessary for successful population-level change. Community Capacity Building efforts may consist of providing training, using influence to help develop connections between organizations, creating peer learning opportunities, hosting convenings, organizing to expand resident leadership capabilities, and enabling access to technical assistance. Our goal is for community capacity building interventions to have immediate impact on the success of the initiative as well as contribute to longer-term and sustainable changes in the community systems. (Adapted from Grantmakers for Effective Organizations) 

For both funding opportunities listed above, agencies must use funds for at least one of the guidelines below.  

• Planning – Funding to help collaborative come together and create a steering committee, common agenda, and working groups 
• Infrastructure Backbone – Funding to support backbone organizations and/or functions  
• Implementation – Funding to support system change strategies developed by working groups (e.g., policy/advocacy, spreading innovation and best practices across participating organizations, cross-organizational learning)  
• Continuous Improvement – Funding to help collaboratives conduct evaluation