Hello everyone welcome to Foundation Center Facebook Live. My name is Julieta Mendez I'm
Director of Programs here at Foundation Center and today I am joined by my colleague
Dorian Burton chief program officer of Kenan Charitable Trust. And Dorian is here to talk with us about the upcoming
webinar that we're going to be hosting on Thursday September 13, 2018 at 2:00 PM eastern
time.
Called Reframing the Story: Investment in Black Men And Boys is Vital to Whole Community Health
Dorian welcome we're very excited to have you with us! How are you
today? I'm doing well thank you for having me.
Wonderful well I just briefly want to mention that this webinar Reframing the story investment
in black men and boys is vital to whole community health is part of Foundation Center's All Together
Now conversations in DEI which is a webinar series being sponsored by Borealis
And it's a series of monthly conversations on DEI related topics that are designed to explore
the nuances of the social sector from the perspective of leaders and professionals from historically
marginalized communities. So Dorian can you please tell us a
little bit about what you're going to be sharing with us on September 13 and who should
be tuning in for this webinar? Well firstly I'd like to thank you guys for having us. We're going
to be extremely excited to have an opportunity to talk to you guys. I think as we start to frame this
conversation you have to really think that philanthropy has one of the greatest opportunities to really
build communities in equitable ways.
Not only opportunity, but an obligation to do so. I think philanthropy
It's not necessarily reaching its full potential right now as we think about being able to
take risks and be able to push and be innovative but also as we think around systems-level change
you know having been in this space for a while now one of the things that
you see is that philanthropy rewards individuals that can tell the worst stories the best about our communities.
And so we really have to be very thoughtful about how we frame the stories, how we build
a narrative, but what who and how we think about our investments particularly in black men and
boys and I want to be really intentional about using black men and boys specifically. I think
folks pull in a variety of different languages where we avoid actually having this conversation
about race and the history behind it but not only the history but the present.
So we're gonna talk around investing into communities of color, specifically around black men and boys.
To think about how when black males thrive our communities thrive as a whole.
If you are a individual or represent an organization that is investing in communities of color, I think this
conversation is for you. If you really are focused on the concept of justice as opposed
to charity and righting historical wrongs, I think that this conversation's for you. And as you think
about your own personal growth in this work, as we all do, I think this conversation will challenge
you in the best of ways and push you to your learning edge around this work.
Wonderful I'm doing tell us a little bit about your journey what inspired you to become involved
in this work? Absolutely so I grew up in New York to California and the great communities
that we're talking about.
This is a story that is deeply personal to me as a black man as somebody who's grown up in
underappreciated communities that systems have very intentionally not served well.
And thinking about the opportunities that have been created for folks that chose to
make investments in me, chose to warm me, and chose to really believe in the potential black
communities.
What you often hear is a narrative that will promote that we're broken, that individuals are
broken. And to be really clear, I think we have to be able to talk about we have broken
systems, not broken people.
And if you don't push on that narrative and really examine it and bring it to work
with you every day then you can run the risk of thinking that a community is inherently deficient.
Which we know that that's not true. As a person, you know I'm a father as well
I have two small black boys. I want to make sure that we're creating that future
in a space where they can thrive. I have black boys right now that will grow to be black men, God willing
But when we have to have that worry that thought around, you know. Are they going to make it home music
too loud or for going to get a bag of skittles or an iced tea? Or if they're just stopped
an appropriate situation what is that look like for them?
And so this is a conversation, again is deeply personal, but actually I think it's
the soul of our nation and are who I think as a country we're striving to be. I think
you often hear a lot that's not who we are as Americans.
Well I think that's who we are as Americans, right now. It might not be who we strive to
be, but in order to get there I think it's gonna require all of us to do some heavy lifting
and some deep reflection about do we actually have the will to do it.
Yeah.
It is one thing that our audience will walk away with after attending the webinar with
you and your colleagues?I think you'll to walk away with a deep understanding about why this work is
important. As you think about whole community health and paid in full investments and what we mean by
that, is really thinking about not
any one silver bullet solution to this work.
In philanthropy, we often talk about making big bets. Saying we're gonna do this one
thing it's gonna be this kind of
silver bullets. You know you do this, and a miracle happens.
We know that those investments although they might have some success, we need to think about
the communities as whole. The problems the challenges that face our communities don't happen in isolation
that's so simple solutions can't either. So the same bets that we're making for our families
around economic development, around workforce, around our health, around our housing, around our justice
system, are the same bets we should be making about communities of color.
And so I think they'll walk away with an understanding on what that actually looks like. I think they'll walk away
with some tangible tools to take back to the organization. That they go about their work, in terms
of building assets framing, understanding what it look like to really build from the community
on. And also being really thoughtful around saying no in this work and my creating
a table and mapping reform onto a community or am I finding the table that was already
created.
And walking into communities,
with the assumption that there's already assets there.
And changing my language and making sure I'm not further perpetuating.
So we want to be really clear about how we are addressing this work. And how we're uplifting
a truer narrative around who our
black communities are, but also specifically, who our black leaders are.
Yes and I should add Dorian, that you are going to be joined by a few other colleagues including
Dr. Brian Barnes who is the co-founder and CEO of TandemED, Shawn Dove who is the CEO of the Campaign
for Black Male Achievement, Trabian Shorters who is the founding CEO,
of the BMe Community and Anthony Smith
who is the CEO of Cities United. So we're looking forward to having all of you here with us on that day.
My final question and this is more of a fun light question because we like to get to know our presenters
as people not just as much as talking heads. What is your favorite dessert?
So listen, you guys bring me some chocolate chip cookies, I'll be your friend forever.
But like the Pillsbury one that you can get a lot out of, works for me. I'm a cookie guy.
Again thank you so much for having us! I'm looking forward to folks being able to join us. You know it's
gonna be a great group having a great conversation.
You're gonna be hearing from practitioners the field. These are folks that live just work every day, they take it home
with them.
And are really, if you see how these guys work it is a it is a sight to see. But
you know that they're working with that passion and with the idea that they are really gonna have an impact
in our communities and in our world.
Wonderful thank you so much Dorian! And we'll continue to be in touch have a great
day.
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